SQL Commands – A Beginner’s Guide To

SQL
Last updated on Jun 19,2023288.2K Views
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Sahiti Kappagantula

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26 / 37 Blog from Introduction to SQL

In the era where data is being generated in humongous amounts, there is a

constant need to handle data in databases. Relational databases are one of
the most popular databases, and SQL is the basis of relational databases.
Therefore SQL skills are indispensable in most of the job roles. In this
article on SQL Commands, I will discuss the top commands and statements
that you need to understand in SQL.

The topics covered in this blog are mainly divided into 4 categories:

 Data Definition Language(DDL) – Consists of commands which are

used to define the database.
 Data Manipulation Language(DML) – Consists of commands which
are used to manipulate the data present in the database.
  Data Control Language(DCL) – Consists of commands which deal
with the user permissions and controls of the database system.
 Transaction Control Language(TCL) – Consist of commands which
deal with the transaction of the database.

Apart from the above commands, the following topics will also be covered
in this article:

 Comments in SQL
 Different Types Of Keys In Database
 Constraints Used In Database
 Nested Queries
 Joins
 Set Operations
 Dates & Auto Increment
 Views
 Stored Procedures
 Triggers

In this article on SQL Commands, I am going to consider the below database

as an example, to show you how to write commands.

Emergency
EmployeeI EmployeeNa PhoneNumb Countr
ContactNa Address City
D me er y
me
Oberoi
01 Shanaya Abhinay 9898765612 Mumbai India
Street 23
Marathal
02 Anay Soumya 9432156783 li House Delhi India
No 23
Queens Bangalor
03 Preeti Rohan 9764234519 India
Road 45 e
Brigade
Hyderaba
04 Vihaan Akriti 9966442211 Road India
d
Block 4
Mayo
05 Manasa Shourya 9543176246 Kolkata India
Road 23
So, let’s get started now!

Comments in SQL
There are two ways in which you can comment in SQL, i.e. either the Single-
Line Comments or the Multi-Line Comments.

Single-Line Comments
The single line comment starts with two hyphens (–). So, any text mentioned
after (–), till the end of a single line will be ignored by the compiler.

Example:

1--Select all:
2SELECT * FROM Employee_Info;
Multi-Line Comments

The Multi-line comments start with /* and end with */. So, any text
mentioned between /* and */ will be ignored by the compiler.

Example:

1/*Select all the columns

2of all the records
3from the Employee_Info table:*/
4SELECT * FROM Students;
SQL Commands: Data Definition Language
Commands (DDL)
This section of the article will give you an insight into the commands
through which you can define your database. The commands are as follows:


 CREATE
 DROP
 TRUNCATE
 ALTER
 BACKUP DATABASE

CREATE

This statement is used to create a table or a database.

The ‘CREATE DATABASE’ Statement

As the name suggests, this statement is used to create a database.

Syntax

CREATE DATABASE DatabaseName;

Example

1CREATE DATABASE Employee;

The ‘CREATE TABLE’ Statement
This statement is used to create a table.

Syntax

CREATE TABLE TableName (

Column1 datatype,
Column2 datatype,
Column3 datatype,
....

ColumnN datatype
);
Example

1
2CREATE TABLE Employee_Info
(
3
EmployeeID int,
4EmployeeName varchar(255),
5Emergency ContactName varchar(255),
6PhoneNumber int,
7Address varchar(255),
8City varchar(255),
9Country varchar(255)
10);
You can also create a table using another table. Refer the below sytax and
example:

The ‘CREATE TABLE AS’ Statement

Syntax

CREATE TABLE NewTableName AS

SELECT Column1, column2,..., ColumnN
FROM ExistingTableName
WHERE ....;
Example

1CREATE TABLE ExampleTable AS

2SELECT EmployeeName, PhoneNumber
3FROM Employee_Info;
DROP

This statement is used to drop an existing table or a database.

The ‘DROP DATABASE’ Statement

This statement is used to drop an existing database. When you use this
statement, complete information present in the database will be lost.
Syntax

DROP DATABASE DatabaseName;

Example

1DROP DATABASE Employee;

The ‘DROP TABLE’ Statement

This statement is used to drop an existing table. When you use this
statement, complete information present in the table will be lost.

Syntax

DROP TABLE TableName;

Example

1DROP Table Employee_Info;

TRUNCATE

This command is used to delete the information present in the table but
does not delete the table. So, once you use this command, your information
will be lost, but not the table.

Syntax

TRUNCATE TABLE TableName;

Example

1TRUNCATE Table Employee_Info;

ALTER

This command is used to delete, modify or add constraints or columns in an

existing table.

The ‘ALTER TABLE’ Statement

This statement is used to add, delete, modify columns in an existing table.

The ‘ALTER TABLE’ Statement with ADD/DROP COLUMN

You can use the ALTER TABLE statement with ADD/DROP Column command
according to your need. If you wish to add a column, then you will use the
ADD command, and if you wish to delete a column, then you will use the
DROP COLUMN command.

