Professional Documents
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SQL Intro
SQL Syntax
SQL SELECT
SQL DISTINCT
SQL WHERE
SQL AND & OR
SQL ORDER BY
SQL TOP
SQL Advanced
SQL LIKE
SQL Wildcards
SQL IN
SQL BETWEEN
SQL Alias
SQL Join
SQL INNER JOIN
SQL LEFT JOIN
SQL RIGHT JOIN
SQL FULL JOIN
SQL UNION
SQL SELECT INTO
SQL CREATE DB
SQL CREATE TABLE
SQL Constraints
SQL NOT NULL
SQL UNIQUE
SQL PRIMARY KEY
SQL FOREIGN KEY
SQL CHECK
SQL DEFAULT
SQL CREATE INDEX
SQL DROP
SQL ALTER
SQL INSERT
SQL INCREMENT
SQL UPDATE
SQL DELETE
SQL CREATE VIEW
SQL Functions
SQL Functions
SQL AVG()
SQL COUNT()
SQL FIRST()
SQL LAST()
SQL MAX()
SQL MIN()
SQL SUM()
SQL GROUP BY
SQL HAVING
SQL UCASE()
SQL LCASE()
SQL MID()
SQL LEN()
SQL ROUND()
SQL NOW()
SQL FORMAT()
SQL Specials
SQL NULLS
SQL ISNULL()
SQL Data Types
What is SQL?
SQL stands for Structured Query Language
SQL lets you access and manipulate databases
SQL is an ANSI (American National Standards Institute) standard
Although SQL is an ANSI (American National Standards Institute) standard, there are many
different versions of the SQL language.
However, to be compliant with the ANSI standard, they all support at least the major commands
(such as SELECT, UPDATE, DELETE, INSERT, WHERE) in a similar manner.
Note: Most of the SQL database programs also have their own proprietary extensions in addition to
the SQL standard!
To build a web site that shows some data from a database, you will need the following:
RDBMS
RDBMS is the basis for SQL, and for all modern database systems like MS SQL Server, IBM DB2,
Oracle, MySQL, and Microsoft Access.
A table is a collections of related data entries and it consists of columns and rows.
Database Tables
A database most often contains one or more tables. Each table is identified by a name (e.g.
"Customers" or "Orders"). Tables contain records (rows) with data.
The table above contains three records (one for each person) and five columns (P_Id, LastName,
FirstName, Address, and City).
SQL Statements
Most of the actions you need to perform on a database are done with SQL statements.
The following SQL statement will select all the records in the "Persons" table:
SELECT * FROM Persons
In this tutorial we will teach you all about the different SQL statements.
Some database systems require a semicolon at the end of each SQL statement.
Semicolon is the standard way to separate each SQL statement in database systems that allow
more than one SQL statement to be executed in the same call to the server.
We are using MS Access and SQL Server 2000 and we do not have to put a semicolon after each
SQL statement, but some database programs force you to use it.
SQL can be divided into two parts: The Data Manipulation Language (DML) and the Data Definition
Language (DDL).
The query and update commands form the DML part of SQL:
The DDL part of SQL permits database tables to be created or deleted. It also define indexes (keys),
specify links between tables, and impose constraints between tables. The most important DDL
statements in SQL are:
SELECT column_name(s)
FROM table_name
and
Now we want to select the content of the columns named "LastName" and "FirstName" from the
table above.
LastName FirstName
Hansen Ola
Svendson Tove
Pettersen Kari
SELECT * Example
Now we want to select all the columns from the "Persons" table.
In a table, some of the columns may contain duplicate values. This is not a problem, however,
sometimes you will want to list only the different (distinct) values in a table.
The DISTINCT keyword can be used to return only distinct (different) values.
Now we want to select only the distinct values from the column named "City" from the table above.
City
Sandnes
Stavanger
SELECT column_name(s)
FROM table_name
WHERE column_name operator value
Now we want to select only the persons living in the city "Sandnes" from the table above.
SQL uses single quotes around text values (most database systems will also accept double quotes).
