Articles Cookbook
30 Jul 2019
Jakub Romanowski

YouTube Tutorials That Actually Teach You Some SQL

YouTube is not just funny cats, music clips, and viral videos. It can also be a mine of knowledge – if you know where to look. Can YouTube tutorials really help you learn SQL? Let's say you're a marketer or an accountant. You work with databases every day. But when it’s time to write a query and get specific data, you need to call someone from IT. Why not learn to do it yourself?
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2 Jul 2019
Tihomir Babic

Career Change: From Accountant to Database Designer

How do career changes and life choices impact our future? Can we change the path that's been set for us? And if so, where do we begin? I wouldn't blame you if you thought this article is about change. In a sense, it is—it's in the title, after all. But for me, this article is more about what remains constant. If somebody were to ask me what hasn't changed for me since my childhood, I would know the answer immediately: curiosity.
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18 Jun 2019
Dorota Wdzięczna

24 Rules to the SQL Formatting Standard

Writing queries to a database requires knowledge about SQL syntax, but this is not all you should know. Best practices for writing professional SQL code require good formatting skills. In this article I discuss why this is so important and what are the basic rules you should follow. Why is it Worthwhile to Format SQL Code? Beginner SQL programmers often don't pay much attention to formatting their code. If you think formatting is something that can be safely ignored, look at the code below:
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30 Apr 2019
Ignacio L. Bisso

SQL INNER JOIN Explained in Simple Words

In this article, I will cover perhaps the most important element of the SQL language. That's right! I'm talking about the SQL INNER JOIN clause. As you know, in a database the data are stored in several tables. In my last article, I covered how to create SQL queries when the data you need is in only one table. But what if the data you need is in two tables?
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19 Mar 2019
Dorota Wdzięczna

14 Differences Between Standard SQL and Transact-SQL

In my last article, I roughly described how standard SQL differs from T-SQL and who should learn which. Now I'd like to focus on the syntax differences and illustrate these differences with examples. If you think T-SQL is an extension implementing all the features from standard SQL, you aren't right. However, in SQL Server you will find almost all the features of the SQL standard. In this article you will find examples of some of the differences in syntax between standard SQL and Transact-SQL.
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20 Feb 2019
Michał Kołodziejski

Get to Know the Power of SQL Recursive Queries

Most commonly, the SQL queries we run on a database are quite simple. Well, that depends on your role, of course. Analysts in data warehouses retrieve completely different sorts of information using (very often) much more complicated queries than software engineers creating CRUD applications. However, sometimes it's simpler or more elegant to run a query that is a little bit more sophisticated without needing further data processing in the code.
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19 Feb 2019
Dorota Wdzięczna

What's the Difference Between SQL and T-SQL?

If you are beginning to learn SQL and are confused by the differences between standard SQL and other similar languages like T-SQL, this article will help make things clear. You’ll not only learn about the difference between SQL and T-SQL but also find explanations concerning which topics would be better to start learning first: standard SQL or something more specific like MS SQL Server. What is Standard SQL? SQL (Structured Query Language) is a basic ANSI/ISO standard programming language designed to operate on data stored in relational databases.
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7 Feb 2019
Ignacio L. Bisso

Learn SQL on Your Lunch Break

Do you think learning SQL will help you in your career? You are right. SQL is one of the easiest computer languages to learn. These days many non-IT employees have SQL skills and use them to extend their professional capacity. Moreover, more and more companies are encouraging their employees in non-IT areas (like sales, advertising, and finances) to learn and use SQL. One of the benefits of empowering employees with SQL skills is that once you answer one data question, the results will generate a new data question, and then perhaps a cascade of further data questions.
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17 Jan 2019
Roman Pijacek

Microsoft SQL Server Pros and Cons

Thinking about using Microsoft SQL Server? If so, you’re in the right place. In this article, we’ll go over the pros and cons of Microsoft SQL Server and evaluate the platform from both a company’s and a data specialist’s perspective. What Is Microsoft SQL Server? Before diving into the pros and cons of Microsoft SQL Server, I’ll explain what it is. In technical terms, it is a relational database management system (RDBMS) developed by Microsoft.
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4 Dec 2018
LearnSQL.com Team

Practical Ways to Improve the Performance of SQL Queries

Knowing how to improve SQL query performance is an important skill, especially when working with with large databases. In this article, you'll learn how to write more efficient SQL queries to get results faster. The biggest difference between SQL and other languages is that SQL is a non-procedural language. In a non-procedural language you specify the results that you need but not the methods used to get it. The advantage of a non-procedural language is that it is easier to write programs, therefore it is common for non-programmer business users to generate reports from SQL queries.
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