Introduction to SQL Server

Every organization needs to maintain information related to employees,

customers, business partners, or business transactions. Organizations
build business applications with a user-friendly interface to store and
manipulate this information and to generate reports. For this, they
need a platform to store and maintain this information in an efficient
way. Various Database Management Systems (DBMS) and Relational
Database Management Systems (RDBMS), such as SQL Server, Oracle,
and Sybase, provide the platforms for storing and maintaining this
information.

SQL Server is a database engine introduced by Microsoft. It provides

an environment used to create and manage databases. It allows secure
and efficient storage and management of data. In addition, it provides
other components and services that support the business intelligence
platform to generate reports and help in analyzing historical data and
predicting future trends. As a database developer, it is important for
you to identify the role of a database server in an organization. You can
design a database effectively if you know all the components and
services of SQL Server. In addition, you need to understand the basics
of SQL, a language that is used to query and manage data.
Role of a Database Server
Organizations have always been storing and managing business data.
Earlier, organizations used to store data on paper. With an increase in
the usage of computers, organizations started maintaining the same
information in computers. Data was stored in an organized way, and it
was also easy to retrieve data faster than before. As data retrieval
became easy and fast, organizations started using business or Web
applications to support the business operations.

Consider a scenario. The Human Resource department of an

organization uses an application to manage the employee data. The
users need to add the details of new employees. For this, the
application provides an interface to enter the employee details. These
details are validated for accuracy based on business rules. For
example, a business rule is defined to check that the date of joining of
the new employee is less than or equal to the current date. If the data
meets the requirements, it is saved in the data store. Based on the
preceding scenario, a business application can have the following
elements:




The User Interface (UI) or the presentation element through which

data is entered.

The application logic or the business rule element, which helps in

validating the entered data.

The data storage or the data management element, which manages

the storage and retrieval of data.
These elements form the base of the models or architectures used in
application development. All these elements can exist on the same
computer as a single process or on different computers as different
processes. Depending on the placement of these elements, the
application architecture can be categorized as:

 Single-tier architecture

 Two-tier architecture

 Three-tier architecture

 N-tier architecture

Single-Tier Architecture
In a single-tier architecture, all elements of a business application are
combined as a single process. If multiple users need to work on this
application then it needs to be installed on the computer of every user.
This type of architecture has one disadvantage. In case some errors
are identified in the application then after rectifying the same, the
application has to be installed again on the system of every user. This
is a time-consuming process.

Two-Tier Architecture
To solve the problems of single-tier application, two-tier architecture
was introduced. In two-tier architecture, the application is divided into
two parts. One part handles the data, while the other provides the
user interface. Therefore, this architecture is called two-tier
architecture. These two parts can be located on a single computer or
on separate computers over a network. The part that handles the UI is
called the client tier. The part that implements the application logic
and validates the input data based on the business rules is called the
server tier, as shown in the following figure.

In the preceding architecture, the maintenance, upgrade, and general

administration of data is easier, as it exists only on the server and not
on all the clients. A two-tier architecture is also called the client-
server architecture. A client sends the request for a service and a
server provides that service. Most RDBMSs, such as Microsoft Access,
SQL Server, and Oracle, support client-server architecture. RDBMS
provides centralized functionality while supporting many users.

Three-Tier Architecture
When implementing complex business solutions in a two-tier
architecture, the tier on which the business logic is implemented
becomes over loaded. As a result, it takes more time to execute.
Therefore, to provide further flexibility, the two-tier architecture can
be split into three tiers. In three-tier architecture, the first tier is
the client tier. The second or the middle tier is called the business
tier. The third tier is called the server tier. The server tier contains a
database server that manages the data. In this architecture, an
additional tier called a business tier has been added between the client
tier and the server tier, as shown in the following figure.

The business tier consists of all the business rules. It consists of the
application logic that implements business rules and validates the data.
The advantage of a three-tier application is that it allows you to
change the business rules without affecting the other two tiers. For
example, in a banking application for loans, the user tier is the
frontend used by the customer to specify the loan details. The server
tier can consist of an RDBMS in which the data is stored. The business
tier lies between the other two tiers and consists of business rules,
such as the loan limit and the interest rate charged to a customer. If
there is a change in the rate of interest, only the middle tier
component needs to be modified.

N-Tier Architecture
As the business complexities increased, the business tier became
larger and unmanageable. This led to the evolution of n-tier
architecture, where the business services model was divided into
smaller manageable units. N-tier architecture is also called a multi-tier
architecture. In this architecture, one component near the client tier
is responsible to do the client side validation and send the data to the
presentation tier. Therefore, it is possible to keep the UI-centric
processing component on a computer near the client. The UI-centric
processing component is responsible for processing the data retrieved
from and sent to the presentation tier. In addition, you may have
another component near the database server to manipulate and validate
the data. You can keep the data-centric processing components on
another computer near the database server, so that you gain
significant performance benefits. Data-centric processing components
are responsible for accessing the data tier to retrieve, modify, and
delete data to and from the database server. The n-tier architecture
consists of the following layers:

Client tier

 UI-centric processing components

 Data-centric processing objects

Database server

The banking application, when further expanded, can represent an

example of n tier architecture. The client tier would consist of the
user interface, which would include the user interface controls, such as
forms, menus, and toolbars. The server tier would consist of data-
handling including saving data to the database server. The business
logic would include the rules and guidelines for different types of
accounts, interest rates, fixed deposits, ATMs, and loan rules. All of
these would form the middle tier. However, there would be some rules
that need to be implemented both on the user interface and on the
database. You can place these rules either on the UI-centric
processing components or data-centric processing components, based
on the functionality. Applications that follow multi-tier architecture
can be used across various locations. For example, in Web applications,
an application is stored on the Web server. The clients access the
application from any location through a browser. The clients make
requests to the Web server and receive responses. The following
figure shows the architecture of the Web applications.

