SQL in 24 Hours, Sams Teach Yourself

First of all, I have the second edition, and it has no typos,nor is it Oracle-oriented. Plain ANSI SQL.I needed to learn SQLvery fast while starting from scratch. I have been computing for 35 years, but never dealt with SQL, believe it or not.This book is very well organized. It assumes no prior knowledge. It starts with simple concepts, and leads you to complete understanding and mastery of SQL in no time. It says 24 hours, but it took me less. END

Having been babied by Access for years, I knew that I needed to get more into SQL itself if I wanted to successfully move to SQL Server or any other platform. This book was easy to use, has a good index (which seems rare in computer books these days) and hits all the important points about SQL that you need to know. The process is step-by-step, and the steps are logically organized. It provides information about multiple platforms, including syntax for Sybase, SQL Server, and Oracle, where necessary. Its nice to see a book that's not product-centered. There's also an excellent quick reference at the back of the book that I have permanently bookmarked and refer to it constantly when I need reminding about syntax. Haven't found a better SQL book yet, and this one is the go-to SQL book for our team.

I was learning to program in C++Builder and found that second guessing SQL was not getting me anywhere. All the books that I had either covered Builder or C++, and I was stumbling with the database stuff because I didn't know SQL.The Book brought me well up to speed with the syntax and I was programming in SQL in no time. The book focuses on ANSI SQL and shows how a couple of databases implement their own versions of the syntax. I had no trouble using the example code with my database, with only a few modifications.Because the book is fairly short, it wastes no time and gets straight into programming without having large chapters for the reader to wade through. This is one book that you can truly get through in 24 hours.

This book does a great job of teaching beginning to intermediate SQL syntax. Also covered in the text are more advanced topics such as dynamic SQL, stored procedures, and interactive SQL. The book does not come with a disk/CD to load the tables. However, I found creating the tables myself to be extremely instructional. Yes, there are some typos, but this too is instructional from a debugging standpoint. Also, the syntax used for most of the examples are Oracle's implementation of SQL. Overall, I'd like to say, "Great job, guys!" I'm now ready to take the next small step towards mastery of SQL and eventual Oracle certification.

The best book I have found to explain SQL to someone with no experience.It is very easy to grasp SQL using this book. Plus the format allows one to invest a little bit of time each day and make recognizable progress. In addition, if you don't have access to database software, you can still do the exercises and check your results.