SQL Concepts

Krishnadas Manakotte
Vivek Verma

© LogicaCMG 2006. All rights reserved

SQL

 Basic Structure
 Set Operations
 Aggregate Functions
 Null Values
 Nested Subqueries
 Views
 Derived Relations
 Modification of the Database
 Joined Relations
 Data Definition Language
 Links

SQL Concepts
Schema Used in Examples

branch account depositor

PK branch_name PK account_number FK1 customer_name

branch_city FK3 branch_name account_number

assets balance

customer

PK customer_name

customer_street
customer_city

loan borrower

PK loan_number

FK1 branch_name FK1 customer_name

amount loan_number

SQL Concepts
SQL What/Where ?

SQL (pronounced "ess-que-el") stands for Structured Query Language. SQL is

used to communicate with a database. According to ANSI (American National
Standards Institute), it is the standard language for relational database
management systems.

Originally developed in the System-R

project of IBM (1974)

SQL Concepts
Basic Structure

 SQL is based on set and relational operations with certain modifications and
enhancements
 A typical SQL query has the form:

select A1, A2, ..., An

from r1, r2, ..., rm
where P
 Ais represent attributes
 ris represent relations
 P is a predicate.
( or )
SELECT column_list
FROM tablename_list
[ WHERE search_condition ]
[ GROUP BY column_list ]
[ HAVING group_condition ]
[ ORDER BY column_list ]

SQL Concepts
The select Clause

 The select clause corresponds to the projection operation of the

relational algebra. It is used to list the attributes desired in the result of
a query.
 Find the names of all branches in the loan relation
select branch-name
from loan
 An asterisk in the select clause denotes “all attributes”
select *
from loan
 NOTE: SQL does not permit the ‘-’ character in names, so you would
use, for example, branch_name instead of branch-name in a real
implementation. We use ‘-’ since it looks nicer!
 NOTE: SQL names are case insensitive, meaning you can use upper
case or lower case.
 You may wish to use upper case in places where we use bold font.

SQL Concepts
The select Clause (Cont.)

 SQL allows duplicates in relations as well as in query results.

 To force the elimination of duplicates, insert the keyword distinct after select.
Find the names of all branches in the loan relations, and remove duplicates
select distinct branch-name
from loan
 The keyword all specifies that duplicates not be removed.
select all branch-name
from loan

SQL Concepts
The select Clause (Cont.)

 The select clause can contain arithmetic expressions involving the operation,
+, –, ∗, and /, and operating on constants or attributes of tuples.
 The query:
select loan-number, branch-name, amount ∗ 100
from loan
would return a relation which is the same as the loan relations, except that
the attribute amount is multiplied by 100.

SQL Concepts
The where Clause

 The where clause corresponds to the selection predicate of the relational

algebra. If consists of a predicate involving attributes of the relations that
appear in the from clause.
 To find all loan number for loans made at the Indiranagar branch with loan
amounts greater than Rs.1200.
select loan-number
from loan
where branch-name = ‘INDIRANAGAR’ and amount > 1200
 Comparison results can be combined using the logical connectives and, or,
and not.
 Comparisons can be applied to results of arithmetic expressions.

SQL Concepts
The where Clause (Cont.)

 SQL Includes a between comparison operator in order to simplify where

clauses that specify that a value be less than or equal some value and greater
than or equal to some other value.
 Find the loan number of those loans with loan amounts between Rs.90,000
and Rs.100,000 (that is, ≥Rs.90,000 and ≤Rs.100,000)
select loan-number
from loan
where amount between 90000 and 100000

SQL Concepts
The from Clause

 The from clause corresponds to the Cartesian product operation of the

relational algebra. It lists the relations to be scanned in the evaluation of the
expression.
 Find the Cartesian product borrower x loan
select ∗
from borrower, loan
 Find the name, loan number and loan amount of all customers having a loan
at the Jayanagar branch.
select customer-name, borrower.loan-number, amount
from borrower, loan
where borrower.loan-number = loan.loan-number and
branch-name = ‘JAYANAGAR’

