Information_schema.columns

[Shrek]

if I select character_maximum_length from INFORMATION_SCHEMA.COLUMNS
if returns -1 on columns that are defined as varchar(max)
is this normal???

[ck9663]

It's because varchar(max) has no defined length in character. It was added in sql2005 to accommodate those datatypes that could potentially exceed 8000 characters. Specially that sql2005 have improved it's support to XML data type. As of today, it can accommodate up to 2GB of data. That's why it's not giving you a definite character length.

-- CK