Syntax

ALTER TABLE TableName

ADD ColumnName Datatype;
ALTER TABLE TableName
DROP COLUMN ColumnName;
Example

1--ADD Column BloodGroup:

2
3ALTER TABLE Employee_Info
4ADD BloodGroup varchar(255);
5
6--DROP Column BloodGroup:
7
8ALTER TABLE Employee_Info
9DROP COLUMN BloodGroup ;
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Course.

The ‘ALTER TABLE’ Statement with ALTER/MODIFY COLUMN

This statement is used to change the datatype of an existing column in a

table.

Syntax

ALTER TABLE TableName

ALTER COLUMN ColumnName Datatype;
Example

1--Add a column DOB and change the data type to Date.

2
3ALTER TABLE Employee_Info
4ADD DOB year;
5
6ALTER TABLE Employee_Info
7ALTER DOB date;
BACKUP DATABASE

This statement is used to create a full backup of an existing database.

Syntax

BACKUP DATABASE DatabaseName

TO DISK = 'filepath';
Example

1BACKUP DATABASE Employee

2TO DISK = 'C:UsersSahitiDesktop';
You can also use a differential back up. This type of back up only backs up
the parts of the database, which have changed since the last complete
backup of the database.

Syntax

BACKUP DATABASE DatabaseName

TO DISK = 'filepath'
WITH DIFFERENTIAL;
Example

1BACKUP DATABASE Employee

2TO DISK = 'C:UsersSahitiDesktop'
3WITH DIFFERENTIAL;
Now that you know the data definition commands, let me take you through
the various types of Keys and Constraints that you need to understand
before learning how to manipulate the databases.

SQL Commands: Different Types Of Keys In Database

There are mainly 7 types of Keys, that can be considered in a database. I am
going to consider the below tables to explain to you the various keys.
 Candidate Key – A set of attributes which can uniquely identify a
table can be termed as a Candidate Key. A table can have more than
one candidate key, and out of the chosen candidate keys, one key can
 be chosen as a Primary Key. In the above example, since EmployeeID,
InsuranceNumber and PanNumber can uniquely identify every tuple,
they would be considered as a Candidate Key.
 Super Key – The set of attributes which can uniquely identify a tuple
is known as Super Key. So, a candidate key, primary key, and a
unique key is a superkey, but vice-versa isn’t true.
 Primary Key – A set of attributes which are used to uniquely identify
every tuple is also a primary key. In the above example, since
EmployeeID, InsuranceNumber and PanNumber are candidate keys,
any one of them can be chosen as a Primary Key. Here EmployeeID is
chosen as the primary key.
 Alternate Key – Alternate Keys are the candidate keys, which are not
chosen as a Primary key. From the above example, the alternate keys
are PanNumber and Insurance Number.
 Unique Key – The unique key is similar to the primary key, but
allows one NULL value in the column. Here the Insurance Number
and the Pan Number can be considered as unique keys.
 Foreign Key – An attribute that can only take the values present as
the values of some other attribute, is the foreign key to the attribute
to which it refers. in the above example, the Employee_ID from the
Employee_Information Table is referred to the Employee_ID from the
Employee_Salary Table.
 Composite Key – A composite key is a combination of two or more
columns that identify each tuple uniquely. Here, the Employee_ID and
Month-Year_Of_Salary can be grouped together to uniquely identify
every tuple in the table.

SQL Commands: Constraints Used In Database

Constraints are used in a database to specify the rules for data in a table.
The following are the different types of constraints:

 NOT NULL
 UNIQUE
 CHECK
 DEFAULT
 INDEX

NOT NULL

This constraint ensures that a column cannot have a NULL value.

Example
 1
2--NOT NULL on Create Table
3
4CREATE TABLE Employee_Info
5(
6EmployeeID int NOT NULL,
7EmployeeName varchar(255) NOT NULL,
Emergency ContactName varchar(255),
8
PhoneNumber int NOT NULL,
9Address varchar(255),
10City varchar(255),
11Country varchar(255)
12);
13
14--NOT NULL on ALTER TABLE
15
16ALTER TABLE Employee_Info
17MODIFY PhoneNumber int NOT NULL;
UNIQUE

This constraint ensures that all the values in a column are unique.