SQL Concepts
The Rename Operation

 The SQL allows renaming relations and attributes using the as clause:
old-name as new-name
 Find the name, loan number and loan amount of all customers; rename the
column name loan-number as loan-id.

select customer-name, borrower.loan-number as loan-id, amount

from borrower, loan
where borrower.loan-number = loan.loan-number

SQL Concepts
Tuple Variables

 Tuple variables are defined in the from clause via the use of the as clause.
 Find the customer names and their loan numbers for all
customers having a loan at some branch.
select customer-name, T.loan-number, S.amount
from borrower as T, loan as S
where T.loan-number = S.loan-number
 Find the names of all branches that have greater assets than some branch
located in Bangalore.
select distinct T.branch-name
from branch as T, branch as S
where T.assets > S.assets and S.branch-city = ‘BANGALORE’

SQL Concepts
String Operations

 SQL includes a string-matching operator for comparisons on character

strings. Patterns are described using two special characters:
 percent (%). The % character matches any substring.
 underscore (_). The _ character matches any character .
 Find the names of all customers whose street includes the substring “MAIN”.

select customer-name
from customer
where customer-street like ‘%MAIN%’

 Match the name “Main%”

like ‘Main\%’ escape ‘\’
 SQL supports a variety of string operations such as
 concatenation (using “||”)
 converting from upper to lower case (and vice versa)
 finding string length, extracting substrings, etc.

SQL Concepts
Ordering the Display of Tuples

 List in alphabetic order the names of all customers having a loan in Jayanagar
branch
select distinct customer-name
from borrower, loan
where borrower loan-number = loan.loan-number and
branch-name = ‘JAYANAGAR’
order by customer-name
 We may specify desc for descending order or asc for ascending order, for
each attribute; ascending order is the default.
 E.g. order by customer-name desc

SQL Concepts
Set Operations

 The set operations union, intersect, and except operate on relations and
correspond to the relational algebra operations
∪, ∩, −.
 Each of the above operations automatically eliminates duplicates; to retain all
duplicates use the corresponding multiset versions union all, intersect all
and except all.
Suppose a tuple occurs m times in r and n times in s, then, it
occurs:
 m + n times in r union all s
 min(m,n) times in r intersect all s
 max(0, m – n) times in r except all s

SQL Concepts
Set Operations

 Find all customers who have a loan, an account, or both:

(select customer-name from depositor)
union
(select customer-name from borrower)
 Find all customers who have both a loan and an account.
(select customer-name from depositor)
intersect
(select customer-name from borrower)
Oracle
 Find all customers who have an account but no loan. syntax
(select customer-name from depositor)
except (minus)
(select customer-name from borrower)

SQL Concepts
Aggregate Functions

 These functions operate on the multiset of values of a column of a relation,

and return a value

avg: average value

min: minimum value
max: maximum value
sum: sum of values
count: number of values

SQL Concepts
Aggregate Functions (Cont.)

 Find the average account balance at the Jayanagar branch.

select avg (balance)
from account
where branch-name = ‘JAYANAGAR’
 Find the number of tuples in the customer relation.
select count (*)
from customer
 Find the number of depositors in the bank.
select count (distinct customer-name)
from depositor

SQL Concepts
Aggregate Functions – Group By

 Find the number of depositors for each branch.

select branch-name, count (distinct customer-name)
from depositor, account
where depositor.account-number = account.account-number
group by branch-name

Note: Attributes in select clause should match group by clause

SQL Concepts
Aggregate Functions – Having Clause

 Find the names of all branches where the average account balance is more
than Rs.5,000.
select branch-name, avg (balance)
from account
group by branch-name
having avg (balance) > 5000
Note: predicates in the having clause are applied after the
formation of groups whereas predicates in the where clause are applied
before forming groups

