PHP and MySQL for Dynamic Web Sites: Visual QuickPro Guide, Fifth Edition

5. Introduction to SQL

In This Chapter

Creating Databases and Tables

Inserting Records

Selecting Data

Using Conditionals

Using LIKE and NOT LIKE

Sorting Query Results

Limiting Query Results

Updating Data

Deleting Data

Using Functions

Review and Pursue

The preceding chapter provided a quick introduction to MySQL. That chapter focused on two topics: using MySQL’s rules and data types to define a database, and how to interact with the MySQL server. This chapter moves on to the lingua franca of databases: SQL.

SQL, short for Structured Query Language, is a group of special words used exclusively for interacting with databases. SQL is surprisingly easy to learn and use, and yet it’s amazingly powerful. In fact, the hardest thing to do in SQL is ...