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Database Management System 10CS54

UNIT 4
SQL The Relational Database Standard
SQL The Relational Database Standard

4.1 Data Definition, Constraints, and Schema Changes in SQL2

4.2 Basic Queries in SQL

4.3 More Complex SQL Queries

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UNIT 4

SQL The Relational Database Standard

4.1 Data Definition, Constraints, and Schema Changes in SQL2
x Structured Query Language (SQL) was designed and implemented at IBM Research.
x Created in late 70’s, under the name of SEQUEL
x A standard version of SQL (ANSI 1986), is called SQL86 or SQL1.
x A revised version of standard SQL, called SQL2 (or SQL92).
x SQL are going to be extended with objectoriented and other recent database concepts.
x Consists of
x A Data Definition Language (DDL) for declaring database schemas
x Data Manipulation Language (DML) for modifying and querying database
instances
x In SQL, relation, tuple, and attribute are called table, row, and columns respectively.
x The SQL commands for data definition are CREATE, ALTER, and DROP.
x The CREATE TABLE Command is used to specify a new table by giving it a name and
specifying its attributes (columns) and constraints.
x Data types available for attributes are:
o Numeric integer, real (formated, such as DECIMAL(10,2))
o CharacterString fixedlength and varyinglength
o BitString fixedlength, varyinglength
o Date in the form YYYYMMDD
o Time in the form HH:MM:SS
o Timestamp includes both the DATE and TIME fields
o Interval to increase/decrease the value of date, time, or timestamp

4.2 Basic Queries in SQL

x SQL allows a table (relation) to have two or more tuples that are identical in all their
attributes values. Hence, an SQL table is not a set of tuple, because a set does not allow
two identical members; rather it is a multiset of tuples.
x A basic query statement in SQL is the SELECT statement.
x The SELECT statement used in SQL has no relationship to the SELECT operation of
relational algebra.

The SELECT Statement

The syntax of this command is:

SELECT <attribute list>
FROM <table list>
WHERE <Condition>;

Some example:

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Query 0: Retrieve the birthday and address of the employee(s) whose name is ‘John B. Smith’

Q0: SELECT BDATE, ADDRESS

FROM EMPLOYEE

WHERE FNAME = ‘John’ AND MINIT =‘B’ AND LNAME = ‘SMITH’

Query 1: Retrieve the name and address of all employee who work for the ‘Research’ Dept.

Q1: SELECT FNAME, LNAME, ADDRESS

FROM EMPLOYEE, DEPARTMENT

WHERE DNAME = ‘Research’ AND DNUMBER = DNO

Query 2: For every project located in ‘Stafford’, list the project number, the controlling
department number, and the department manager’s last name, address, and birthdate.

Q2: SELECT PNUMBER, DNUM, LNAME, ADDRESS, BDATE

FROM PROJECT, DEPARTMENT, EMPLOYEE

WHERE DNUM=DNUMBER AND MGRSSN=SSN AND PLOCATION =

‘Stafford’

Dealing with Ambiguous Attribute Names and Renaming (Aliening)

Ambiguity in the case where attributes are same name need to qualify the attribute using DOT
separator

e.g., WHERE DEPARTMENT.DNUMBER=EMPLOYEE.DNUMBER

More Ambiguity in the case of queries that refer to the same relation twice

Query 8: For each employee, retrieve the employee’s first and last name and the first and last
name of his or her immediate supervisor

Q8: SELECT E.FNAME, E.LNAME, S.FNAME, S.LNAME

FROM EMPLOYEE AS E, EMPLOYEE AS S

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WHERE E.SUPERSSN=S.SSN

Unspecified WHEREClause and Use of Asterisk (*)

A missing WHEREclause indicates no conditions, which means all tuples are selected

In case of two or more table, then all possible tuple combinations are selected

Example: Q10: Select all EMPLOYEE SSNs , and all combinations of EMPLOYEE SSN and
DEPARTMENT DNAME

SELECT SSN, DNAME

FROM EMPLOYEE, DEPARTMENT

More

To retrieve all the attributes, use * in SELECT clause

Retrieve all employees working for Dept. 5

SELECT *

FROM EMPLOYEE

WHERE DNO=5

Substring Comparisons, Arithmetic Operations, and Ordering

x like, binary operator for comparing strings

x %, wild card for strings
x _, wild card for characters
x ||, concatenate operation for strings

(name like ’%a_’) is true for all names having ‘a’ as second letter from the end.

x Partial strings are specified by using '

x SELECT FNAME, LNAME
x FROM EMPLOYEE
WHERE FNAME LIKE '%Mc%';

x In order to list all employee who were born during 1960s we have the followings:
x SELECT FNAME, LNAME
. FROM EMPLOYEE
WHERE BDATE LIKE '6_______';

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x SQL also supports addition, subtraction, multiplication and division (denoted by +, , *,

and /, respectively) on numeric values or attributes with numeric domains.

Examples: Show the resulting salaries if every employee working on the 'ProductX' project is
given a 10 percent raise.