Example

1--UNIQUE on Create Table

2
3CREATE TABLE Employee_Info
4(
5EmployeeID int NOT NULL UNIQUE,
6EmployeeName varchar(255) NOT NULL,
7Emergency ContactName varchar(255),
8PhoneNumber int NOT NULL,
Address varchar(255),
9
City varchar(255),
10
Country varchar(255)
11);
12
13--UNIQUE on Multiple Columns
14
15CREATE TABLE Employee_Info
16(
17EmployeeID int NOT NULL,
18EmployeeName varchar(255) NOT NULL,
19Emergency ContactName varchar(255),
20PhoneNumber int NOT NULL,
21Address varchar(255),
22City varchar(255),
23Country varchar(255),
24CONSTRAINT UC_Employee_Info UNIQUE(Employee_ID, PhoneNumber)
25);
26
--UNIQUE on ALTER TABLE
27
28
29
30ALTER TABLE Employee_Info
31ADD UNIQUE (Employee_ID);
32
33--To drop a UNIQUE constraint
34
35ALTER TABLE Employee_Info
36DROP CONSTRAINT UC_Employee_Info;
CHECK

This constraint ensures that all the values in a column satisfy a specific
condition.

Example

1--CHECK Constraint on CREATE TABLE

2
3CREATE TABLE Employee_Info
4(
5EmployeeID int NOT NULL,
6EmployeeName varchar(255),
7Emergency ContactName varchar(255),
8PhoneNumber int,
Address varchar(255),
9
City varchar(255),
10
Country varchar(255) CHECK (Country=='India')
11);
12
13--CHECK Constraint on multiple columns
14
15CREATE TABLE Employee_Info
16(
17EmployeeID int NOT NULL,
18EmployeeName varchar(255),
19Emergency ContactName varchar(255),
20PhoneNumber int,
21Address varchar(255),
22City varchar(255),
23Country varchar(255) CHECK (Country = 'India' AND Cite = 'Hyderabad')
24);
25
26--CHECK Constraint on ALTER TABLE
27
28ALTER TABLE Employee_Info
ADD CHECK (Country=='India');
29
30
--To give a name to the CHECK Constraint
31
32ALTER TABLE Employee_Info
33
34
35ADD CONSTRAINT CheckConstraintName CHECK (Country=='India');
36
37--To drop a CHECK Constraint
38
39ALTER TABLE Employee_Info
40DROP CONSTRAINT CheckConstraintName;
DEFAULT

This constraint consists of a set of default values for a column when no

value is specified.

Example

1
2--DEFAULT Constraint on CREATE TABLE
3
4CREATE TABLE Employee_Info
5(
6EmployeeID int NOT NULL,
7EmployeeName varchar(255),
8Emergency ContactName varchar(255),
9PhoneNumber int,
10Address varchar(255),
11City varchar(255),
Country varchar(255) DEFAULT 'India'
12
);
13
14--DEFAULT Constraint on ALTER TABLE
15
16ALTER TABLE Employee_Info
17ADD CONSTRAINT defau_Country
18DEFAULT 'India' FOR Country;
19
20--To drop the Default Constraint
21
22ALTER TABLE Employee_Info
23ALTER COLUMN Country DROP DEFAULT;
INDEX

This constraint is used to create indexes in the table, through which you can
create and retrieve data from the database very quickly.

Syntax

--Create an Index where duplicate values are allowed

CREATE INDEX IndexName
ON TableName (Column1, Column2, ...ColumnN);
--Create an Index where duplicate values are not allowed
CREATE UNIQUE INDEX IndexName
ON TableName (Column1, Column2, ...ColumnN);
Example

1CREATE INDEX idex_EmployeeName

2ON Persons (EmployeeName);
3
4--To delete an index in a table
5
6DROP INDEX Employee_Info.idex_EmployeeName;
Now, let us look into the next part of this article i.e. DML Commands.

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SQL Commands: Data Manipulation Language

Commands (DML)
This section of the article will give you an insight into the commands
through which you can manipulate the database. The commands are as
follows:


 USE
 INSERT INTO
 UPDATE
 DELETE
 SELECT

Apart from these commands, there are also other manipulative

operators/functions such as:


 Operators
 Aggregate Functions
  NULL Functions
 Aliases & Case Statement

USE

The USE statement is used to select the database on which you want to
perform operations.

Syntax

USE DatabaseName;
Example

1USE Employee;
INSERT INTO

This statement is used to insert new records into the table.

Syntax

INSERT INTO TableName (Column1, Column2, Column3, ...,ColumnN)

VALUES (value1, value2, value3, ...);

--If you don't want to mention the column names then use the
below syntax

INSERT INTO TableName

VALUES (Value1, Value2, Value3, ...);
Example

1INSERT INTO Employee_Info(EmployeeID, EmployeeName, Emergency ContactName, PhoneNumber, Addr

2VALUES ('06', 'Sanjana','Jagannath', '9921321141', 'Camel Street House No 12', 'Chennai', 'I
3
4INSERT INTO Employee_Info
5VALUES ('07', 'Sayantini','Praveen', '9934567654', 'Nice Road 21', 'Pune', 'India');
UPDATE

This statement is used to modify the records already present in the table.

