Obscure Query Analyzer Option

Query Analyzer is packed with features that many people haven't experimented with. Here's an obscure capability that I didn't know existed until recently. Query Analyzer lets you set a wide variety of configuration options. However, I didn't know that you could save the options to a configuration file, then start Query Analyzer or ISQL/w by using that file. ISQL/w is the command-line name of Query Analyzer's GUI. To save the options to a configuration file, use ISQL/w's —C option from the command line or use the Save and Load buttons on the Options dialog box's General tab in Query Analyzer.

For example, say you want to configure Query Analyzer to start up with the Display Results option set to Results to Grid or Results to Text, based on what tasks you were going to perform. You can create a configuration file by setting all the options in Query Analyzer to the settings you choose, then save the current settings to that configuration file by using the Save button on the General tab. You can then reload that configuration file by using the Load button, or you could start a new instance of Query Analyzer that uses that configuration file by calling ISQL/w from the command line and specifying the —C option. This approach would be silly if you were changing one setting, but it can save a tremendous amount of time if you're changing a lot of Query Analyzer options.