BCP Problem: Newbie; Need Help With Getting It To Work

Hello folks,



This is my first time here. I defined my first database (DB-Name) in SQL Server 2005 Express (installed on my home computer) with about six tables in it. Now I am trying to load the main table (TBL-Name) using the BCP utility. The input file is CSV (non MS-DOS) file (F:SQLServerInfile.csv) created from an Excel spreadsheet. The SQL Server instance is up and running, and I can access it using the Management Studio.



At the Command Prompt I enter:


bcp DB-Name..TBL-Name in F:SQLServerInfile.csv -t "," -F 2 -T -c

The -F parameter is set to two because the first line of input data is colomn headings. I have tried it:


with and without the -t parameter

with single quotes around the comma and without any quotes around it

with and without between the -t and the comma

with and without the -c parameter
All I ever get is:


An error occurred while processing the command line.



which is no help at all.

I also manually entered a couple of test records into the main table and tried:


bcp DB-Name..TBL-Name out F:SQLServerOutfile.txt -T -c

and get the same error.

I know I am doing something fundamentally wrong, but I have no idea what it is and how to go about finding out what it is.

I would greatly appreciate any and all help I can get with this problem as soon as possible.

I am trying to get into SQL Server 2005, SQL/TSQL, and C#. I have a lot of database design and development experience on mainframes and some in MS Access.

This is the first time I have been stumped. But this is also the first time I have gotten a totally unhelpful error message. I feel the BCP utility needs to be enhanced to give at least some indication about what the problem is.

Thanks in advance,



Gunny