Syntax

UPDATE TableName
SET Column1 = Value1, Column2 = Value2, ...
WHERE Condition;
Example

1UPDATE Employee_Info
2SET EmployeeName = 'Aahana', City= 'Ahmedabad'
3WHERE EmployeeID = 1;
DELETE

This statement is used to delete the existing records in a table.

Syntax

DELETE FROM TableName WHERE Condition;

Example

1DELETE FROM Employee_Info

2WHERE EmployeeName='Preeti';
SELECT

This statement is used to select data from a database and the data returned
is stored in a result table, called the result-set.

Syntax

SELECT Column1, Column2, ...ColumN

FROM TableName;

--(*) is used to select all from the table

SELECT * FROM table_name;

-- To select the number of records to return use:

SELECT TOP 3 * FROM TableName;
Example

1SELECT EmployeeID, EmployeeName

2FROM Employee_Info;
3
4--(*) is used to select all from the table
5SELECT * FROM Employee_Info;
6
7-- To select the number of records to return use:
8SELECT TOP 3 * FROM Employee_Info;
Apart from just using the SELECT keyword individually, you can use the
following keywords with the SELECT statement:


 DISTINCT
 ORDER BY
 GROUP BY
 HAVING Clause
 INTO
The ‘SELECT DISTINCT’ Statement

This statement is used to return only different values.

Syntax

SELECT DISTINCT Column1, Column2, ...ColumnN

FROM TableName;
Example

1SELECT DISTINCT PhoneNumber FROM Employee_Info;

The ‘ORDER BY’ Statement

The ‘ORDER BY’ statement is used to sort the required results in ascending
or descending order. The results are sorted in ascending order by default.
Yet, if you wish to get the required results in descending order, you have to
use the DESC keyword.

Syntax

SELECT Column1, Column2, ...ColumnN

FROM TableName
ORDER BY Column1, Column2, ... ASC|DESC;
Example

1
2-- Select all employees from the 'Employee_Info' table sorted by EmergencyContactName:
3SELECT * FROM Employee_Info
4ORDER BY EmergencyContactName;
5
-- Select all employees from the 'Employee_Info' table sorted by EmergencyContactName in De
6
SELECT * FROM Employee_Info
7ORDER BY EmergencyContactName DESC;
8
9-- Select all employees from the 'Employee_Info' table sorted by EmergencyContactName and E
10SELECT * FROM Employee_Info
11ORDER BY EmergencyContactName, EmployeeName;
12
13/* Select all employees from the 'Employee_Info' table sorted by EmergencyContactName in De
14SELECT * FROM Employee_Info
15ORDER BY EmergencyContactName ASC, EmployeeName DESC;
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The ‘GROUP BY’ Statement
This ‘GROUP BY’ statement is used with the aggregate functions to group
the result-set by one or more columns.

Syntax

SELECT Column1, Column2,..., ColumnN

FROM TableName
WHERE Condition
GROUP BY ColumnName(s)
ORDER BY ColumnName(s);
Example

1-- To list the number of employees from each city.

2
3SELECT COUNT(EmployeeID), City
4FROM Employee_Info
5GROUP BY City;
The ‘HAVING’ Clause

The ‘HAVING’ clause is used in SQL because the WHERE keyword cannot be
used everywhere.

Syntax

SELECT ColumnName(s)
FROM TableName
WHERE Condition
GROUP BY ColumnName(s)
HAVING Condition
ORDER BY ColumnName(s);
Example

/* To list the number of employees in each city. The employees should be sorted high to low
1employees:*/
2
3SELECT COUNT(EmployeeID), City
4FROM Employee_Info
5GROUP BY City
6HAVING COUNT(EmployeeID) > 2
7ORDER BY COUNT(EmployeeID) DESC;
The ‘SELECT INTO’ Statement

The ‘SELECT INTO’ statement is used to copy data from one table to
another.

Syntax

SELECT *
INTO NewTable [IN ExternalDB]
FROM OldTable
WHERE Condition;
Example

1
-- To create a backup of database 'Employee'
2
SELECT * INTO EmployeeBackup
3FROM Employee;
4
5--To select only few columns from Employee
6SELECT EmployeeName, PhoneNumber INTO EmployeeContactDetails
7FROM Employee;
8
9SELECT * INTO BlrEmployee
10FROM Employee
11WHERE City = 'Bangalore';
Now, as I mentioned before, let us move onto our next section in this article
on SQL Commands, i.e. the Operators.

Operators in SQL

The different set of operators available in SQL are as follows:

Let us look into each one of them, one by one.

