Structured Query Language

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1 Introduction to SQL
What is SQL?
– When a user wants to get some information
from a database file, he can issue a query.
– A query is a user–request to retrieve data or
information with a certain condition.
– SQL is a query language that allows user to
specify the conditions. (instead of algorithms)

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1 Introduction to SQL
Concept of SQL

– The user specifies a certain condition.

– The program will go through all the records
in the database file and select those records
that satisfy the condition.(searching).
– Statistical information of the data.
– The result of the query will then be stored in
form of a table.

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1 Introduction to SQL
How to involve SQL in FoxPro
– Before using SQL, the tables should be
opened.
– The SQL command can be entered directly
in the Command Window
– To perform exact matching, we should
SET ANSI ON

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2 Basic structure of an SQL
query
General SELECT, ALL / DISTINCT, *,
Structure AS, FROM, WHERE

Comparison IN, BETWEEN, LIKE "% _"

Grouping GROUP BY, HAVING,

COUNT( ), SUM( ), AVG( ), MAX( ), MIN( )

Display Order ORDER BY, ASC / DESC

Logical AND, OR, NOT

Operators

Output INTO TABLE / CURSOR

TO FILE [ADDITIVE], TO PRINTER, TO SCREEN

Union UNION

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I General Structure

SELECT ...... FROM ...... WHERE ......

SELECT [ALL / DISTINCT] expr1 [AS col1], expr2 [AS col2] ;
FROM tablename WHERE condition

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I General Structure
SELECT [ALL / DISTINCT] expr1 [AS col1], expr2 [AS col2] ;
FROM tablename WHERE condition
– The query will select rows from the source tablename and
output the result in table form.

– Expressions expr1, expr2 can be :

• (1) a column, or
• (2) an expression of functions and fields.

– And col1, col2 are their corresponding column names

in the output table.

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I General Structure
SELECT [ALL / DISTINCT] expr1 [AS col1], expr2 [AS col2] ;
FROM tablename WHERE condition
– DISTINCT will eliminate duplication in the output
while ALL will keep all duplicated rows.
– condition can be :
• (1) an inequality, or
• (2) a string comparison
• using logical operators AND, OR, NOT.

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 I General Structure
Before using SQL, open the student file:
USE student
eg. 1 List all the student records.
SELECT * FROM student

id name dob sex class mtest hcode dcode remission

Result 9801 Peter 06/04/86 M 1A 70 R SSP .F.
9802 Mary 01/10/86 F 1A 92 Y HHM .F.
9803 Johnny 03/16/86 M 1A 91 G SSP .T.
9804 Wendy 07/09/86 F 1B 84 B YMT .F.
9805 Tobe 10/17/86 M 1B 88 R YMT .F.
: : : : : : : : :

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I
eg. 2
General Structure
List the names and house code of 1A students.

SELECT name, hcode, class FROM student ;

WHERE class="1A"

Class Class
1A  1A

class="1A" 
1A 1A
1A  1A
1B  1B
1B  1B
: :

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I
eg. 2
General Structure
List the names and house code of 1A students.

Result name hcode class

Peter R 1A
Mary Y 1A
Johnny G 1A
Luke G 1A
Bobby B 1A
Aaron R 1A
: : :

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I
eg. 3
General Structure
List the residential district of the Red House
members.
SELECT DISTINCT dcode FROM student ;
WHERE hcode="R"
dcode
Result
HHM
KWC
MKK
SSP
TST
YMT
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II Comparison

eg. 8 List the 1A students whose Math test score is

between 80 and 90 (incl.)
SELECT name, mtest FROM student ;
WHERE class="1A" AND ;
mtest BETWEEN 80 AND 90

Result name mtest

Luke 86
Aaron 83
Gigi 84

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II
eg. 9
Comparison
List the students whose names start with "T".

SELECT name, class FROM student ;

WHERE name LIKE "T%"

Result name class

Tobe 1B
Teddy 1B
Tim 2A

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II Comparison

eg. 10 List the Red house members whose names contain

"a" as the 2nd letter.

SELECT name, class, hcode FROM student ;

WHERE name LIKE "_a%" AND hcode="R"

name class hcode

Result
Aaron 1A R
Janet 1B R
Paula 2A R

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III Grouping
SELECT ...... FROM ...... WHERE condition ;
GROUP BY groupexpr [HAVING requirement]

Group functions:
COUNT( ), SUM( ), AVG( ), MAX( ), MIN( )

– groupexpr specifies the related rows to be grouped

as one entry. Usually it is a column.
– WHERE condition specifies the condition of
individual rows before the rows are group.
HAVING requirement specifies the condition
involving the whole group.
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IV Display Order
SELECT ...... FROM ...... WHERE ......
GROUP BY ..... ;
ORDER BY colname ASC / DESC

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IV Display Order
eg. 16 List the boys of class 1A, order by their names.