This is correct:
SELECT * FROM Persons WHERE FirstName='Tove'
This is wrong:
SELECT * FROM Persons WHERE FirstName=Tove
This is correct:
SELECT * FROM Persons WHERE Year=1965
This is wrong:
SELECT * FROM Persons WHERE Year='1965'
Operators Allowed in the WHERE Clause
Operator Description
= Equal
<> Not equal
> Greater than
< Less than
>= Greater than or equal
<= Less than or equal
BETWEEN Between an inclusive range
LIKE Search for a pattern
IN If you know the exact value you want to return for
at least one of the columns
The AND & OR operators are used to filter records based on more than one condition.
The AND operator displays a record if both the first condition and the second condition is true.
The OR operator displays a record if either the first condition or the second condition is true.
Now we want to select only the persons with the first name equal to "Tove" AND the last name
equal to "Svendson":
OR Operator Example
Now we want to select only the persons with the first name equal to "Tove" OR the first name equal
to "Ola":
You can also combine AND and OR (use parenthesis to form complex expressions).
Now we want to select only the persons with the last name equal to "Svendson" AND the first name
equal to "Tove" OR to "Ola":
The AND & OR operators are used to filter records based on more than one condition.
The AND & OR Operators
The AND operator displays a record if both the first condition and the second condition is true.
The OR operator displays a record if either the first condition or the second condition is true.
Now we want to select only the persons with the first name equal to "Tove" AND the last name
equal to "Svendson":
OR Operator Example
Now we want to select only the persons with the first name equal to "Tove" OR the first name equal
to "Ola":
You can also combine AND and OR (use parenthesis to form complex expressions).
Now we want to select only the persons with the last name equal to "Svendson" AND the first name
equal to "Tove" OR to "Ola":
The TOP clause can be very useful on large tables with thousands of records. Returning a large
number of records can impact on performance.
Now we want to select only the two first records in the table above.
Now we want to select only 50% of the records in the table above.
SQL Wildcards
SQL wildcards can substitute for one or more characters when searching for data in a database.
Wildcard Description
% A substitute for zero or more characters
_ A substitute for exactly one character
[charlist] Any single character in charlist
[^charlist] Any single character not in charlist
or
[!charlist]
SQL Wildcard Examples
Now we want to select the persons living in a city that starts with "sa" from the "Persons" table.
Next, we want to select the persons living in a city that contains the pattern "nes" from the
"Persons" table.
Now we want to select the persons with a first name that starts with any character, followed by "la"
from the "Persons" table.
Next, we want to select the persons with a last name that starts with "S", followed by any character,
followed by "end", followed by any character, followed by "on" from the "Persons" table.
Now we want to select the persons with a last name that starts with "b" or "s" or "p" from the
"Persons" table.
Next, we want to select the persons with a last name that do not start with "b" or "s" or "p" from
the "Persons" table.
The IN Operator
The IN operator allows you to specify multiple values in a WHERE clause.
SQL IN Syntax
SELECT column_name(s)
FROM table_name
WHERE column_name IN (value1,value2,...)
IN Operator Example
Now we want to select the persons with a last name equal to "Hansen" or "Pettersen" from the table
above.
The BETWEEN operator is used in a WHERE clause to select a range of data between two
values.
The BETWEEN operator selects a range of data between two values. The values can be numbers,
text, or dates.
SELECT column_name(s)
FROM table_name
WHERE column_name
BETWEEN value1 AND value2
BETWEEN Operator Example
Now we want to select the persons with a last name alphabetically between "Hansen" and
"Pettersen" from the table above.
In some databases a person with the LastName of "Hansen" or "Pettersen" will not be listed
(BETWEEN only selects fields that are between and excluding the test values).
In other databases a person with the last name of "Hansen" or "Pettersen" will be listed (BETWEEN
selects fields that are between and including the test values).
And in other databases a person with the last name of "Hansen" will be listed, but "Pettersen" will
not be listed (BETWEEN selects fields between the test values, including the first test value and
excluding the last test value).
Example 2
To display the persons outside the range in the previous example, use NOT BETWEEN:
SQL Alias
You can give a table or a column another name by using an alias. This can be a good thing to do if
you have very long or complex table names or column names.