Arithmetic Operators

Operator Description
% Modulous [A % B]
/ Division [A / B]
* Multiplication [A * B]
 – Subtraction [A – B]
+ Addition [A + B]
Bitwise Operators

Operator Description
^ Bitwise Exclusive OR (XOR) [A ^ B]
| Bitwise OR [A | B]
& Bitwise AND [A & B]
Comparison Operators

Operator Description
<> Not Equal to [A < > B]
<= Less than or equal to [A <= B]
>= Greater than or equal to [A >= B]
< Less than [A < B]
> Greater than [A > B]
= Equal to [A = B]
Compound Operators

Operator Description
|*= Bitwise OR equals [A |*= B]
^-= Bitwise Exclusive equals [A ^-= B]
&= Bitwise AND equals [A &= B]
%= Modulo equals [A %= B]
/= Divide equals [A /= B]
*= Multiply equals [A*= B]
-= Subtract equals [A-= B]
+= Add equals [A+= B]
Logical Operators

The Logical operators present in SQL are as follows:


 AND
 OR
 NOT
 BETWEEN
 LIKE
 IN
 EXISTS
 ALL
 ANY
AND Operator

This operator is used to filter records that rely on more than one condition.
This operator displays the records, which satisfy all the conditions
separated by AND, and give the output TRUE.

Syntax

SELECT Column1, Column2, ..., ColumnN

FROM TableName
WHERE Condition1 AND Condition2 AND Condition3 ...;
Example

1SELECT * FROM Employee_Info

2WHERE City='Mumbai' AND City='Hyderabad';</pre>
OR Operator

This operator displays all those records which satisfy any of the conditions
separated by OR and give the output TRUE.

Syntax

SELECT Column1, Column2, ..., ColumnN

FROM TableName
WHERE Condition1 OR Condition2 OR Condition3 ...;
Example

1SELECT * FROM Employee_Info

2WHERE City='Mumbai' OR City='Hyderabad';
NOT Operator

The NOT operator is used, when you want to display the records which do
not satisfy a condition.

Syntax

SELECT Column1, Column2, ..., ColumnN

FROM TableName
WHERE NOT Condition;
Example

1SELECT * FROM Employee_Info

2WHERE NOT City='Mumbai';
NOTE: You can also combine the above three operators and write a query
as follows:
1SELECT * FROM Employee_Info
2WHERE NOT Country='India' AND (City='Bangalore' OR City='Hyderabad');
NOTE: You can also combine the above three operators and write a query
as follows:
1SELECT * FROM Employee_Info
WHERE NOT Country='India' AND (City='Bangalore' OR City='Hyderabad');
2
BETWEEN Operator

The BETWEEN operator is used, when you want to select values within a
given range. Since this is an inclusive operator, both the starting and ending
values are considered.

Syntax

SELECT ColumnName(s)
FROM TableName
WHERE ColumnName BETWEEN Value1 AND Value2;
Example

1SELECT * FROM Employee_Salary

2WHERE Salary BETWEEN 40000 AND 50000;
LIKE Operator

The LIKE operator is used in a WHERE clause to search for a specified

pattern in a column of a table. There are mainly two wildcards that are used
in conjunction with the LIKE operator:

 % – It matches 0 or more character.

 _ – It matches exactly one character.

Syntax

SELECT ColumnName(s)
FROM TableName
WHERE ColumnName LIKE pattern;
Refer to the following table for the various patterns that you can mention
with the LIKE operator.

Like Operator Condition Description

WHERE CustomerName LIKE ‘v% Finds any values that start with “v”
WHERE CustomerName LIKE ‘%v’ Finds any values that end with “v”
WHERE CustomerName LIKE ‘%and%’ Finds any values that have “and” in any pos
WHERE CustomerName LIKE ‘_q%’ Finds any values that have “q” in the second p
Finds any values that start with “u” and are at
WHERE CustomerName LIKE ‘u_%_%’
characters in length
WHERE ContactName LIKE ‘m%a’ Finds any values that start with “m” and end w
Example

1SELECT * FROM Employee_Info

2WHERE EmployeeName LIKE 'S%';
IN Operator
This operator is used for multiple OR conditions. This allows you to specify
multiple values in a WHERE clause.

Syntax

SELECT ColumnName(s)
FROM TableName
WHERE ColumnName IN (Value1,Value2...);
Example

1SELECT * FROM Employee_Info

2WHERE City IN ('Mumbai', 'Bangalore', 'Hyderabad');
NOTE: You can also use IN while writing Nested Queries.
EXISTS Operator

The EXISTS operator is used to test if a record exists or not.

Syntax

SELECT ColumnName(s)
FROM TableName
WHERE EXISTS
(SELECT ColumnName FROM TableName WHERE condition);
Example

1SELECT EmergencyContactName
2FROM Employee_Info
3WHERE EXISTS (SELECT EmergencyContactName FROM Employee_Info WHERE EmployeeId = 05 AND City
ALL Operator

The ALL operator is used with a WHERE or HAVING clause and returns TRUE
if all of the subquery values meet the condition.

