Transaction is an essential part of the database. No database design is complete without handing transaction behaviour correctly. Transaction defines that all the set of operations has to succeed or fail as a unit. Partial success or failure results in the unexpected output. Transaction is needed to maintain integrity in the database.

BCP (bulk copy program) – a command line utility that bulk copies data between SQL Server database tables and data files. Using BCP, we can export data from a database table, view or a query to data files, generally text delimited files. Moreover, using BCP to import data into SQL Server database table from data […]

A conditional statement IF…ELSE included in many programming languages. IF…ELSE works on boolean expression resulting in TRUE or FALSE. Besides, different actions can be performed on boolean expression results. IF…ELSE in SQL Server is used to check expression and based on the results (TRUE or FALSE) execute another SQL statements block.

Using a keyboard shortcut saves time and effort. Every smart developer should know a handful of keyboard shortcuts to increase productivity. SQL Server includes numerous keyboard shortcuts for developers to increase efficiency. Important to learn and try them out to speed up the development. You can save a lot of time and efforts by assigning […]

SQL Server has added support for various string functions. Coupled with manipulation and pattern finding features. String function takes a string as input and returns numeric value or another string as an output. Depends on the type of function used. Usually while working with string, we need to find the first occurrence of a character […]

Using SELECT and SET statement for variable assignments is a common practice in SQL Server. I did not pay more attention to SELECT vs SET difference, until I met with surprising logical errors. In production code using SELECT over SET, produced unanticipated results. Both are used interchangeably for variable assignment. Importantly, understanding when to use […]

SQL Server agent job is a windows service based scheduler. Agent job is used to schedule and automate SQL scripts, administrative tasks, SSIS packages and various other tasks using SQL agent job tool. This component is integrated along with SSMS and available under Object explorer as SQL Server Agent.

ROW_NUMBER with a CTE (Common Table Expression) is used for Pagination in query results. This was a go-to method with SQL Server 2008. Later, SQL Server 2012 introduced the OFFSET-FETCH option to simplify pagination using queries with improved performance. Pagination is a way to show results into a small number of rows and pages. Instead […]

Microsoft SQL Server software is bundled with exceptional features. Whenever we begin typing queries, SQL Server automatically starts suggesting you the schema names, table name and columns. Many more suggestions are offered to make developers’ work easy. All these suggestions and auto-completes are nothing but SQL Server’s Intelligence cache feature.

SQL Server LIKE operator is used for pattern and wildcard text search. Using LIKE with WHERE clause we can filter out rows by either matching partial text or using a wildcard as a placeholder for a character. We can use a single character or multiple character search. Possible use of LIKE operator is when we […]

Counting the number of characters or size of a string in SQL Server is possible with LEN and DATALENGTH function. Both these functions are used interchangeably. While we need to be careful while using these functions in production code. Basically, both the function sounds similar although each has a distinct purpose.

Constraints in SQL database maintains data integrity and accuracy. SQL Default Constraint is used to assign a default value to a column when no value is specified. Using Default constraint we can have a meaningful value instead of storing NULL or Empty value. It reduces the presence of NULLs when applicable by improving data consistency.