MS-SQL Bulk Insert with RODBC

Question

Is it possible to perform a bulk insert into an MS-SQL Server (2000, 2005, 2008) using the RODBC package?

I know that I can do this using freebcp, but I\'m curious i

Answer 1

Using RODBC, the fastest insert we've been able to create (260 million row insert) looks like the following (in R pseudo code):

ourDataFrame <- sqlQuery(OurConnection, "SELECT myDataThing1, myDataThing2
                                         FROM myData")
ourDF <- doStuff(ourDataFrame)
write.csv(ourDF,ourFile)  
sqlQuery(OurConnection, "CREATE TABLE myTable ( la [La], laLa [LaLa]);
                         BULK INSERT myTable FROM 'ourFile' 
                              WITH YOURPARAMS=yourParams;")

If you're running this from between servers, you need a network drive that the R server can write to (e.g. one server with permissions for writing to the DB uses Rscript to productionalize the code), and the SQL Server can read from.