relational databases

If you are new to Database Application Design/Web Based Application Design, as I am, you will find this title most helpful in getting you off the ground. I bought this book in hopes that it would help me build SQL statements into my ASP pages, and it has done that and more. This book is an easy read and very clearly explains the basic concepts of the SQL language, techniques, capabilities, etc. It also offers a concise look into the way databases are designed and how they function. The book does a wonderful job of remaining non-proprietary, and is quick to point out when you are learning something that is specific to one Database Management System or another. This is a wonderful little book to add to your reference library if you wish to spend little and learn tons.

Great book for those who know nothing about SQL but need to get up to speed quickly. As a developer who just inherited 4 database driven projects, the book had helped immensely. Halfway through the book (page 90) you are doing advanced table joins!

Four things make this a must have for SQL beginners: easy to read chapters with great explanations (I found reading cover to cover more helpful than the '10 minute' per chapter approach), a focus on e-commerce implementations in all exercises/examples, caution boxes when MS SQL Server, Oracle, and others' code may differ - with examples of the differences, and lastly the completely populated e-commerce MS Access database is available for download.

Now on to the intermediate books!

I taught a class to co-workers who had no SQL experience using this book, covering the first 6 chapters in approximately 4 hours; and the next day they were able to assist in writing queries, easing my workload (this is an excellent book to use for learning how to write queries, but it does not cover design, for that see Steven Roman's Access Database Design and Programming). This book demands a careful reading as it explains the syntactical differences between different implementations of SQL (e.g., Access uses * and ? as wildcards as opposed to % and _).