I actually wanted to do that but I run into problems because both the time and description must be casted into the same datatype or the order by clause blows...

Dynamic sql really isn't a good option because of the overhead coupled with the use of this query.  The benefit is in the cached query plan and dynamic sql blows...

Well, the syntax for that doesn't check out.  Incorrect syntax near CASE.  I'm guessing that the comma is causing it.

But regardless, that would only work for Time.  If Description was...

Yeah, it is turning rows into columns but not from the same table.  There is a master data table and then two sets of other data tables joined by type-keys. ...

Thats the catch though...for the 17 (ouch) outer joins that compiling all of this data would entail, at least 13-14 of the columns would always be queried.

This is the problem...

Awesome.  Not only did I get a good answer but empirical evidence to back it! 

Thank you much!

The first solution I need to try to stay away from because the actual query is rather large and I don't want to duplicate it just for that reason.

The second...

Full failover takes ~5 minutes.

Right now I am running W2K3 with SQL 2KSP4. 

Actually I am not running WINS at all. The cluster is running in a small domain with dns.  Does adding a...

I was hoping not to have to use tracing (because of the pitfalls with profiler) but this could be a good solution.

Have you used this to just capture the query...

Can't use profiler.  This has to be done within a trigger.

Ahhhh.....yeah that's it.

Instead of trying to force the value using IN you can just the set column equal to itself.....should have known that one.

Thanks a bunch!

BIT field can be 0,1...such as:

SELECT *

FROM myTable

WHERE Deleted IN (0,1)

This works fine.  The problem I'm having is the CASE statement recognizing '0,1' as a list of bits and not...

No,

Deleted is a bit field.  The only values can be 0 1 or 0,1.  The CASE statement in this query will put strings into the conditional

Pretty slick.  I implemented this as a user defined function in my stored proc.  Working well.  thanks!