SQL Concepts
Aggregate Functions – Having Clause

 Find the names of all branches where the average account balance is more
than Rs.1,200 except Jayanagar branch.
select branch-name, avg (balance)
from account
where branch-name <> ‘JAYANAGAR’
group by branch-name
having avg (balance) > 1200

SQL Concepts
Null Values

 It is possible for tuples to have a null value, denoted by null, for

some of their attributes
 null signifies an unknown value or that a value does not exist.
 The predicate is null can be used to check for null values.
 E.g. Find all loan number which appear in the loan relation with
null values for amount.
select loan-number
from loan
where amount is null
 The result of any arithmetic expression involving null is null
 E.g. 5 + null returns null
 However, aggregate functions simply ignore nulls

SQL Concepts
Null Values and Three Valued Logic

 Any comparison with null returns unknown

 E.g. 5 < null or null <> null or null = null
 Three-valued logic using the truth value unknown:
 OR: (unknown or true) = true, (unknown or false) = unknown
(unknown or unknown) = unknown
 AND: (true and unknown) = unknown, (false and unknown) =
false,
(unknown and unknown) = unknown
 NOT: (not unknown) = unknown
 “P is unknown” evaluates to true if predicate P evaluates to
unknown
 Result of where clause predicate is treated as false if it
evaluates to unknown

SQL Concepts
Null Values and Aggregates

 Total all loan amounts

select sum (amount)
from loan
Above statement ignores null amounts
result is null if there is no non-null amount, that is the
 All aggregate operations except count(*) ignore tuples with null values on the
aggregated attributes.

SQL Concepts
Example NULL value

 Select all branches who has not achieved the monthly target of Rs.1000. All
the branches with ‘NIL’ transaction should be displayed.

Select branch-name,sum(nvl(amount,0))
from loan
group by branch-name
having sum(nvl(amount,0))<1000

SQL Concepts
Nested Subqueries

• SQL provides a mechanism for the nesting of subqueries.

• A subquery is a select-from-where expression that is nested within another
query.
• A common use of subqueries is to perform tests for set membership, set
comparisons, and set cardinality.

SQL Concepts
Example Query (subqueries)

 Find all customers who have both an account and a loan at the bank.
select distinct customer-name
from borrower
where customer-name in (select customer-name from depositor)
 Find all customers who have a loan at the bank but do not have an account at
the bank
select distinct customer-name
from borrower
where customer-name not in (select customer-name from
depositor)

SQL Concepts
Views

 Provide a mechanism to hide certain data from the view of certain users. To
create a view we use the command:
create view v as <query expression>
where:
 <query expression> is any legal expression
 The view name is represented by v

SQL Concepts
Example Query

 A view consisting of branches and their customers

Create view all-customer as
(select branch-name, customer-name
from depositor, account
where depositor.account-number = account.account-number)
union
(select branch-name, customer-name
from borrower, loan
where borrower.loan-number = loan.loan-number)
 Find all customers of the Jayanagar branch
select customer-name
from all-customer
where branch-name = ‘JAYANAGAR’

SQL Concepts
Derived Relations

 Find the average account balance of those branches where the average
account balance is greater than Rs.4000.
select branch-name, avg-balance
from (
select branch-name, avg (balance)
from account
group by branch-name) as result (branch-name, avg-
balance
)
where avg-balance > 4000
Note that we do not need to use the having clause, since we
compute the temporary (view) relation result in the from clause,
and the attributes of result can be used directly in the where
clause.