SELECT FNAME, LNAME, 1.1*SALARY

FROM EMPLOYEE, WORKS_ON, PROJECT
WHERE SSN=ESSN AND PNO=PNUMBER AND PNAME='ProductX';

Retrieve all employees in department number 5 whose salary between $30000 and $40000.

SELECT *
FROM EMPLOYEE
WHERE (SALARY BETWEEN 30000 AND 40000) AND DNO=5;

It is possible to order the tuples in the result of a query.

SELECT DNAME, LNAME, FNAME, PNAME

FROM DEPARTMENT, EMPLOYEE, WORKS_ON, PROJECT
WHERE DNUMBER=DNO AND SSN=ESSN AND PNO=PNUMBER
ORDER BY DNAME, LNAME, FNAME;

The default order is in ascending order, but user can specify

ORDER BY DNAME DESC, LNAME ASC, FNAME, ASC;

Tables as Sets in SQL

SQL treats table as a multiset, which means duplicate tuples are OK

SQL does not delete duplicate because Duplicate elimination is an expensive operation (sort and
delete) user may be interested in the result of a query in case of aggregate function, we do not
want to eliminate duplicates

To eliminate duplicate, use DISTINCT

examples

Q11: Retrieve the salary of every employee , and (Q!2) all distinct salary values

Q11: SELECT ALL SALARY

FROM EMPLOYEE

Q12: SELECT DISTINCT SALARY

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FROM EMPLOYEE

4.3 More Complex SQL Queries

Complex SQL queries can be formulated by composing nested SELECT/FROM/WHERE

clauses within the WHEREclause of another query

Example: Q4: Make a list of Project numbers for projects that involve an employee whose last
name is ‘Smith’, either as a worker or as a manger of the department that controls the project

Q4 SELECT DISTINCT PNUMBER

FROM PROJECT

WHERE PNUMBER IN (SELECT PNUMBER

FROM PROJECT, DEPARTMENT, EMPLOYEE

WHERE DNUM=DNUMBER AND MGRSSN=SSN AND LNAME=‘Smith’

OR PNUMBER IN (SELECT PNO

FROM WORKS_ON, EMPLOYEE

WHERE ESSN=SSN AND LNAME=‘Smith’)

IN operator and set of unioncompatible tuples

Example:

SELECT DISTINCT ESSN

FROM WORKS_ON

WHERE (PNO, HOURS) IN (SELECT PNO, HOURS

FROM WORKS_ON

WHERE SSN=‘123456789’

ANY, SOME and >, <=,<>,etc.

The keyword ALL

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In addition to the IN operator, a number of other comparison operators can be used to compare a
single value v to a set of multiset V.

ALL V returns TRUE if v is greater than all the value in the set

Select the name of employees whose salary is greater than the salary of all the employees in
department 5

SELECT LNAME, FNAME

FROM EMPLOYEE
WHERE SALARY > ALL (SELECT SALARY
FROM EMPLOYEE
WHERE DNO=5);

Ambiguity in nested query

SELECT E.FNAME, E.LNAME

FROM EMPLOYEE AS E
WHERE E.SSN IN (SELECT ESSN
FROM DEPENDENT
WHERE ESSN=E.SSN AND E.FNAM=DEPENDENT_NAME AND
SEX=E.SEX

Correlated Nested Query

Whenever a condition in the WHEREclause of a nested query references some attributes of a

relation declared in the outer query, the two queries are said to be correlated. The result of a
correlated nested query is different for each tuple (or combination of tuples) of the relation(s) the
outer query.

In general, any nested query involving the = or comparison operator IN can always be
rewritten as a single block query

SELECT E.FNAME, E.LNAME

FROM EMPLOYEE E, DEPENDENT D

WHERE E.SSN=D.ESSN AND E.SEX=D.SEX AND E.FNAME =D.DEPENDENT=NAME

Query 12: Retrieve the name of each employee who has a dependent with the same first name as
the employee.
Q12: SELECT E.FNAME, E.LNAME
FROM EMPLOYEE AS E
WHERE E.SSN IN (SELECT ESSN

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FROM DEPENDENT
WHEREESSN=E.SSN AND
E.FNAME=DEPENDENT_NAME)

In Q12, the nested query has a different result for each tuple in the outer query.

The original SQL as specified for SYSTEM R also had a CONTAINS comparison operator,
which is used in conjunction with nested correlated queries This operator was dropped from the
language, possibly because of the difficulty in implementing it efficiently Most implementations
of SQL do not have this operator The CONTAINS operator compares two sets of values , and
returns TRUE if one set contains all values in the other set (reminiscent of the division operation
of algebra).

Query 3: Retrieve the name of each employee who works on all the projects controlled by
department number 5.

Q3: SELECT FNAME, LNAME

FROM EMPLOYEE WHERE ( (SELECT PNO FROM WORKS_ON WHERE SSN=ESSN)

CONTAINS (SELECT PNUMBER FROM PROJECT WHERE DNUM=5) )

In Q3, the second nested query, which is not correlated with the outer query, retrieves the project
numbers of all projects controlled by department 5.

The first nested query, which is correlated, retrieves the project numbers on which the employee
works, which is different for each employee tuple because of the correlation.