SELECT column_name(s)
FROM table_name
AS alias_name
Alias Example
Assume we have a table called "Persons" and another table called "Product_Orders". We will give
the table aliases of "p" an "po" respectively.
Now we want to list all the orders that "Ola Hansen" is responsible for.
The JOIN keyword is used to query data from two or more tables, based on a relationship
between certain columns in these tables.
SQL JOIN
The JOIN keyword is used in an SQL statement to query data from two or more tables, based on a
relationship between certain columns in these tables.
A primary key is a column with a unique value for each row. Each primary key value must be unique
within the table. The purpose is to bind data together, across tables, without repeating all of the
data in every table.
Note that the "P_Id" column is the primary key in the "Persons" table. This means that no two rows
can have the same P_Id. The P_Id distinguishes two persons even if they have the same name.
Note that the "O_Id" column is the primary key in the "Orders" table and that the "P_Id" column
refers to the persons in the "Persons" table without using their names.
Notice that the relationship between the two tables above is the "P_Id" column.
Before we continue with examples, we will list the types of JOIN you can use, and the differences
between them.
JOIN: Return rows when there is at least one match in both tables
LEFT JOIN: Return all rows from the left table, even if there are no matches in the right
table
RIGHT JOIN: Return all rows from the right table, even if there are no matches in the left
table
FULL JOIN: Return rows when there is a match in one of the tables
The INNER JOIN keyword return rows when there is at least one match in both tables.
SQL INNER JOIN Syntax
SELECT column_name(s)
FROM table_name1
INNER JOIN table_name2
ON table_name1.column_name=table_name2.column_name
The INNER JOIN keyword return rows when there is at least one match in both tables. If there are
rows in "Persons" that do not have matches in "Orders", those rows will NOT be listed.
SELECT column_name(s)
FROM table_name1
LEFT JOIN table_name2
ON table_name1.column_name=table_name2.column_name
Now we want to list all the persons and their orders - if any, from the tables above.
The LEFT JOIN keyword returns all the rows from the left table (Persons), even if there are no
matches in the right table (Orders).
SQL RIGHT JOIN Keyword
The RIGHT JOIN keyword Return all rows from the right table (table_name2), even if there are no
matches in the left table (table_name1).
SELECT column_name(s)
FROM table_name1
RIGHT JOIN table_name2
ON table_name1.column_name=table_name2.column_name
Now we want to list all the orders with containing persons - if any, from the tables above.
The FULL JOIN keyword return rows when there is a match in one of the tables.
SELECT column_name(s)
FROM table_name1
FULL JOIN table_name2
ON table_name1.column_name=table_name2.column_name
Now we want to list all the persons and their orders, and all the orders with their persons.
The UNION operator is used to combine the result-set of two or more SELECT statements.
Notice that each SELECT statement within the UNION must have the same number of columns. The
columns must also have similar data types. Also, the columns in each SELECT statement must be in
the same order.
Note: The UNION operator selects only distinct values by default. To allow duplicate values, use
UNION ALL.
PS: The column names in the result-set of a UNION are always equal to the column names in the
first SELECT statement in the UNION.
"Employees_Norway":
E_ID E_Name
01 Hansen, Ola
02 Svendson, Tove
03 Svendson, Stephen
04 Pettersen, Kari
"Employees_USA":
E_ID E_Name
01 Turner, Sally
02 Kent, Clark
03 Svendson, Stephen
04 Scott, Stephen
Now we want to list all the different employees in Norway and USA.
We use the following SELECT statement:
E_Name
Hansen, Ola
Svendson, Tove
Svendson, Stephen
Pettersen, Kari
Turner, Sally
Kent, Clark
Scott, Stephen
Note: This command cannot be used to list all employees in Norway and USA. In the example
above we have two employees with equal names, and only one of them will be listed. The UNION
command selects only distinct values.
Result
E_Name
Hansen, Ola
Svendson, Tove
Svendson, Stephen
Pettersen, Kari
Turner, Sally
Kent, Clark
Svendson, Stephen
Scott, Stephen
The SQL SELECT INTO statement can be used to create backup copies of tables.