SQL Concepts
Modification of the Database – Deletion

 Delete all account records at the Indiranagar branch

delete from account
where branch-name = ‘INDIRANAGAR’
 Delete all accounts at every branch located in BANGALORE city.
-Remove records from account table
-Remove records from depositor table
delete from account
where branch-name in (select branch-name
from branch
where branch-city = ‘BANGALORE’)
delete from depositor
where account-number in
(select account-number
from branch, account
where branch-city = ‘BANGALORE’
and branch.branch-name = account.branch-name)

SQL Concepts
Example Query

 Delete the record of all accounts with balances below the average at the bank.
 Problem: as we delete tuples from deposit, the average balance
changes
delete from account
where balance < (select avg (balance)
from account)
 Solution used in SQL:
1. First, compute avg balance and find all tuples to delete
2. Next, delete all tuples found above (without recomputing avg
or retesting the tuples)

SQL Concepts
Modification of the Database – Insertion

 Add a new tuple to account

insert into account
values (‘A-9732’, ‘JAYANAGAR’,1200)
or equivalently
insert into account (branch-name, balance, account-number)
values (‘JAYANAGAR’, 1200, ‘A-9732’)
 Add a new tuple to account with balance set to null
insert into account
values (‘A-777’,‘JAYANAGAR’, null)

SQL Concepts
Modification of the Database – Insertion

 Provide as a gift for all loan customers of the Jayanagar branch, a Rs.200
savings account. Let the loan number serve as the account number for the
new savings account
insert into account
select loan-number, branch-name, 200
from loan
where branch-name = ‘JAYANAGAR’
insert into depositor
select customer-name, loan-number
from loan, borrower
where branch-name = ‘JAYANAGAR’
and loan.account-number = borrower.account-number
 The select from where statement is fully evaluated before any of its results are
inserted into the relation (otherwise queries like
insert into table1 select * from table1
would cause problems)

SQL Concepts
Modification of the Database – Updates

 Increase all accounts with balances over Rs.6,000 by 6%, all other accounts
receive 5%.
 Write two update statements:
update account
set balance = balance ∗ 1.06
where balance > 6000
update account
set balance = balance ∗ 1.05
where balance ≤ 6000
 The order is important
 Can be done better using the case statement (next slide)

SQL Concepts
Case Statement for Conditional Updates

 Same query as before: Increase all accounts with balances over Rs.6,000 by
6%, all other accounts receive 5%.

update account
set balance=
case
when balance <= 6000 then balance *1.05
else balance * 1.06
end

SQL Concepts
Transactions

 A transaction is a sequence of queries and update statements executed as a

single unit
 Transactions are started implicitly and terminated by one of
 commit work: makes all updates of the transaction permanent in the database
 rollback work: undoes all updates performed by the transaction.
 Motivating example
 Transfer of money from one account to another involves two steps:
 deduct from one account and credit to another
 If one steps succeeds and the other fails, database is in an inconsistent state
 Therefore, either both steps should succeed or neither should
 If any step of a transaction fails, all work done by the transaction can be
undone by rollback work.
 Rollback of incomplete transactions is done automatically, in case of system
failures

SQL Concepts
Joined Relations

• Join operations take two relations and return as a result another relation.
• These additional operations are typically used as subquery expressions in the
from clause
• Join condition – defines which tuples in the two relations match,and what
attributes are present in the result of the join.
• Join type – defines how tuples in each relation that do not match any tuple in
the other relation (based on the join condition) are treated.

Join Types
– inner join
– left outer join
– right outer join
– full outer join

SQL Concepts
Joined Relations – Datasets for Examples

SQL Concepts
Joined Relations – Examples

SQL Concepts
Joined Relations – Examples

SQL Concepts
Joined Relations – Examples Examples

SQL Concepts
Data Definition Language (DDL)

Allows the specification of not only a set of relations but also

information about each relation, including:
 The schema for each relation.
 The domain of values associated with each attribute.
 Integrity constraints
 The set of indices to be maintained for each relations.
 Security and authorization information for each relation.
 The physical storage structure of each relation on disk.

