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The SQL COALESCE function or CASE expressions can be used to "simulate" Null equality in join criteria, and the IS NULL and IS NOT NULL predicates can be used in the join criteria as well. The following predicate tests for equality of the values A and B and treats Nulls as being equal.
A NOT NULL constraint is functionally equivalent to the following check constraint with an IS NOT NULL predicate: . CHECK (column IS NOT NULL) Some relational database management systems are able to optimize performance when the NOT NULL constraint syntax is used as opposed to the CHECK constraint syntax given above.
SQL statements also include the semicolon (";") statement terminator. Though not required on every platform, it is defined as a standard part of the SQL grammar. Insignificant whitespace is generally ignored in SQL statements and queries, making it easier to format SQL code for readability.
SQL was initially developed at IBM by Donald D. Chamberlin and Raymond F. Boyce after learning about the relational model from Edgar F. Codd [12] in the early 1970s. [13] This version, initially called SEQUEL (Structured English Query Language), was designed to manipulate and retrieve data stored in IBM's original quasirelational database management system, System R, which a group at IBM San ...
The relational algebra uses set union, set difference, and Cartesian product from set theory, and adds additional constraints to these operators to create new ones.. For set union and set difference, the two relations involved must be union-compatible—that is, the two relations must have the same set of attributes.
In addition to basic equality and inequality conditions, SQL allows for more complex conditional logic through constructs such as CASE, COALESCE, and NULLIF. The CASE expression, for example, enables SQL to perform conditional branching within queries, providing a mechanism to return different values based on evaluated conditions. This logic ...
The SQL EXCEPT operator takes the distinct rows of one query and returns the rows that do not appear in a second result set. For purposes of row elimination and duplicate removal, the EXCEPT operator does not distinguish between NULLs .
WHERE clauses are not mandatory clauses of SQL DML statements, but can be used to limit the number of rows affected by a SQL DML statement or returned by a query. In brief SQL WHERE clause is used to extract only those results from a SQL statement, such as: SELECT, INSERT, UPDATE, or DELETE statement. [1]