SQL Express not playing nice

sql express not yielding field values

[louisjetline]

Really weird problem - i got a sqlexpressserver with valid databases being updated and written to otherwise, and yet...
this classic asp script refuses to give any of the field values, and for some reason also the browser also refuses to render html <BR> tags etc unless they are separated from the ASP code (in other words to write the value of a field out to the screen i'd normally use:

<%
response.write "Field value: " & x("fieldvalue") & "<br>"
%>

but now, the script wont render that properly unless i revise it as follows:

Field value: <% =x("fieldvalue") %><br>

Weird....I've never had to do this before....

And to make matters worse, as mentioned above, the <% =x("fieldvalue") %> yields nothing even though the field DOES contain a string. Numeric values (like the ID) seem to not have this problem.

Any ideas? Anybody? PLeez?