Structured Query Language (SQL)

What is Structured Query Language (SQL)?

Structured Query Language (SQL) is a standardized programming language that is used to manage relational databases and execute numerous operations on the data in them. At the start created in the 1970s, SQL is usually used not only by database administrators, but also by developers writing data combination scripts and data analysts looking to set up and run logical queries.



The term SQL is pronounced ess-kew-ell or sequel.
SQL is used for the following:

• modifying database table and index structures;
• adding, updating and deleting rows of data;
• retrieving subsets of information from within relational database management systems (RDBMS)

SQL queries and other operations take the form of commands written as statements and are aggregated into programs that entitle users to add, modify or retrieve data from database tables.

SQL standard and proprietary extensions

An official SQL standard was embraced by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI) in 1986, with the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) adopting the standard in 1987. New versions of the SQL standard are issued every few years, the most recent in 2016.

ISO/IEC 9075 is the ISO SQL standard developed jointly by ISO and the International Electrotechnical Commission. The current ISO standard for SQL is ISO/IEC 9075:2016.

Some versions of SQL consist of fashionable extensions to the standard language for procedural programming and other functions. For example, Microsoft offers a set of extensions called Transact-SQL, while Oracle's extended version of the standard is Procedural Language for SQL. Commercial sellers proffer proprietary extensions to transform their product offerings by giving customers extra features and functions. Consequence the different variants of extended SQL offered by vendors are not fully agreeable with one another.