I have used SQL Server 2000, 2005, and 2008. Currently 2008. The T-SQL language has seemed like tinker toys in all of them compared to real computer languages. Likewise the lame IDE.

You don't have to blindly defend SS just because you are an expert in it. Which I agree you are. Maybe this is an example of that establishment thing we were discussing <g>.

Mike I'm not blindly defending SS. I simply asked what you were running into. I assume anyone making a post in a technical forum is somehow looking for information. If I came up here and posted, "I'm really frustrated with product such-and-such, and that product was your field of study, you'd reasonably want to know what the person was running into.

I know I don't need to say this, but T-SQL was never intended to be compared to other languages.

You said you were running into limitations - I was curious specifically what they were. Maybe they are limitations - or maybe there "is" an answer for the limitation you're running into. I'm sure you acknowledge that asserting, "I have to perform tasks A and B and C to get result X, when I should only have to do B" is a better starting point than saying, "this is lame".