In the process of refactoring some MySQL queries in some PHP code, I came across some interesting syntax for field aliases in the existing code and poked around a bit…

I have blogged before about simplicity in code: how the simplest solutions are usually the best, and I normally put it down to elegance. I have the following table:tblTagstagID (int,…

One of the basic aims of Structured Query Language (“SQL”) is to provide a standard for interacting with databases. Unfortunately, most SQL code requires at least some changes before being…

After swatting up on connecting QlikView to a MySQL database, I used the knowledge gained to create a similar set-up, this time with Microsoft Excel. This is how to dynamically…

I got stuck writing a query for Firebird today. This is not the first time that the SQL was a standard has not been so standard — if only the “S”…

I battled for ages to find the correct syntax to create a trigger in MySQL — the examples I could find were all too complex and I could not get…

I spend a lot of time sanitising data. I use Microsoft Excel a lot of the time to perform most of the work — but I am slowly starting to use…

I am creating an Excel Report that queries a MySQL database using an ODBC connection. The data is then returned as a result of a Stored Procedure that contains some…

I have always stored IP addresses as strings in VARCHAR fields in MySQL. I am currently reading “High Performance MySQL” (O’Reilly) and it mentions the advantages of storing IP addresses…

I got this question as part of a skills evaluation test. It requires a query to aggregate data from 2 tables in a one-to-many relationship in an “order system”-type database.…