If this error message appears when trying to expand the databases node in SQL Server Management Studio and the x64 version of SQL Server 2008 is installed, follow the steps below:

1) Bring Object Explorer Details window by selecting View –> Object Explorer Details in menu (or hitting F7)
2) In Object Explorer window click at Databases folder
3) In Object Explorer Details window right-click at the column header and deselect Collation
4) Refresh Databases folder.

For more details click here.

We have the following excel file that has a pivot table in it:

The first column represents the age (A) while in the columns starting from B to D is the pivoted data. The column names are 10, 11 and 12. In order for SSIS to recognize the numbers as column names you must put a ” ‘ ” in front of the number, like this: ‘10.

Next we open SSIS and create a new project. We add a Data Flow task and in the data flow area we add an Excel source and a unpivot transformation like below:

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