Real-world practice problems to bring your SQL skills to the next level It's easy to find basic SQL syntax and keyword information online. What's hard to find is challenging, well-designed, real-world problems--the type of problems that come up all the time when you're dealing with data. Learning how to solve these problems will give you the skill and confidence to step up in your career. With SQL Practice Problems, you can get that level of experience by solving sets of targeted problems. These aren't just problems designed to give an example of specific syntax, or keyword. These are the common problems you run into all the time when you deal with data. You will get real world practice, with real world data. I'll teach you how to "think" in SQL, how to analyze data problems, figure out the fundamentals, and work towards a solution that you can be proud of. It contains challenging problems, that hone your ability to write high quality SQL code. What do you get when you buy SQL Practice Problems? You get instructions on how set up MS SQL Server Express Edition 2016 and SQL Server Management Studio 2016, both free downloads. Almost all the SQL presented here works for previous versions of MS SQLServer, and any exceptions are highlighted. You'll also get a customized sample database, with video walk-through instructions on how to set it up on your computer. And of course, you get the actual practice problems - 57 problems that you work through step-by-step. There are targeted hints if you need them that help guide you through the question. For the more complex questions there are multiple levels of hints. Each answer comes with a short, targeted discussion section with alternative answers and tips on usage and good programming practice. What kind of problems are there in SQL Practice Problems? SQL Practice Problems has data analysis and reporting oriented challenges that are designed to step you through introductory, intermediate and advanced SQL Select statements, with a learn-by-doing technique. Most textbooks and courses have some practice problems. But most often, they're used just to illustrate a particular piece of syntax, with no filtering on what's most useful. What you'll get with SQL Practice Problems is the problems that illustrate some the most common challenges you'll run into with data, and the best, most useful techniques to solve them. These practice problems involve only Select statements, used for data analysis and reporting, and not statements to modify data (insert, delete, update), or to create stored procedures. About the author: Hi, my name is Sylvia Moestl Vasilik. I've been a database programmer and engineer for more than 15 years, working at top organizations like Expedia, Microsoft, T-Mobile, and the Gates Foundation. In 2015, I was teaching a SQL Server Certificate course at the University of Washington Continuing Education. It was a 10 week course, and my students paid more than $1000 for it. My students learned the basics of SQL, most of the keywords, and worked through practice problems every week of the course. But because of the emphasis on getting a broad overview of all features of SQL, we didn't spend enough time on the types of SQL that's used 95% of the time--intermediate and advanced Select statements. After the course was over, some of my students emailed me to ask where they could get more practice. That's when I was inspired to start work on this book.

The #1 Easy, Common-Sense Guide to SQL Queries--Updated for Today's Databases, Standards, and Challenges SQL Queries for Mere Mortals ® has earned worldwide praise as the clearest, simplest tutorial on writing effective SQL queries. The authors have updated this hands-on classic to reflect new SQL standards and database applications and teach valuable new techniques. Step by step, John L. Viescas and Michael J. Hernandez guide you through creating reliable queries for virtually any modern SQL-based database. They demystify all aspects of SQL query writing, from simple data selection and filtering to joining multiple tables and modifying sets of data. Three brand-new chapters teach you how to solve a wide range of challenging SQL problems. You'll learn how to write queries that apply multiple complex conditions on one table, perform sophisticated logical evaluations, and think "outside the box" using unlinked tables. Coverage includes -- Getting started: understanding what relational databases are, and ensuring that your database structures are sound -- SQL basics: using SELECT statements, creating expressions, sorting information with ORDER BY, and filtering data using WHERE -- Summarizing and grouping data with GROUP BY and HAVING clauses -- Drawing data from multiple tables: using INNER JOIN, OUTER JOIN, and UNION operators, and working with subqueries -- Modifying data sets with UPDATE, INSERT, and DELETE statements Advanced queries: complex NOT and AND, conditions, if-then-else using CASE, unlinked tables, driver tables, and more Practice all you want with downloadable sample databases for today's versions of Microsoft Office Access, Microsoft SQL Server, and the open source MySQL database. Whether you're a DBA, developer, user, or student, there's no better way to master SQL. informit.com/aw forMereMortals.com

