Author Description

This block introduces SQL, the Structured Query Language - the standard language for data management tasks. First, it introduces you to SQL's facilities for retrieving data from a database using increasingly complex queries. Then it looks at how to use SQL to define and populate tables, define constraints on the data and modify the data held in the database. Finally, it looks at some programming structures that can be used to embed SQL in application processes.Please note that although this block is intended to be self contained, you will find many of the concepts easier to understand if you have a good knowledge of the relational theory of Block 2. Also the practical skills that are developed in this block are used in Blocks 4 and 5. This is a very practical block and requires the use of the Interactive SQL interface to the Sybase DBMS that is supplied on the Software CD (order code M359/CDR01) and database cards University data summary and Hospital data summary (order code M359/DBCARDS).