Weird SQL Server 2005 Collation difference between varchar() and nvarchar()

Question

Can someone please explain this:

SELECT 
  CASE WHEN CAST(\'iX\' AS nvarchar(20)) 
      > CAST(\'-X\' AS nvarchar(20)) THEN 1 ELSE 0 END,
  CASE WHEN CAS         


        

Answer 1

A nice question!

Digging around, I found that the issue is related to hyphens and apostrophes. Your example exhibits the same 'odd' behaviour with '''X' as with '-X'.

I can't take credit for finding the answer, because it's here: SQL Sorting and hyphens