Syntax

SELECT ColumnName(s)
FROM TableName
WHERE ColumnName operator ALL
(SELECT ColumnName FROM TableName WHERE condition);
Example

1SELECT EmployeeName
2FROM Employee_Info
3WHERE EmployeeID = ALL (SELECT EmployeeID FROM Employee_Info WHERE City = 'Hyderabad');
ANY Operator

Similar to the ALL operator, the ANY operator is also used with a WHERE
or HAVING clause and returns true if any of the subquery values meet the
condition.

Syntax
SELECT ColumnName(s)
FROM TableName
WHERE ColumnName operator ANY
(SELECT ColumnName FROM TableName WHERE condition);
Example

1SELECT EmployeeName
2FROM Employee_Info
3WHERE EmployeeID = ANY (SELECT EmployeeID FROM Employee_Info WHERE City = 'Hyderabad' OR Cit
Next, in this article on SQL Commands, let us look into the various
Aggregate Functions provided in SQL.

Aggregate Functions

This section of the article will include the following functions:


 MIN()
 MAX()
 COUNT()
 SUM()
 AVG()

MIN() Function

The MIN function returns the smallest value of the selected column in a
table.

Syntax

SELECT MIN(ColumnName)
FROM TableName
WHERE Condition;
Example

1SELECT MIN(EmployeeID) AS SmallestID

2FROM Employee_Info;
MAX() Function

The MAX function returns the largest value of the selected column in a
table.

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Syntax

SELECT MAX(ColumnName)
FROM TableName
WHERE Condition;
Example

1SELECT MAX(Salary) AS LargestFees

2FROM Employee_Salary;
COUNT() Function
The COUNT function returns the number of rows which match the specified
criteria.

Syntax

SELECT COUNT(ColumnName)
FROM TableName
WHERE Condition;
Example

1SELECT COUNT(EmployeeID)
2FROM Employee_Info;
SUM() Function

The SUM function returns the total sum of a numeric column that you
choose.

Syntax

SELECT SUM(ColumnName)
FROM TableName
WHERE Condition;
Example

1SELECT SUM(Salary)
2FROM Employee_Salary;
AVG() Function

The AVG function returns the average value of a numeric column that you
choose.

Syntax

SELECT AVG(ColumnName)
FROM TableName
WHERE Condition;
Example

1SELECT AVG(Salary)
2FROM Employee_Salary;
NULL Functions

The NULL functions are those functions which let you return an alternative
value if an expression is NULL. In the SQL Server, the function is ISNULL().

Example

1SELECT EmployeeID * (Month_Year_of_Salary + ISNULL(Salary, 0))

2FROM Employee_Salary;
Aliases & Case Statement

In this section of this article on SQL Commands, you will go through

the Aliases and Case statement one after the other.

Aliases

Aliases are used to give a column/table a temporary name and only exists
for a duration of the query.

Syntax

--Alias Column Syntax

SELECT ColumnName AS AliasName

FROM TableName;

--Alias Table Syntax

SELECT ColumnName(s)
FROM TableName AS AliasName;
Example

1SELECT EmployeeID AS ID, EmployeeName AS EmpName

2FROM Employee_Info;
3
4SELECT EmployeeName AS EmpName, EmergencyContactName AS [Contact Name]
5FROM Employee_Info;
Case Statement

This statement goes through all the conditions and returns a value when
the first condition is met. So, if no conditions are TRUE, it returns the value
in the ELSE clause. Also, if no conditions are true and there is no ELSE part,
then it returns NULL.

Syntax

CASE
WHEN Condition1 THEN Result1
WHEN Condition2 THEN Result2
WHEN ConditionN THEN ResultN
ELSE Result
END;
Example

1SELECT EmployeeName, City

2FROM Employee_Info
3ORDER BY
4(CASE
5 WHEN City IS NULL THEN 'Country is India by default'
6 ELSE City
7END);
Now, that I have told you a lot about DML commands in this article on SQL
Commands, let me just tell you in short about Nested Queries, Joins, Set
Operations, and Dates & Auto Increment.

SQL Commands: Nested Queries

Nested queries are those queries which have an outer query and inner
subquery. So, basically, the subquery is a query which is nested within
another query such as SELECT, INSERT, UPDATE or DELETE. Refer to the
image below:
SQL Commands: Joins
JOINS are used to combine rows from two or more tables, based on a
related column between those tables. The following are the types of joins:

 INNER JOIN: This join returns those records which have matching
values in both the tables.
 FULL JOIN: This join returns all those records which either have a
match in the left or the right table.
 LEFT JOIN: This join returns records from the left table, and also
those records which satisfy the condition from the right table.
 RIGHT JOIN: This join returns records from the right table, and also
those records which satisfy the condition from the left table.

Refer to the image below.

Let’s consider the below table apart from the Employee_Info table, to
understand the syntax of joins.

