Example: Specify the CDATA directive

Applies to: SQL Server Azure SQL Database Azure SQL Managed Instance SQL database in Microsoft Fabric

If the directive is set to CDATA, the contained data isn't entity encoded, but is put in the CDATA section. The CDATA attributes must be nameless.

The following query wraps the product model summary description in a CDATA section.

USE AdventureWorks2022;
GO
SELECT  1 as Tag,
        0 as Parent,
        ProductModelID  as [ProductModel!1!ProdModelID],
        Name            as [ProductModel!1!Name],
        '<Summary>This is summary description</Summary>'
            as [ProductModel!1!!CDATA] -- no attribute name so ELEMENT assumed
FROM    Production.ProductModel
WHERE   ProductModelID = 19
FOR XML EXPLICIT;

This is the result:

<ProductModel ProdModelID="19" Name="Mountain-100">
   <![CDATA[<Summary>This is summary description</Summary>]]>
</ProductModel>

See also

• Use EXPLICIT Mode with FOR XML