get field names from join statement (Expand the * star) - tsql

Question

I'm building rather lengthy joins in ad-hoc queries lately and I find it very tedious to type out all of the field names in the select statement once my joins work. Is there a quick way to just list out all of the field names in a combined query? Is there some query to run against a select statement, or key command to do this?
For example, there are probably about 30 fields in the below join. If I could get a quick list of them to expand from the '*' star then I could take away what I don't need.
SELECT *
FROM [DB].[THINGS].[QLINKS] Q
JOIN [DB].[THINGS].[POINTS] RQ
ON Q.ID = RQ.POINT_ID
JOIN [DB].[THINGS].[REFERENCES] R
ON RQ.POINT_ID = R.ID
JOIN SA_MEMBERSHIP.DBO.ASPNET_USERS U
ON U.USERID = R.PERSON_ID
JOIN SA_MEMBERSHIP.DBO.ASPNET_MEMBERSHIP M
ON M.USERID = U.USERID
WHERE NOT Q.ID IN (
SELECT RQ.QLINK_ID
FROM [DB].[DATA].[ENTRIES] E
JOIN [DB].[THINGS].[REFERENCES] R
ON E.PERSON_ID = R.PERSON_ID
JOIN [DB].[THINGS].[POINTS] RQ
ON R.ID = RQ.POINT_ID
WHERE (
ITEMKEY LIKE '102_0%'
OR ITEMKEY LIKE '104_0%'
)
AND E.POINT_ID IS NULL
GROUP BY E.PERSON_ID, LEFT(ITEMKEY, 5), R.ID, RQ.QLINK_ID
)

Answer 1

something like the following (tsql version, the idea is to use metadata of the result set) with cursor c being your query
declare c cursor for select * from sys.databases
go
open c
DECLARE #Report CURSOR;
declare #cn sysname
declare #op int
declare #ccf int
declare #cs int
declare #dts smallint
declare #cp tinyint
declare #colsc tinyint
declare #orp int
declare #od varchar(1)
declare #hc smallint
declare #cid int
declare #oid int
declare #dbid int
declare #dbn sysname
exec sp_describe_cursor_columns #cursor_return = #Report out, #cursor_source = N'global', #cursor_identity = N'c';
declare #res nvarchar(max)
set #res = '';
FETCH NEXT from #Report into #cn, #op, #ccf, #cs, #dts, #cp, #colsc, #orp, #od, #hc, #cid, #oid, #dbid, #dbn;
WHILE (##FETCH_STATUS <> -1)
BEGIN
set #res = #res +',' + #cn
FETCH NEXT from #Report into #cn, #op, #ccf, #cs, #dts, #cp, #colsc, #orp, #od, #hc, #cid, #oid, #dbid, #dbn;
END
print stuff(#res, 1, 1, '')
CLOSE #Report;
DEALLOCATE #Report;
GO
close c
deallocate c

Answer 2

It turns out that there is a plugin for that! The plugin ApexSQL refactor has this for free.
Direct link here:http://www.apexsql.com/sql_tools_refactor.aspx
Described by the venerable Pinal Dave here: http://blog.sqlauthority.com/2014/07/24/sql-server-how-to-format-and-refactor-your-sql-code-directly-in-ssms-and-visual-studio/