The SELECT INTO statement selects data from one table and inserts it into a different table.
The SELECT INTO statement is most often used to create backup copies of tables.
SQL SELECT INTO Syntax
SELECT *
INTO new_table_name [IN externaldatabase]
FROM old_tablename
Or we can select only the columns we want into the new table:
SELECT column_name(s)
INTO new_table_name [IN externaldatabase]
FROM old_tablename
Make a Backup Copy - Now we want to make an exact copy of the data in our "Persons" table.
SELECT *
INTO Persons_Backup
FROM Persons
We can also use the IN clause to copy the table into another database:
SELECT *
INTO Persons_Backup IN 'Backup.mdb'
FROM Persons
We can also copy only a few fields into the new table:
SELECT LastName,FirstName
INTO Persons_Backup
FROM Persons
The following SQL statement creates a "Persons_Backup" table with only the persons who lives in
the city "Sandnes":
SELECT LastName,Firstname
INTO Persons_Backup
FROM Persons
WHERE City='Sandnes'
The following example creates a "Persons_Order_Backup" table contains data from the two tables
"Persons" and "Orders":
SELECT Persons.LastName,Orders.OrderNo
INTO Persons_Order_Backup
FROM Persons
INNER JOIN Orders
ON Persons.P_Id=Orders.P_Id
SQL FUNCTION
SQL aggregate functions return a single value, calculated from values in a column.
SQL scalar functions return a single value, based on the input value.
Tip: The aggregate functions and the scalar functions will be explained in details in the next
chapters.
The AVG() Function
OrderAverage
950
Now we want to find the customers that have an OrderPrice value higher then the average
OrderPrice value.
Customer
Hansen
Nilsen
Jensen
The COUNT(DISTINCT column_name) function returns the number of distinct values of the specified
column:
Note: COUNT(DISTINCT) works with ORACLE and Microsoft SQL Server, but not with Microsoft
Access.
The result of the SQL statement above will be 2, because the customer Nilsen has made 2 orders in
total:
CustomerNilsen
2
NumberOfOrders
6
Now we want to count the number of unique customers in the "Orders" table.
NumberOfCustomers
3
which is the number of unique customers (Hansen, Nilsen, and Jensen) in the "Orders" table.
The FIRST() function returns the first value of the selected column.
FirstOrderPrice
1000
The LAST() function returns the last value of the selected column.
LastOrderPrice
100
LargestOrderPrice
2000
The MIN() function returns the smallest value of the selected column.
SmallestOrderPrice
100
OrderTotal
5700
The HAVING Clause
The HAVING clause was added to SQL because the WHERE keyword could not be used with
aggregate functions.
Now we want to find if any of the customers have a total order of less than 2000.
Customer SUM(OrderPrice)
Nilsen 1700
Now we want to find if the customers "Hansen" or "Jensen" have a total order of more than 1500.
Customer SUM(OrderPrice)
Hansen 2000
Jensen 2000
..
The GROUP BY Statement
The GROUP BY statement is used in conjunction with the aggregate functions to group the result-set
by one or more columns.
Now we want to find the total sum (total order) of each customer.
Customer SUM(OrderPrice)
Hansen 2000
Nilsen 1700
Jensen 2000
Customer SUM(OrderPrice)
Hansen 5700
Nilsen 5700
Hansen 5700
Hansen 5700
Jensen 5700
Nilsen 5700
Explanation of why the above SELECT statement cannot be used: The SELECT statement
above has two columns specified (Customer and SUM(OrderPrice). The "SUM(OrderPrice)" returns a
single value (that is the total sum of the "OrderPrice" column), while "Customer" returns 6 values
(one value for each row in the "Orders" table). This will therefore not give us the correct result.
However, you have seen that the GROUP BY statement solves this problem.
We can also use the GROUP BY statement on more than one column, like this:
The HAVING clause was added to SQL because the WHERE keyword could not be used with
aggregate functions.
Now we want to find if any of the customers have a total order of less than 2000.
Customer SUM(OrderPrice)
Nilsen 1700
Now we want to find if the customers "Hansen" or "Jensen" have a total order of more than 1500.