TechID EmpID TechName ProjectStartDate

1 10 DevOps 04-01-2019
2 11 Blockchain 06-07-2019
3 12 Python 01-03-2019
INNER JOIN

Syntax

SELECT ColumnName(s)
FROM Table1
INNER JOIN Table2 ON Table1.ColumnName = Table2.ColumnName;
Example

1SELECT Technologies.TechID, Employee_Info.EmployeeName

2FROM Technologies
3INNER JOIN Employee_Info ON Technologies.EmpID = Employee_Info.EmpID;
FULL JOIN

Syntax

SELECT ColumnName(s)
FROM Table1
FULL OUTER JOIN Table2 ON Table1.ColumnName = Table2.ColumnName;
Example

1SELECT Employee_Info.EmployeeName, Technologies.TechID

2FROM Employee_Info
3FULL OUTER JOIN Orders ON Employee_Info.EmpID=Employee_Salary.EmpID
4ORDER BY Employee_Info.EmployeeName;
LEFT JOIN

Syntax

SELECT ColumnName(s)
FROM Table1
LEFT JOIN Table2 ON Table1.ColumnName = Table2.ColumnName;
Example

1SELECT Employee_Info.EmployeeName, Technologies.TechID

2FROM Employee_Info
3LEFT JOIN Technologies ON Employee_Info.EmployeeID = Technologies.EmpIDID
4ORDER BY Employee_Info.EmployeeName;
RIGHT JOIN

Syntax
SELECT ColumnName(s)
FROM Table1
RIGHT JOIN Table2 ON Table1.ColumnName = Table2.ColumnName;
Example

1SELECT Technologies.TechID
2FROM Technologies
3RIGHT JOIN Employee_Info ON Technologies.EmpID = Employee_Info.EmployeeID
4ORDER BY Technologies.TechID;
SQL Commands: Set Operations
There are mainly three set operations:UNION, INTERSECT, EXCEPT. You can
refer to the image below to understand the set operations in SQL.

UNION

This operator is used to combine the result-set of two or

more SELECT statements.

Syntax

SELECT ColumnName(s) FROM Table1

UNION
SELECT ColumnName(s) FROM Table2;
INTERSECT

This clause used to combine two SELECT statements and return the
intersection of the data-sets of both the SELECT statements.

Syntax

SELECT Column1 , Column2 ....

FROM TableName
WHERE Condition

INTERSECT

SELECT Column1 , Column2 ....

FROM TableName
WHERE Condition
EXCEPT

This operator returns those tuples that are returned by the

first SELECT operation, and are not returned by the second SELECT
operation.

Syntax

SELECT ColumnName
FROM TableName

EXCEPT

SELECT ColumnName
FROM TableName;
Next, in this article, let us look into the date functions and auto-increment
fields.

SQL Commands: Dates & Auto Increment

In this section of this article, I will explain to you how to use the Date
functions and also the Auto-Increment fields.

Dates

The following data types are present in a SQL Server to store a date or a
date/time value in a database.

Data Type Format

DATE YYYY-MM-DD
 DATETIME YYYY-MM-DD HH:MI:SS
SMALLDATETIME YYYY-MM-DD HH:MI:SS
TIMESTAMP A Unique Number
Example

1SELECT * FROM Technologies WHERE ProjectStartDate='2019-04-01'

Auto Increment

This field generates a unique number automatically when a new record is

inserted into a table. The MS SQL Server uses the IDENTITY keyword for
this feature.

Example

1<span>/* To define the "EmployeeID" column to be an auto-increment primary key field in the
2
3<span>CREATE TABLE Employee_Info (</span>
4<span>EmployeeID INT IDENTITY(1,1) PRIMARY KEY,</span>
5<span>EmployeeName VARCHAR(255) NOT NULL</span>
6<span>EmergencyContactName VARCHAR(255) NOT NULL,</span>
7<span>);</span>
Now, that you guys know the DML commands, let’s move onto our next
section in this article on SQL Commands i.e. the DCL commands.

SQL Commands: Data Control Language Commands

(DCL)
This section of the article will give you an insight into the commands which
are used to enforce database security in multiple user database
environments. The commands are as follows:


 GRANT
 REVOKE

GRANT

This command is used to provide access or privileges on the database and

its objects to the users.

Syntax

GRANT PrivilegeName
ON ObjectName
TO {UserName |PUBLIC |RoleName}
[WITH GRANT OPTION];
where,

 PrivilegeName – Is the privilege/right/access granted to the user.

 ObjectName – Name of a database object like TABLE/VIEW/STORED
PROC.
 UserName – Name of the user who is given the
access/rights/privileges.
 PUBLIC – To grant access rights to all users.
 RoleName – The name of a set of privileges grouped together.
 WITH GRANT OPTION – To give the user access to grant other users
with rights.

Example

1-- To grant SELECT permission to Employee_Info table to user1

2GRANT SELECT ON Employee_Info TO user1;
REVOKE

This command is used to withdraw the user’s access privileges given by

using the GRANT command.

