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A Better way to write SQL queries
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queries. The way you structure your query, the
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way you write it goes a long way to
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communicate your intent to the fellow
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developer. When I see SQL queries on emails
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from multiple developers, I can see the stark
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difference in their writing style. Some
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developers write it so neatly and indent their
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query properly, which makes it easy to spot the
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key details e.g. which columns you are
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extracting from which table and what are
conditions. Since in real life projects, SQL
queries are hardly one‐liner, learning the right way to write SQL query makes a lot of
difference when you read it yourself later or you share that query to someone for review or
use.

In this article, I am going to show you a couple of styles which I have tried in past, their pros
and cons and what I think is the best way to write SQL query. Unless you have a good reason
not to use my style e.g. you have a better style or you want to stick with the style used in
your project (consistency overrules everything) there is no reason not to use it.

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1st way to write SQL query Seleccionar idioma

Con la tecnología de  Traductor de Google
SELECT e.emp_id, e.emp_name, d.dept_name, p.project_name from Employee e  
INNER JOIN Department d ON e.emp_id = d.dept_id INNER JOIN Projects p  
ON e.emp_id = p.project_id Where d.dept_name="finance" and e.emp_name  
like '%A%' and e.salary > 5000;

Pros:
1) mixed case was introduced to separate keyword from column and table names e.g. writing
SELECT in capital case and writing Employee in as it is, but given you are not consistent e.g.
SELECT is in caps but from is in small, there is no benefit of using that style.

Problem:
1) mixed case
2) all query is written on one line which gets unreadable as soon number of tables and
columns increases
3) no flexibility on adding a new condition or running without existing condition

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2nd way to write SQL query

SELECT e.emp_id, e.emp_name, d.dept_name, p.project_name 
from Employee e 
INNER JOIN Department d ON e.emp_id = d.dept_id 
INNER JOIN Projects p ON e.emp_id = p.project_id 
Where d.dept_name="finance" and e.emp_name like '%A%' and e.salary > 500;
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Improvement:
1) query is divided into multiple lines which make it more readable

Problems
1) mixed case
2) all conditions on where clause are on the same line, which means excluding them by
commenting is not that easy.

3rd way to write SQL query

 select e.emp_id, e.emp_name, d.dept_name, p.project_name 
from Employee e 
inner join Department d on e.emp_id = d.dept_id 
where d.dept_name = 'finance' 
and e.emp_name like '%A%' 
and e.salary > 500;

1) dividing SQL queries into multiple lines makes it more readable

2) using proper indentation makes it easy to spot the source of data i.e. tables and joins
3) having conditions on separate lines allow you to run the query by commenting one of the
condition e.g.

select e.emp_id, e.emp_name, d.dept_name 
from Employee e 
inner join Department d on e.emp_id = d.dept_id, p.project_name 
where d.dept_name = 'finance' 
‐‐ and e.emp_name like '%A%'; 
add e.salary > 5000

That's all about how to write SQL query which is readable and more maintainable. Freel free
to give your opinion on what do you think of this indentation or styling of SQL queries. It's a
simpler technique but very powerful and goes a long way on improving the readability of your
complex SQL queries.
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Thanks for reading this article and let me know how do you write SQL queries? which style you
use, or you have your own style?

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Labels: best practices , SQL

4 comments :
Badal Chowdhary said...
Nice post. 1 additional input: make all the sql text lower case and keywords upper case. it can help distinguish
between key words and column/table names.

In SQL Developer, can be easily achieved by:

1. Ctrl + Shift + ' (change case)
2. Ctrl + F7 (Format: keywords are changed to uppercase)

January 12, 2017 at 7:46 AM

Mladen said...
I think upper case sql keywords are not bad. If there is no sql highlighting available (maybe the sql is embedded in
another language or just an email) then it's much easier to read. I also prefer indentation in some cases.

January 14, 2017 at 1:10 AM

Turnkey Solutions said...

You have barely scratched the surface of SQL at this point. What about subqueries?

January 14, 2017 at 7:59 AM

Anonymous said...
I always put the new table name first in a join clause, not second. That way the join looks more consistent if you're
joining to Table c with clauses correlating to Table a and Table b, and if you have a simple join constraint on c, e.g.
"
LEFT JOIN c
ON c.foo = a.foo
AND c.bar = b.bar
AND c.baz LIKE 'A%'​
 January 15, 2017 at 5:21 AM

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