Introduction to SQL

SQL stands for the structured query language. SQL Server is a relational database management system (RDBMS) developed by Microsoft. By using SQL Server we can store and retrieve data from one place called database and use that data whenever it required in other programming applications. SQL is same as other relational database management systems like Sybase, Mysql, pl/sql, etc.

Uses of SQL Server

• It will allow us to access data in database and perform different operations on data
• We can create databases, tables, and stored procedures to access data in required format
• We can do insert, update, delete, select, etc. to communicate with data stored in databases.
• We can create views, functions, indexes, keys, etc. in a database to get data in an efficient way
• In SQL we can create roles and user-level permissions to access data in databases
• We can access SQL database data from other languages using SQL modules, libraries

History of SQL Server

The journey of SQL started in 1989, originally code base of SQL sold by Sybase SQL Server to Microsoft. They launched this product as a competitor for IBM, Oracle, etc. Overall Microsoft has launched more than 14 versions, check the following table for more information.