T-SQL IP octet split

Found a neat piece of T-SQL that can be used to separate the octets of an IP address:

Declare @IP varchar(20)
Select @IP = '239.147.8.165'
select @IP AS IP,
cast(substring(@IP, 1, charindex('.', @IP) - 1) as int) AS Octet1,
cast(substring(@IP, charindex('.', @IP) + 1,
charindex('.', @IP, charindex('.', @IP) + 1) -
charindex('.', @IP) - 1) as int) as Octet2,
cast(reverse(substring(reverse(@IP), charindex('.', reverse(@IP)) + 1,
charindex('.', reverse(@IP), charindex('.', reverse(@IP)) + 1) -
charindex('.', reverse(@IP)) - 1)) as int) AS Octet3,
cast(reverse(substring(reverse(@IP), 1, charindex('.', reverse(@IP)) - 1)) as int) as Octet4

The source for this is http://www.umachandar.com/technical/SQL6x70Scripts/Main.htm.

Unmanaged DLLs and string (or char*) output parameters

I wrestled with this one for awhile, but discovered (via Google) that you can use StringBuilder to allocate a fixed-length string, then pass the StringBuilder in by value to the exported function/method in the unmanaged DLL. Strings don't work in this case because they are not fixed length, and access violation errors can (and usually) occur.

Declare Ansi Function Function_Name Lib "lib.dll" (ByVal strGoingIn As String, ByVal strComingOut As StringBuilder) As Integer