Count number of groups present in column using SQL Server 2008 -

i have table shown below:

create table test (   cola varchar(10)  ) 

inserting data:

insert test values('a'); insert test values('a'); insert test values('a'); insert test values('b'); insert test values('b'); insert test values('c'); insert test values('d'); insert test values('d'); 

i want show how many groups present in column cola

expected result:

totalgroups      b    c    d  --------------------------------  4            3    2    1    2 

try this, removing [ , ] avoid sql injections:

declare @sql varchar(max) =         'select (select count(distinct cola) test) totalgroups'  select @sql += ',' +cast(count(*) varchar(10)) +        '['+ replace(replace(cola, ']', ''), '[', '') + ']' test group cola order cola   exec(@sql) 

result:

total_groups   b  c  d 4             3  2  1  2