SQL Concepts
Create Table Construct

 An SQL relation is defined using the create table command:

create table r (A1 D1, A2 D2, ..., An Dn,
(integrity-constraint1),
...,
(integrity-constraintk))
 r is the name of the relation
 each Ai is an attribute name in the schema of relation r
 Di is the data type of values in the domain of attribute Ai
 Example:
create table branch
(branch-name char(15) not null,
branch-city char(30),
assets integer)

SQL Concepts
Integrity Constraints in Create Table

• not null
• primary key (A1, ..., An)
• check (P), where P is a predicate
Example: Declare branch-name as the primary key for branch and ensure that
the values of assets are nonnegative.
create table branch
(branch-name char(15),
branch-city char(30)
assets integer,
primary key (branch-name),
check (assets >= 0))
primary key declaration on an attribute automatically ensures not null in
SQL-92 onwards, needs to be explicitly stated in SQL-89 (NB Exams)

SQL Concepts
Drop and Alter Table Constructs

 The drop table command deletes all information about the dropped relation
from the database.
 The after table command is used to add attributes to an existing relation. All
tuples in the relation are assigned null as the value for the new attribute. The
form of the alter table command is
alter table r add A D
where A is the name of the attribute to be added to relation r
and D is the domain of A.
 The alter table command can also be used to drop attributes of a relation
alter table r drop A
where A is the name of an attribute of relation r
Dropping of attributes not supported by many databases (Supported from
Oracle 8i onwards)

SQL Concepts
Procedural Extensions and Stored Procedures

 SQL provides a module language

 permits definition of procedures in SQL, with if-then-else statements, for and while
loops, etc.
 Stored Procedures
 Can store procedures in the database
 then execute them using the call statement
 permit external applications to operate on the database without knowing about
internal detail

SQL Concepts
Links

• http://www.ilook.fsnet.co.uk/ora_sql/sqlmain.htm
• http://www.db.cs.ucdavis.edu/teaching/sqltutorial/
• http://www.sql-tutorial.net/
• http://www.firstsql.com/tutor.htm

SQL Concepts
Reference

• www.oracle.com
• www.csee.umbc.edu
• www.wiscorp.com

SQL Concepts
Contact Information

Vivek Verma
[email protected]

THANK YOU

SQL Concepts
Primary Key
• What is a primary key?
• A primary key is a single field or combination of fields that uniquely defines a record.
None of the fields that are part of the primary key can contain a null value. A table can
have only one primary key.
• Note: In Oracle, a primary key can not contain more than 32 columns.
• A primary key can be defined in either a CREATE TABLE statement or an ALTER
TABLE statement.
•
Using a CREATE TABLE statement
• The syntax for creating a primary key using a CREATE TABLE statement is:
• CREATE TABLE table_name
(column1 datatype null/not null,
column2 datatype null/not null,
...
CONSTRAINT constraint_name PRIMARY KEY (column1, column2, . column_n)
);
•
For example:
• CREATE TABLE supplier
(supplier_idnumeric(10)not null,
supplier_namevarchar2(50)not null,
contact_namevarchar2(50),
CONSTRAINT supplier_pk PRIMARY KEY (supplier_id));

SQL Concepts
Foreign Key
• What is a foreign key?
• A foreign key means that values in one table must also appear in another table.
• The referenced table is called the parent table while the table with the foreign key is called the child
table. The foreign key in the child table will generally reference a primary key in the parent table.
• A foreign key can be defined in either a CREATE TABLE statement or an ALTER TABLE statement.
•
Using a CREATE TABLE statement
• The syntax for creating a foreign key using a CREATE TABLE statement is:
• CREATE TABLE table_name
(column1 datatype null/not null,
column2 datatype null/not null,
...
CONSTRAINT fk_column
  FOREIGN KEY (column1, column2, ... column_n)
  REFERENCES parent_table (column1, column2, ... column_n)
);
•
For example: CREATE TABLE
• CREATE TABLE supplier( products(product_idnumeric(10)not
supplier_idnumeric(10)not null, null,supplier_idnumeric(10)not null,CONSTRAINT
supplier_namevarchar2(50)not null, fk_supplier  FOREIGN KEY (supplier_id) 
contact_namevarchar2(50),
CONSTRAINT supplier_pk REFERENCES supplier(supplier_id));
PRIMARY KEY (supplier_id));

SQL Concepts