For example, you can use a single UPDATE statement to update many rows of data. There are times when you want to loop through a series of rows a perform processing for each row. In this case you can use a cursor.

Syntax for Declaring Cursor

-- Syntax
DECLARE <CURSOR_NAME> CURSOR FOR SELECT <COLUMN_NAME> FROM <TABLE_NAME> WHERE <CONDITION>

Example for Declaring Cursor

-- Example
DECLARE INFO_CURSOR CURSOR FOR SELECT * FROM INFO WHERE ID >

After declaring the cursor we can access the data. Before accessing the

data of the cursor it must be opened by using open statement. Directly

following a successful opening, the cursor is positioned before the first row

in the result set.

Example for Opening Cursor

--Syntax
OPEN <CURSOR_NAME>
--Example
OPEN INFO_CURSOR

After opening cursor on a specific row in the result set with the fetch

statement. A fetch operation transfers the data of the row into the

application. Simply we can say by using fetch statement we read one by

one row at a time in forward only by default.

Example for Fetching Cursor

--Syntax
FETCH <CURSOR_NAME>
--Example
FETCH INFO_CURSOR

Example for Closing Cursor

--Syntax
CLOSE <CURSOR_NAME>
--Exaple
CLOSE INFO_CURSOR

Example which demonstrate the use of Scrollable Cursor

This feature not available in SQL Server 2005. This is come from SQL Server

2008 and 2012

declare cur_std scroll cursor for select * from student --Declare a cursor named cur_std
open cur_std -- Open the cursor
fetch next from cur_std -- Fetch next records in the cursor and display it
fetch absolute 3 from cur_std  --Fetch 3 records in the cursor
fetch prior from cur_std --Fetch previous record in the cursor