Depending on the type of business rules, the applications can be

implemented on any of the tiers, such as Web clients, Web server, or
the database server. To provide support to applications where users
can send requests simultaneously, the database server needs to be
fast, reliable, and secure. SQL Server is one such complete database
platform that provides a fast, reliable, and secure RDBMS. It also
helps in data analysis with integrated BI tools. The BI tools are used to
prepare reports that are analyzed further to make efficient business
decisions.

SQL Server Editions

SQL Server supports various editions that provide different features
targeting different business requirements. SQL Server has the
following editions:

 Enterprise:

The SQL Server Enterprise edition includes the core database engine
and supports the advanced services such as table partitioning, parallel
indexing, and indexed views. The Enterprise edition is designed to
provide high performance and security, optimized productivity, and
high scalability of data.

 Standard:

The SQL Server Standard edition has core database engine and basic
business intelligence capabilities. It differs from the Enterprise
Edition in that it does not support all the security and data
warehousing features of the Enterprise edition. The Standard edition
provides easy integration, improved manageability, and easy extension
of data across various platforms, such as .Net or Linux.
Business Intelligence:

The BI edition has been introduced in SQL Server 2012. It consists of

all the Standard Edition capabilities and supports the business
intelligence tools, such as Master Data Services and Data Quality
Services. The Business Intelligence edition provides rapid exploration
of data and greater consistency, manageability, and security of data.

Features of SQL Server

The components of SQL Server help improve the database management
and developer productivity by the following features of SQL Server:

 Built-in support for Extensible Markup Language (XML)data:

Allows you to store and manage XML data in variables or columns of
the XML data type. The XML feature of SQL Server enables you to
write code to retrieve data from the database in the form of XML. In
addition, it allows you to read an XML document and store the XML
data in the database.

 CLR integration:
Allows you to use the CLR features of .NET Framework in the SQL
Server database. It enables you to use the code written in any of the
.NET supported languages for implementing complex programming
logics in the database. For example, you need to write a code for the
verification of the credit card number entered by the user. It will be
complex to write the code for the verification of the credit card
number in T-SQL. However, the same code can be written effectively
using a .NET programming language. Therefore, you can write the code
in a .NET programming language and use that code in SQL Server to
verify the credit card information.
 Scalability:
Allows you to distribute the data in large tables into several filegroups.
This enables SQL Server to access all the filegroups simultaneously
and retrieve the data quickly. This makes the database scalable and
helps improve the performance of queries.

 Service-oriented architecture: Provides distributed and

asynchronous application framework for large-scale applications. This
allows the database clients to send requests to the database server
even if the server is not available to process the request immediately.

 Support for Web services: Allows you to provide direct access

to the data from the Web services by implementing the HTTP
endpoints. For example, sales executives of an organization need to
access the data on the database server through their Personal Desktop
Assistant (PDA) devices. However, providing direct access from a PDA
device to the database server involves a high cost. Therefore,
organization can implement Web services through which each sales
executive can log the sales details online from anywhere using any
device.

 High level of security: Implements high security by enforcing

policies for log on passwords. Administrators can also manage
permissions on database objects granted to different users.

 High availability: Ensures that the database server is available to

all users at all times. This reduces the downtime of the server. In SQL
Server, high availability is implemented with the help of database
mirroring, failover clustering, and database snapshots.

 Support for data migration and analysis: Provides tools to

migrate data from different data sources to a common database. In
addition, it allows building the data warehouse on this data that can
support BI applications for data analysis and decision-making.

 Intellisense: Provides the feature of auto completion of code

written to create or manipulate database objects in the Query Editor
window.

 Policy-based management:
Used to define a set of policies for configuring and managing SQL
Server. For example, you can define a policy to set a naming convention
for tables and stored procedures. When a user tries to create a table,
the table name must map with the naming convention defined in the
policy, else an error will be raised.

