7.4. Viewing XML Data as Relational Data

OPENXML is a T-SQL function that provides access to in-memory XML documents through a mechanism similar to a relational result set. OPENXML can be used in SELECT and SELECT INTO statements wherever rowset providers such as a table or view, or the OPENROWSET function, can appear.

Before you can use OPENXML, you must call the system stored procedure sp_xml_preparedocument to parse the XML document and return the handle of the parsed internal representation of the document. The document handle is passed to OPENXML, which provides a relational rowset view of the document.