Updated for the latest database management systems -- including MySQL 6.0, Oracle 11g, and Microsoft's SQL Server 2008 -- this introductory guide will get you up and running with SQL quickly. Whether you need to write database applications, perform administrative tasks, or generate reports, Learning SQL, Second Edition, will help you easily master all the SQL fundamentals. Each chapter presents a self-contained lesson on a key SQL concept or technique, with numerous illustrations and annotated examples. Exercises at the end of each chapter let you practice the skills you learn. With this book, you will: Move quickly through SQL basics and learn several advanced features Use SQL data statements to generate, manipulate, and retrieve data Create database objects, such as tables, indexes, and constraints, using SQL schema statements Learn how data sets interact with queries, and understand the importance of subqueries Convert and manipulate data with SQL's built-in functions, and use conditional logic in data statements Knowledge of SQL is a must for interacting with data. With Learning SQL, you'll quickly learn how to put the power and flexibility of this language to work.

Beginning Queries with SQL is a friendly and easily read guide to writing queries with the all-important — in the database world — SQL language. Anyone who does any work at all with databases needs to know something of SQL, and that is evidenced by the strong sales of such books as Learning SQL (O'Reilly) and SQL Queries for Mere Mortals (Pearson). Beginning Queries with SQL is written by the author of Beginning Database Design, an author who is garnering great reviews on Amazon due to the clarity and succinctness of her writing.

A guide to SQL covers such topics as retrieving records, metadata queries, working with strings, data arithmetic, date manipulation, reporting and warehousing, and hierarchical queries.

Analyze data like a pro, even if you’re a beginner. Practical SQL is an approachable and fast-paced guide to SQL (Structured Query Language), the standard programming language for defining, organizing, and exploring data in relational databases. Anthony DeBarros, a journalist and data analyst, focuses on using SQL to find the story within your data. The examples and code use the open-source database PostgreSQL and its companion pgAdmin interface, and the concepts you learn will apply to most database management systems, including MySQL, Oracle, SQLite, and others.* You’ll first cover the fundamentals of databases and the SQL language, then build skills by analyzing data from real-world datasets such as US Census demographics, New York City taxi rides, and earthquakes from US Geological Survey. Each chapter includes exercises and examples that teach even those who have never programmed before all the tools necessary to build powerful databases and access information quickly and efficiently. You’ll learn how to: Create databases and related tables using your own data Aggregate, sort, and filter data to find patterns Use functions for basic math and advanced statistical operations Identify errors in data and clean them up Analyze spatial data with a geographic information system (PostGIS) Create advanced queries and automate tasks This updated second edition has been thoroughly revised to reflect the latest in SQL features, including additional advanced query techniques for wrangling data. This edition also has two new chapters: an expanded set of instructions on for setting up your system plus a chapter on using PostgreSQL with the popular JSON data interchange format. Learning SQL doesn’t have to be dry and complicated. Practical SQL delivers clear examples with an easy-to-follow approach to teach you the tools you need to build and manage your own databases. * Microsoft SQL Server employs a variant of the language called T-SQL, which is not covered by Practical SQL.

T-SQL insiders help you tackle your toughest queries and query-tuning problems Squeeze maximum performance and efficiency from every T-SQL query you write or tune. Four leading experts take an in-depth look at T-SQL’s internal architecture and offer advanced practical techniques for optimizing response time and resource usage. Emphasizing a correct understanding of the language and its foundations, the authors present unique solutions they have spent years developing and refining. All code and techniques are fully updated to reflect new T-SQL enhancements in Microsoft SQL Server 2014 and SQL Server 2012. Write faster, more efficient T-SQL code: Move from procedural programming to the language of sets and logic Master an efficient top-down tuning methodology Assess algorithmic complexity to predict performance Compare data aggregation techniques, including new grouping sets Efficiently perform data-analysis calculations Make the most of T-SQL’s optimized bulk import tools Avoid date/time pitfalls that lead to buggy, poorly performing code Create optimized BI statistical queries without additional software Use programmable objects to accelerate queries Unlock major performance improvements with In-Memory OLTP Master useful and elegant approaches to manipulating graphs About This Book For experienced T-SQL practitioners Includes coverage updated from Inside Microsoft SQL Server 2008 T-SQL Querying and Inside Microsoft SQL Server 2008 T-SQL Programming Valuable to developers, DBAs, BI professionals, and data scientists Covers many MCSE 70-464 and MCSA/MCSE 70-461 exam topics