 Resource governor:
Used to manage the workload of SQL Server by allocating and
managing the server resources, such as CPU time and memory. The
resource pool represents the server resource. You can specify the
minimum and maximum values of the CPU and memory utilization in a
resource pool. These resources are used for running and performing
various assigned tasks in SQL Server.
Types of SQL Statements

As a database developer, you need to manage the database to store,

access, and modify data. SQL is the core language used to perform
these operations on the data. SQL, pronounced as ‘sequel’, is a language
that is used to manage data in an RDBMS. This language was developed
by IBM in the 1970s. It follows the International Organization for
Standardization (ISO) and American National Standards Institute
(ANSI) standards. Most database systems have created customized
versions of the SQL language. For example, Transact-SQL (T-SQL) is a
scripting language used in SQL Server for programming. The
applications may have different user interfaces but have a common way
to communicate with SQL Server by sending T-SQL statements to the
server. The SQL statements can be divided into the following
categories:

 Data Definition Language (DDL): Is used to define the database,

data types, structures, and constraints on the data. Some of the DDL
statements are:

 CREATE: Used to create a new database object, such as a table.

 ALTER: Used to modify the database objects.

 DROP: Used to delete the objects.

 Data Manipulation Language (DML):

Is used to manipulate the data in database objects. Some of the DML
statements are:

 INSERT: Used to insert a new data record in a table.

 UPDATE: Used to modify an existing record in a table.

 DELETE: Used to delete a record from a table.

 Data Control Language (DCL):

Is used to control the data access in the database. Some of the DCL statements
are:

 GRANT: Used to assign permissions to users to access a database object.

 REVOKE: Used to deny permissions to users to access a database object.

 Data Query Language (DQL):

Is used to query data from database objects. SELECT is the DQL
statement that is used to select data from the database in different
ways and formats. SQL is not a case-sensitive language. Therefore, you
can write the statements in any case, lowercase or uppercase. For
example, you can use the SELECT statement in lowercase as ‘select’ or
in title case as ‘Select’.

Services by implementing the HTTP endpoints. For example, sales

executives of an organization need to access the data on the database
server through their Personal Desktop Assistant (PDA) devices.
However, providing direct access from a PDA device to the database
server involves a high cost. Therefore, organization can implement Web
services through which each sales executive can log the sales details
online from anywhere using any device.
Identifying Data Types

Data type represents the type of data that a database object can
contain. This data can be in the form of characters or numbers. You
can store the following types of data in a database:

Structured data: Is the data that has definite structure. It follows

a defined format and has a predefined length, such as string or
numeric data. The structured data can be easily stored in a table. For
example, the roll number of a student is a numeric value and can be
easily stored in the RollNo column of the Student table. In addition,
you can store the spatial data, such as geographical data with longitude
and latitude, and geometrical data with coordinates.

Semi-structured data: Is the data that has an indefinite structure

and cannot be easily stored in a database table. The attributes of
semi-structured data can change. For example, the details of the
customers contain various attributes, such as customer ID and
customer name. These attributes change for every customer. Semi-
structured data is generally stored in the XML format.

Unstructured data: Is the data that does not have a defined

structure. It does not necessarily follow any format or sequence. In
addition, it does not follow any rule and is not predictable. For example,
text files, image files, streaming videos, and sound clips represent
unstructured data. Depending upon the type of data to be stored, SQL
Server supports the various data types. These data types can be
associated with the columns, local variables, or expressions defined in
the database. You need to specify the data type of a column according
to the data to be stored in the column. For example, you can specify
the character data type to store the employee name, date data type to
store the hire date of employees. Similarly, you can specify money data
type to store the salary of the employees.

The data types supported in SQL Server can be organized into the
following categories:

Numeric

Character string

Date and time

Binary

Others

Numeric

The numeric data types allow you to store integer values in the
database. The following table lists the numeric data types supported
by SQL Server.
Character and String

The character and string data types allow you to store text values in
the database. The following table lists the character and string data
types supported by SQL Server.
The preceding table lists various data types, such as char, varchar,
nchar, and nvarchar, which are used for storing character data.
However, you must know the difference in using these data types. The
following list describes the differences between these data types:

 char: It is used to store fixed length character data in a variable.

For example, you declare a variable of char data type with 50
character size. This declaration reserves the memory space required
to store 50 characters in that variable. If you store 10 characters in
that variable, then the remaining 40 character memory space will be
wasted.

varchar: It is used to store variable length character data in a

variable. It does not reserve the memory space at the time of variable
declaration. Instead, it allocates memory as per the size of the data
stored in the variable. For example, you declare a variable of varchar
data type with 100 character size. Now, you store a word containing
50 characters in that variable. In this case, the system will allocate
memory space required to store 50 characters only. The space for the
rest 50 characters that can be stored in the variable will be freed.
This way, there is no memory loss. It stores only non unicode
characters.

 nvarchar: It allocates memory similar to the varchar data type.

However, it stores only unicode characters. It requires twice the
storage space as required by varchar.

 nchar: It supports fixed-length unicode data with the maximum

length of 4000 characters. It requires twice as much storage space as
required by the char data type.
Note :- Unicode is an industry wide computing standard for representing characters. It provides
unique number to every character so that these characters are represented in the same way across
different platforms and languages.

Date and Time

The date and time data types allow you to store date and time values in
the database. The following table lists the date and time data types
supported by SQL Server.
Binary
The binary data types allow you to store binary data in the database.
The following table lists the binary data types supported by SQL
Server.

The Binary Data Types

Others
The other data types allow you to store unique identifiers, cursors,
table, XML, and spatial data in the database. The following table lists
the other data types supported by SQL Server.