SQL Server Database Fundamentals

Explore what a database is, how a database server provides data access, security, monitoring, and services for creating, querying, and managing relational databases, with Microsoft SQL Server as the focus.

Explore three common database types—flat file, hierarchical, and relational—highlighting flat file drawbacks like redundancy and lack of relationships, and explain how normalization and keys enforce integrity.

Explore designing relational databases through normalization, applying the first to third normal forms to improve data integrity, reduce redundancy, and manage keys, relationships, and constraints.

Explore how SQL Server constraints enforce data integrity, including data type, nullability, primary key, foreign key, unique, check, and default constraints, to ensure valid, reliable data.

Explore how database keys like candidate keys, primary keys, and foreign keys identify rows and enforce relationships. Learn about composite, surrogate, and compound keys and referential integrity.

Master the core Transact-SQL concepts, including QL for querying, DML, DDL, TCL, and DCL, with examples like SELECT, INSERT, UPDATE, DELETE, CREATE, ALTER, DROP, and TRUNCATE.

Explore SQL Server data types, including character and Unicode string types, temporal and numerical types such as int, decimal, money, and real, to inform database development.

Connect to a SQL Server instance with SQL Server Management Studio, configure authentication, manage logins and security, and restore the Northwind database to start querying.

Learn to query databases using Transact-SQL in SQL Server Management Studio, switch contexts, and write select statements. Explore three-part and two-part naming, use asterisks, brackets for reserved keywords, and semicolons.

Apply aliases using the as clause to create correlation names, disambiguate columns across tables, and name calculated results like net amount for clearer queries.

Learn to filter data using the where clause, applying comparison and range operators, between and in, handle nulls and operator precedence to retrieve targeted rows efficiently.

Order data with the order by clause to sort by one or more columns, using ascending or descending directions regardless of how data is stored by the clustered index.

Explore aggregate functions in SQL Server, including count, sum, average, min, and max. Apply them to entire datasets and verify results across rows and columns.

Group data by one or more columns and apply aggregate functions to summarize values, counting customers by country. Learn about group identifiers, selecting columns, and using aliases in order by.

Master querying across related tables with inner, left, right, full outer, and cross joins, using aliases and primary and foreign keys to pull precise data from customers and orders.

Study set operators in SQL Server: union, union all, intersect, and except, to combine same-structure results like customer and employee country lists, and understand duplicates and data type rules.

Insert data with transact-sql by creating a test schema and employees table, performing single and multi-row inserts, using column lists, identity columns, and default constraints.

Learn to update data in the employees table using update, set, and where clauses; filter by primary key to change Nikki Garcia’s higher date and Patricia Anderson’s department and salary.

Delete data from a table using from and where clauses, filtering by primary key. Truncate is a ddl command that resets the identity and avoids per-row logging.

Learn to create a database and design tables in sql server management studio, using gui or transact sql, and apply primary and foreign keys with constraints for a music catalog.

Explore how database views act as named, virtual tables that filter data for security and integrity, simplify queries, and support updates from a base table, with creation and alteration basics.

Explore built-in system defined functions in SQL Server, including scalar, aggregate, analytical, and ranking types, and create user defined scalar and table valued functions with practical examples.

Explore database triggers in SQL Server, including DML and DDL triggers, and after and instead of triggers, to enforce business rules and audit data with history and temporal tables.

Discover how stored procedures group related statements, reduce network traffic, and boost maintainability and security through parameterization and centralized logic.

Discover how database indexes improve query speed and prevent full table scans by using clustered and non-clustered indexes built on a balanced tree.

Secure a SQL Server database through authentication, authorization, and roles across server, database, and schema levels. Manage logins, users, and permissions with grant or revoke to control access.

Learn how to back up and restore a SQL Server database, using full, differential, and transaction log backups, and select suitable recovery models such as simple, full, and bulk-logged.

Practice questions with explained solutions for the Microsoft database fundamentals exam help you prepare with verified non repetitive questions for success.