THE EXISTS AND UNIQUE FUNCTIONS IN SQL

EXISTS is used to check whether the result of a correlated nested query is empty (contains no
tuples) or not We can formulate Query 12 in an alternative form that uses EXISTS as Q12B
below.

Query 12: Retrieve the name of each employee who has a dependent with the same first name as
the employee.

SELECT E.FNAME, E.LNAME

FROM EMPLOYEE E
WHERE EXISTS (SELECT *
FROM DEPENDENT
WHERE E.SSN=ESSN AND SEX=E.SEX AND
E.FNAME=DEPENDENT_NAME

Query 6: Retrieve the names of employees who have no dependents.

Q6: SELECT FNAME, LNAME

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FROM EMPLOYEE
WHERE NOT EXISTS (SELECT *
FROM DEPENDENT
WHERESSN=ESSN)

In Q6, the correlated nested query retrieves all DEPENDENT tuples related to an EMPLOYEE
tuple. If none exist , the EMPLOYEE tuple is selected EXISTS is necessary for the expressive
power of SQL

EXPLICIT SETS AND NULLS IN SQL

It is also possible to use an explicit (enumerated) set of values in the WHEREclause rather than
a nested query Query 13: Retrieve the social security numbers of all employees who work on
project number 1, 2, or 3.

Retrieve SSNs of all employees who work on project number 1,2,3

SELECT DISTINCT ESSN

FROM WORKS_ON
WHERE PNO IN (1,2,3)

Null example

SQL allows queries that check if a value is NULL (missing or undefined or not applicable) SQL
uses IS or IS NOT to compare NULLs because it considers each NULL value distinct from other
NULL values, so equality comparison is not appropriate .

Retrieve the names of all employees who do not have supervisors

SELECT FNAME, LNAME

FROM EMPLOYEE

WHERE SUPERSSN IS NULL

Note: If a join condition is specified, tuples with NULL values for the join attributes are not
included in the result

Join Revisit

Retrieve the name and address of every employee who works for ‘Search’ department

SELECT FNAME, LNAME, ADDRESS

FROM (EMPLOYEE JOIN DEPARTMENT ON DNO=DNUMBER)
WHERE DNAME=‘Search’

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Aggregate Functions

Include COUNT, SUM, MAX, MIN, and AVG

Query 15: Find the sum of the salaries of all employees the ‘Research’ dept, and the max salary,
the min salary, and average:

SELECT SUM(SALARY), MAX(SALARY), MIN(SALARY) AVG(SALARY)

FROM EMPLOYEE

WHERE DNO=FNUMBER AND DNAME=‘RSEARCH’

Query 16: Find the maximum salary, the minimum salary, and the average salary among
employees who work for the 'Research' department.

Q16: SELECT MAX(SALARY), MIN(SALARY), AVG(SALARY)

FROM EMPLOYEE, DEPARTMENT
WHERE DNO=DNUMBER AND DNAME='Research'

Queries 17 and 18: Retrieve the total number of employees in the company (Q17), and the
number of employees in the 'Research' department (Q18).

Q17: SELECT COUNT (*)

FROM EMPLOYEE
Q18: SELECT COUNT (*)
FROM EMPLOYEE, DEPARTMENT
WHERE DNO=DNUMBER AND DNAME='Research'

Example of grouping

In many cases, we want to apply the aggregate functions to subgroups of tuples in a relation
Each subgroup of tuples consists of the set of tuples that have the same value for the grouping
attribute(s)

The function is applied to each subgroup independently

SQL has a GROUP BYclause for specifying the grouping attributes, which must also appear in
the SELECTclause

For each project, select the project number, the project name, and the number of employees
who work on that projet

SELECT PNUMBER, PNAME, COUNT(*)

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FROM PROJECT, WORKS_ON

WHERE PNUMBER=PNO

GROUP BY PNUMBER, PNAME

In Q20, the EMPLOYEE tuples are divided into groupseach group having the same value for the
grouping attribute DNO
The COUNT and AVG functions are applied to each such group of tuples separately.The
SELECTclause includes only the grouping attribute and the functions to be applied on each
group of tuples. A join condition can be used in conjunction with grouping

Query 21: For each project, retrieve the project number, project name, and the number of
employees who work on that project.
Q21: SELECT PNUMBER, PNAME, COUNT (*)
FROM PROJECT, WORKS_ON
WHERE PNUMBER=PNO
GROUP BY PNUMBER, PNAME
In this case, the grouping and functions are applied after the joining of the two
relations
THE HAVINGCLAUSE:

Sometimes we want to retrieve the values of these functions for only those groups that satisfy
certain conditions. The HAVINGclause is used for specifying a selection condition on groups
(rather than on individual tuples)

Query 22: For each project on which more than two employees work , retrieve the project
number, project name, and the number of employees who work on that project.

Q22: SELECT PNUMBER, PNAME, COUNT (*)

FROM PROJECT, WORKS_ON
WHERE PNUMBER=PNO
GROUP BY PNUMBER, PNAME
HAVING COUNT (*) > 2

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