SELECT name, id FROM student ;

WHERE sex="M" AND class="1A" ORDER BY name

name id Result name id

Peter 9801 Aaron 9812
Johnny 9803 ORDER BY Bobby 9811
Luke 9810 Johnny 9803
dcode
Bobby 9811 Luke 9810
Aaron 9812 Peter 9801
Ron 9813 Ron 9813

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IV Display Order
eg. 17 List the 2A students by their residential district.
SELECT name, id, class, dcode FROM student ;
WHERE class="2A" ORDER BY dcode
name id class dcode
Result Jimmy 9712 2A HHM
Tim 9713 2A HHM
Samual 9714 2A SHT
Rosa 9703 2A SSP
Helen 9702 2A TST
Joseph 9715 2A TSW
Paula 9701 2A YMT
Susan 9704 2A YMT
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IV Display Order
eg. 18 List the number of students of each district
(in desc. order).
SELECT COUNT(*) AS cnt, dcode FROM student ;
GROUP BY dcode ORDER BY cnt DESC
cnt docode
Result 11 YMT
10 HHM
10 SSP
9 MKK
5 TST
2 TSW
1 KWC
1 MMK
1 SHT
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IV Display Order
eg. 19 List the boys of each house order by the
classes. (2-level ordering)

SELECT name, class, hcode FROM student ;

WHERE sex="M" ORDER BY hcode, class

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IV Display Order
Result
name hcode class
Bobby B 1A
Blue
House Teddy B 1B Order
Joseph B 2A by
Zion B 2B class
Order
Leslie B 2C
by Johnny G 1A
hcode Luke G 1A
Kevin G 1C
Green
House George G 1C
: : :
:
:
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3 Union, Intersection and
Difference of Tables
The union of A and B (AB)

A B

A table containing all the rows from A and B.

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3 Union, Intersection and
Difference of Tables
The intersection of A and B (AB)

A B

A table containing only rows that appear in both A and B.

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3 Union, Intersection and
Difference of Tables
The difference of A and B (A–B)

A B

A table containing rows that appear in A but not in B.

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3 Union, Intersection and
Difference of Tables
Bridge [A] Chess [B]
id name sex class id name sex class
1 9812 Aaron M 1A 1 9802 Mary F 1A
2 9801 Peter M 1A 2 9801 Peter M 1A
3 9814 Kenny M 1B 3 9815 Eddy M 1B
4 9806 Kitty F 1B 4 9814 Kenny M 1B
5 9818 Edmond M 1C 5 9817 George M 1C
: : : : : : : :

Before using SQL, open the two tables:

SELECT A
USE bridge
SELECT B
USE chess
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3 Union, Intersection and
Difference of Tables
SELECT ...... FROM ...... WHERE ...... ;
UNION ;
SELECT ...... FROM ...... WHERE ......

eg. 22 The two clubs want to hold a joint party.

Make a list of all students. (Union)
SELECT * FROM bridge ;
Result
UNION ;
SELECT * FROM chess ;
ORDER BY class, name INTO TABLE party

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3 Union, Intersection and
Difference of Tables
SELECT ...... FROM table1 ;
WHERE col IN ( SELECT col FROM table2 )

eg. 23 Print a list of students who are members of both

clubs. (Intersection)

Result SELECT * FROM bridge ;

WHERE id IN ( SELECT id FROM chess ) ;
TO PRINTER

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3 Union, Intersection and
Difference of Tables
SELECT ...... FROM table1 ;
WHERE col NOT IN ( SELECT col FROM table2 )

eg. 24 Make a list of students who are members of the

Bridge Club but not Chess Club. (Difference)

Result SELECT * FROM bridge ;

WHERE id NOT IN ( SELECT id FROM chess ) ;
INTO TABLE diff

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4 Multiple Tables:
• SQL provides a convenient operation to
retrieve information from multiple tables.

• This operation is called join.

• The join operation will combine the tables into

one large table with all possible combinations
(Math: Cartesian Product), and then it will
filter the rows of this combined table to yield
useful information.

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4 Multiple Tables:

field1 field2
A 1
field1 field2
A 2
A 1
A 3
B 2
B 1
3
B 2
B 3

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