Customer SUM(OrderPrice)
Hansen 2000
Jensen 2000
Now we want to select the content of the "LastName" and "FirstName" columns above, and convert
the "LastName" column to uppercase.
We use the following SELECT statement:
LastName FirstName
HANSEN Ola
SVENDSON Tove
PETTERSEN Kari
Now we want to select the content of the "LastName" and "FirstName" columns above, and convert
the "LastName" column to lowercase.
LastName FirstName
hansen Ola
svendson Tove
pettersen Kari
Parameter Description
column_name Required. The field to extract characters from.
start Required. Specifies the starting position (starts at 1).
length Optional. The number of characters to return. If omitted, the MID() function
returns the rest of the text.
Now we want to extract the first four characters of the "City" column above.
SmallCity
Sand
Sand
Stav
The LEN() function returns the length of the value in a text field.
LengthOfAddress
12
9
9
The ROUND() function is used to round a numeric field to the number of decimals specified.
Parameter Description
column_name Required. The field to round.
decimals Required. Specifies the number of decimals to be returned.
Now we want to display the product name and the price rounded to the nearest integer.
ProductName UnitPrice
Jarlsberg 10
Mascarpone 33
Gorgonzola 16
Now we want to display the products and prices per today's date.
Parameter Description
column_name Required. The field to be formatted.
format Required. Specifies the format.
This chapter will explain the IS NULL and IS NOT NULL operators.
If a column in a table is optional, we can insert a new record or update an existing record without
adding a value to this column. This means that the field will be saved with a NULL value.
Note: It is not possible to compare NULL and 0; they are not equivalent.
Suppose that the "Address" column in the "Persons" table is optional. This means that if we insert a
record with no value for the "Address" column, the "Address" column will be saved with a NULL
value.
It is not possible to test for NULL values with comparison operators, such as =, <, or <>.
We will have to use the IS NULL and IS NOT NULL operators instead.
SQL IS NULL
How do we select only the records with NULL values in the "Address" column?
How do we select only the records with no NULL values in the "Address" column?
In the next chapter we will look at the ISNULL(), NVL(), IFNULL() and COALESCE() functions.
Suppose that the "UnitsOnOrder" column is optional, and may contain NULL values.
SELECT ProductName,UnitPrice*(UnitsInStock+UnitsOnOrder)
FROM Products
In the example above, if any of the "UnitsOnOrder" values are NULL, the result is NULL.
Microsoft's ISNULL() function is used to specify how we want to treat NULL values.
The NVL(), IFNULL(), and COALESCE() functions can also be used to achieve the same result.
Below, if "UnitsOnOrder" is NULL it will not harm the calculation, because ISNULL() returns a zero if
the value is NULL:
SELECT ProductName,UnitPrice*(UnitsInStock+ISNULL(UnitsOnOrder,0))
FROM Products
Oracle
Oracle does not have an ISNULL() function. However, we can use the NVL() function to achieve the
same result:
SELECT ProductName,UnitPrice*(UnitsInStock+NVL(UnitsOnOrder,0))
FROM Products
MySQL
MySQL does have an ISNULL() function. However, it works a little bit different from Microsoft's
ISNULL() function.
SELECT ProductName,UnitPrice*(UnitsInStock+IFNULL(UnitsOnOrder,0))
FROM Products
SELECT ProductName,UnitPrice*(UnitsInStock+COALESCE(UnitsOnOrder,0))
FROM Products
A view contains rows and columns, just like a real table. The fields in a view are fields from one or
more real tables in the database.
You can add SQL functions, WHERE, and JOIN statements to a view and present the data as if the
data were coming from one single table.
Note: A view always shows up-to-date data! The database engine recreates the data, using the
view's SQL statement, every time a user queries a view.
If you have the Northwind database you can see that it has several views installed by default.
The view "Current Product List" lists all active products (products that are not discontinued) from
the "Products" table. The view is created with the following SQL:
Another view in the Northwind sample database selects every product in the "Products" table with a
unit price higher than the average unit price:
Another view in the Northwind database calculates the total sale for each category in 1997. Note
that this view selects its data from another view called "Product Sales for 1997":
2. DDL
Data types and ranges for Microsoft Access, MySQL and SQL Server.