Syntax

REVOKE PrivilegeName
ON ObjectName
FROM {UserName |PUBLIC |RoleName}
Example

1-- To revoke the granted permission from user1

2REVOKE SELECT ON Employee_Info TO user1;
Now, next in this article on SQL Commands, I will discuss Views, Stored
Procedures, and Triggers.

SQL Commands: Views

A view in SQL is a single table, which is derived from other tables. So, a view
contains rows and columns similar to a real table and has fields from one or
more table.
The ‘CREATE VIEW’ statement

This statement is used to create a view, from a table.

Syntax

CREATE VIEW ViewName AS

SELECT Column1, Column2, ..., ColumnN
FROM TableName
WHERE Condition;
Example

1CREATE VIEW [Kolkata Employees] AS

2SELECT EmployeeName, PhoneNumber
3FROM Employee_Info
4WHERE City = "Kolkata";
The ‘CREATE OR REPLACE VIEW’ statement

This statement is used to update a view.

Syntax

CREATE VIEW OR REPLACE ViewName AS

SELECT Column1, Column2, ..., ColumnN
FROM TableName
WHERE Condition;
Example

1CREATE VIEW OR REPLACE [Kolkata Employees] AS

2SELECT EmployeeName, PhoneNumber
3FROM Employee_Info
4WHERE City = "Kolkata";
The ‘DROP VIEW’ statement

This statement is used to delete a view.

Syntax

DROP VIEW ViewName;

Example

1DROP VIEW [Kolkata Employees];

SQL Commands: Stored Procedures
A code which you can save and reuse it again is known as
StoredProcedures.

Syntax

CREATE PROCEDURE ProcedureName

AS
SQLStatement
GO;
Example

1EXEC ProcedureName;
SQL Commands: Triggers
Triggers are a set of SQL statements which are stored in the database
catalog. These statements are executed whenever an event associated with
a table occurs. So, a trigger can be invoked either BEFORE or AFTER the
data is changed by INSERT, UPDATE or DELETE statement. Refer to the
image below.
Syntax

CREATE TRIGGER [TriggerName]

[BEFORE | AFTER]
{INSERT | UPDATE | DELETE}
on [TableName]
[FOR EACH ROW]
[TriggerBody]
Now, let’s move on to the last section of this article on SQL Commands i.e.
the Transaction Control Language Commands.

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SQL Commands: Transaction Control Language

Commands (TCL)
This section of the article will give you an insight into the commands which
are used to manage transactions in the database. The commands are as
follows:


 COMMIT
 ROLLBACK
 SAVEPOINT

COMMIT

This command is used to save the transaction into the database.

Syntax

COMMIT;
ROLLBACK

This command is used to restore the database to the last committed state.

Syntax

ROLLBACK;
NOTE: When you use ROLLBACK with SAVEPOINT, then you can directly
jump to a savepoint in an ongoing transaction. Syntax: ROLLBACK TO
SavepointName;
SAVEPOINT

This command is used to temporarily save a transaction. So if you wish to

rollback to any point, then you can save that point as a ‘SAVEPOINT’.

Syntax

SAVEPOINT SAVEPOINTNAME;
Consider the below example to understand the working of transactions in
the database.

EmployeeID EmployeeName
01 Ruhaan
02 Suhana
03 Aayush
04 Rashi
Now, use the below SQL queries to understand the transactions in the
database.

1
2INSERT INTO Employee_Table VALUES(05, 'Avinash');
3COMMIT;
UPDATE Employee_Table SET name = 'Akash' WHERE id = '05';
4
SAVEPOINT S1;
5INSERT INTO Employee_Table VALUES(06, 'Sanjana');
6SAVEPOINT S2;
7INSERT INTO Employee_Table VALUES(07, 'Sanjay');
8SAVEPOINT S3;
9INSERT INTO Employee_Table VALUES(08, 'Veena');
10SAVEPOINT S4;
11SELECT * FROM Employee_Table;
The output to the above set of queries would be as follows:

EmployeeID EmployeeName
01 Ruhaan
02 Suhana
03 Aayush
04 Rashi
05 Akash
06 Sanjana
07 Sanjay
08 Veena
Now, if you rollback to S2 using the below queries, the output is
mentioned in the below table.

1ROLLBACK TO S2;
2SELECT * FROM Employee_Table;
EmployeeID EmployeeName

01 Ruhaan

02 Suhana

03 Aayush

04 Rashi

05 Akash

06 Sanjana
By this, I come to the end of this article on SQL Commands. I hope you
enjoyed reading this article on SQL Commands. We have seen the different
commands that will help you write queries and play around with your
databases. If you wish to learn more about MySQL and get to know this open
source relational database, then check out our MySQL DBA Certification
Training which comes with instructor-led live training and real-life project
experience. This training will help you understand MySQL in depth and help you
achieve mastery over the subject.

Got a question for us? Please mention it in the comments section of ”SQL
Commands” and I will get back to you.