Outputing data with 'image' datatypes

SSIS and Import/Export
1

Afternoon all,

I'm trying to export about 18000 records to a CSV file. The data includes a few fields with varchar, date & number data types, it also includes an 'image' datatype which happens to be a JPEG image and an 'image' datatype which is a .PDF or .DOCX.

I'm attempting to output the data by right clicking the database > Tasks > Export & selecting 'flatfile' but I'm get an error telling me to convert the datatype.

Error 0xc0208030: Data Flow Task 1: The data type for "input column "C_Photo" (361)" is DT_IMAGE, which is not supported. Use DT_TEXT or DT_NTEXT instead and convert the data from, or to, DT_IMAGE using the data conversion component.
(SQL Server Import and Export Wizard)

How would I convert the datatype or is there a better way to export the data?

Many thanks

Dave4

2

CSVs are text files so cannot include binary data. If you want the images in a csv you will have to encode them first - Base64 would be the normal way to do this. Google etc will show you how.

3

Thank you for the pointer, all sorted now!