In MySQL there are three main types : text, number, and Date/Time types.
Text types:
Note: The values are sorted in the order you enter them.
Number types:
*The integer types have an extra option called UNSIGNED. Normally, the integer goes from an
negative to positive value. Adding the UNSIGNED attribute will move that range up so it starts at
zero instead of a negative number.
Date types:
Note: Values allowed in four-digit format: 1901 to 2155. Values allowed in two-
digit format: 70 to 69, representing years from 1970 to 2069
*Even if DATETIME and TIMESTAMP return the same format, they work very differently. In an
INSERT or UPDATE query, the TIMESTAMP automatically set itself to the current date and time.
TIMESTAMP also accepts various formats, like YYYYMMDDHHMMSS, YYMMDDHHMMSS, YYYYMMDD,
or YYMMDD.
Character strings:
Unicode strings:
Binary types:
Number types:
Date types:
Data type Description Storage
datetime From January 1, 1753 to December 31, 9999 with an accuracy of 3.33 8 bytes
milliseconds
datetime2 From January 1, 0001 and December 31, 9999 with an accuracy of 6-8 bytes
100 nanoseconds
smalldatetime From January 1, 1900 to June 6, 2079 with an accuracy of 1 minute 4 bytes
date Store a date only. From January 1, 0001 to December 31, 9999 3 bytes
time Store a time only to an accuracy of 100 nanoseconds 3-5 bytes
datetimeoffset The same as datetime2 with the addition of a time zone offset 8-10
bytes
timestamp Stores a unique number that gets updated every time a row gets
created or modified. The timestamp value is based upon an internal
clock and does not correspond to real time. Each table may have only
one timestamp variable
The data type specifies what type of data the column can hold. For a complete reference of all the
data types available in MS Access, MySQL, and SQL Server, go to our complete Data Types
reference.
Now we want to create a table called "Persons" that contains five columns: P_Id, LastName,
FirstName, Address, and City.
The P_Id column is of type int and will hold a number. The LastName, FirstName, Address, and City
columns are of type varchar with a maximum length of 255 characters.
The empty table can be filled with data with the INSERT INTO statement.
SQL Constraints
Constraints are used to limit the type of data that can go into a table.
Constraints can be specified when a table is created (with the CREATE TABLE statement) or after the
table is created (with the ALTER TABLE statement).
NOT NULL
UNIQUE
PRIMARY KEY
FOREIGN KEY
CHECK
DEFAULT
The NOT NULL constraint enforces a column to NOT accept NULL values.
The NOT NULL constraint enforces a field to always contain a value. This means that you cannot
insert a new record, or update a record without adding a value to this field.
The following SQL enforces the "P_Id" column and the "LastName" column to not accept NULL
values:
The UNIQUE and PRIMARY KEY constraints both provide a guarantee for uniqueness for a column or
set of columns.
Note that you can have have many UNIQUE constraints per table, but only one PRIMARY KEY
constraint per table.
The following SQL creates a UNIQUE constraint on the "P_Id" column when the "Persons" table is
created:
MySQL:
To allow naming of a UNIQUE constraint, and for defining a UNIQUE constraint on multiple columns,
use the following SQL syntax:
To create a UNIQUE constraint on the "P_Id" column when the table is already created, use the
following SQL:
To allow naming of a UNIQUE constraint, and for defining a UNIQUE constraint on multiple columns,
use the following SQL syntax:
MySQL:
The PRIMARY KEY constraint uniquely identifies each record in a database table.
Each table should have a primary key, and each table can have only one primary key.
The following SQL creates a PRIMARY KEY on the "P_Id" column when the "Persons" table is
created:
MySQL:
To allow naming of a PRIMARY KEY constraint, and for defining a PRIMARY KEY constraint on
multiple columns, use the following SQL syntax:
To create a PRIMARY KEY constraint on the "P_Id" column when the table is already created, use the
following SQL:
To allow naming of a PRIMARY KEY constraint, and for defining a PRIMARY KEY constraint on
multiple columns, use the following SQL syntax:
Note: If you use the ALTER TABLE statement to add a primary key, the primary key column(s) must
already have been declared to not contain NULL values (when the table was first created).
MySQL:
Let's illustrate the foreign key with an example. Look at the following two tables:
Note that the "P_Id" column in the "Orders" table points to the "P_Id" column in the "Persons" table.
The "P_Id" column in the "Persons" table is the PRIMARY KEY in the "Persons" table.
The "P_Id" column in the "Orders" table is a FOREIGN KEY in the "Orders" table.
The FOREIGN KEY constraint is used to prevent actions that would destroy link between tables.
The FOREIGN KEY constraint also prevents that invalid data is inserted into the foreign key column,
because it has to be one of the values contained in the table it points to.
The following SQL creates a FOREIGN KEY on the "P_Id" column when the "Orders" table is created:
MySQL:
To allow naming of a FOREIGN KEY constraint, and for defining a FOREIGN KEY constraint on
multiple columns, use the following SQL syntax:
To create a FOREIGN KEY constraint on the "P_Id" column when the "Orders" table is already
created, use the following SQL:
To allow naming of a FOREIGN KEY constraint, and for defining a FOREIGN KEY constraint on
multiple columns, use the following SQL syntax:
The CHECK constraint is used to limit the value range that can be placed in a column.
If you define a CHECK constraint on a single column it allows only certain values for this column.
If you define a CHECK constraint on a table it can limit the values in certain columns based on
values in other columns in the row.
The following SQL creates a CHECK constraint on the "P_Id" column when the "Persons" table is
created. The CHECK constraint specifies that the column "P_Id" must only include integers greater
than 0.
My SQL:
To allow naming of a CHECK constraint, and for defining a CHECK constraint on multiple columns,
use the following SQL syntax:
To create a CHECK constraint on the "P_Id" column when the table is already created, use the
following SQL:
To allow naming of a CHECK constraint, and for defining a CHECK constraint on multiple columns,
use the following SQL syntax:
The default value will be added to all new records, if no other value is specified.
The following SQL creates a DEFAULT constraint on the "City" column when the "Persons" table is
created:
The DEFAULT constraint can also be used to insert system values, by using functions like
GETDATE():
To create a DEFAULT constraint on the "City" column when the table is already created, use the
following SQL:
MySQL:
Indexes, tables, and databases can easily be deleted/removed with the DROP statement.
What if we only want to delete the data inside the table, and not the table itself?
The ALTER TABLE statement is used to add, delete, or modify columns in an existing table.
To delete a column in a table, use the following syntax (notice that some database systems don't
allow deleting a column):
To change the data type of a column in a table, use the following syntax:
Notice that the new column, "DateOfBirth", is of type date and is going to hold a date. The data
type specifies what type of data the column can hold. For a complete reference of all the data types
available in MS Access, MySQL, and SQL Server, go to our complete Data Types reference.
Now we want to change the data type of the column named "DateOfBirth" in the "Persons" table.
Notice that the "DateOfBirth" column is now of type year and is going to hold a year in a two-digit
or four-digit format.
Next, we want to delete the column named "DateOfBirth" in the "Persons" table.
Indexes allow the database application to find data fast; without reading the whole table.
Indexes
An index can be created in a table to find data more quickly and efficiently.
The users cannot see the indexes, they are just used to speed up searches/queries.
Note: Updating a table with indexes takes more time than updating a table without (because the
indexes also need an update). So you should only create indexes on columns (and tables) that will
be frequently searched against.
Note: The syntax for creating indexes varies amongst different databases. Therefore: Check the
syntax for creating indexes in your database.
The SQL statement below creates an index named "PIndex" on the "LastName" column in the
"Persons" table:
If you want to create an index on a combination of columns, you can list the column names within
the parentheses, separated by commas:
The first form doesn't specify the column names where the data will be inserted, only their values:
The second form specifies both the column names and the values to be inserted:
The following SQL statement will add a new row, but only add data in the "P_Id", "LastName" and
the "FirstName" columns: