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Having a solid working toolkit of SQL knowledge really will make you seem very useful on a team. I do say "seem" though, in that if you weren't around it's not

Having a solid working toolkit of SQL knowledge really will make you seem very useful on a team. I do say "seem" though, in that if you weren't around it's not like the team would fail without you. It's not hard to learn SQL or Google around for a little bit to figure out what you're trying to accomplish. Sort of like that one guy on your team who's a wizard at regular expressions. He seems like a life saver in the moment, but you'd be able to figure it out without him, too.

nicoburns 8y ago
Hmm... I'm not sure. I've seen people take hours or even days (in the case of more junior developers) trying to sort out these kind of issues. It's pretty helpful if you have (or are) someone who can waltz over and fix it in a couple of minutes. Complex git problems are another one that can really throw people sometimes.
- whynotminot 8y ago
  Oh it's definitely helpful! And it's something I should finally take the time to dedicate a weekend to shoring up my knowledge. Just every time I have to deal with a sql database, my lack of knowledge (at least to this point) has never been a show stopper. It takes me a little more time than a real pro to get my statements figured out, but it's rarely so complex to require canvasing the shop for a true expert.
  - tingletech 8y ago
    wait to you have a performance issue in prime time and you need to refactor your query in a hurry
  - james_s_tayler 8y ago
    This is pretty much where I'm at. Though I'm on a mission to really nail fundamentals this year and SQL plus query tuning is the next stop for me. I've got 20 hours of courses related to SQL fundamentals lined up Pluralsight and another 30 odd hours SQL Server / Query Tuning. The half-life of the knowledge is so long it's just a big boost for a really long time to become an order of magnitude better at it.
sooheon 8y ago
Speaking as not an SQL guru -- isn't this true for every skill? Theoretically anyone can figure anything out with enough time, the value is of specialists having better mental maps for what solutions apply, when you need them.
- whynotminot 8y ago
  > isn't this true for every skill? But you're implying then that all skills are equally hard to get a handle on, and that's just not true. Working with sql is fairly simple even for those who aren't experts. But (as the article mentions) it's not always something a dev has done before or consistently so they'll often feel relieved if there's someone who's confident about it around.
  - sooheon 8y ago
    Yes, but I'd say helping out and saving time is just being useful, not "seeming" useful. I suspect like any domain, SQL and DBs have a fractal of complexity, so reading is different from writing is different from architecting, and expertise is useful at each step.
  - dominotw 8y ago
    >Working with sql is fairly simple even for those who aren't experts. Its not though. There are windows, subqueries, joins , various functions, proprietary extensions, partitions, aggregations ect ect. Even if you get all the down, figuring out a performant version of the query is another hurdle, the whole 'simple' abstraction falls apart once you start tuning your query.
  - ehnto 8y ago
    Sure, you can get away with some basic SQL knowledge in simple CRUD applications, but any kind of complex reporting and analytics software with a complex data set is going to take a bit more than simple SQL. It's a career specialization, there are people getting paid astronomical amounts of money for their knowledge of SQL alone, and it's their full time job. Some queries are hundreds of lines long, conjure up entirely new databases from the query itself, and trigger complex procedures across the entire application, all within SQL. It can be as complex as any application logic. Simple SQL is pretty easy to learn, but I wouldn't say you "have a handle" on it if all you've got is the basics.
ehnto 8y ago
Normally if you need a guru it's because you are at a level of SQL complexity that can't be navigated without intuitive knowledge of SQL and it's various nuances.
qaq 8y ago
well it might be a bit too late when you start googling if you didn't have a person on the team that understands your database well. I am always surprised to see that very few people care enough to learn about isolation levels for example.
war1025 8y ago
There is a big difference between "get's the correct data out of the database" and "get's the data efficiently" A significant percentage of my time over the past few years has been spent optimizing queries that other people did in obvious, but non-ideal ways.

nicoburns 8y ago

Hmm... I'm not sure. I've seen people take hours or even days (in the case of more junior developers) trying to sort out these kind of issues. It's pretty helpful if you have (or are) someone who can waltz over and fix it in a couple of minutes. Complex git problems are another one that can really throw people sometimes.

whynotminot 8y ago
Oh it's definitely helpful! And it's something I should finally take the time to dedicate a weekend to shoring up my knowledge. Just every time I have to deal with a sql database, my lack of knowledge (at least to this point) has never been a show stopper. It takes me a little more time than a real pro to get my statements figured out, but it's rarely so complex to require canvasing the shop for a true expert.
- tingletech 8y ago
  wait to you have a performance issue in prime time and you need to refactor your query in a hurry
- james_s_tayler 8y ago
  This is pretty much where I'm at. Though I'm on a mission to really nail fundamentals this year and SQL plus query tuning is the next stop for me. I've got 20 hours of courses related to SQL fundamentals lined up Pluralsight and another 30 odd hours SQL Server / Query Tuning. The half-life of the knowledge is so long it's just a big boost for a really long time to become an order of magnitude better at it.

sooheon 8y ago

Speaking as not an SQL guru -- isn't this true for every skill? Theoretically anyone can figure anything out with enough time, the value is of specialists having better mental maps for what solutions apply, when you need them.

whynotminot 8y ago
> isn't this true for every skill? But you're implying then that all skills are equally hard to get a handle on, and that's just not true. Working with sql is fairly simple even for those who aren't experts. But (as the article mentions) it's not always something a dev has done before or consistently so they'll often feel relieved if there's someone who's confident about it around.
- sooheon 8y ago
  Yes, but I'd say helping out and saving time is just being useful, not "seeming" useful. I suspect like any domain, SQL and DBs have a fractal of complexity, so reading is different from writing is different from architecting, and expertise is useful at each step.
- dominotw 8y ago
  >Working with sql is fairly simple even for those who aren't experts. Its not though. There are windows, subqueries, joins , various functions, proprietary extensions, partitions, aggregations ect ect. Even if you get all the down, figuring out a performant version of the query is another hurdle, the whole 'simple' abstraction falls apart once you start tuning your query.
- ehnto 8y ago
  Sure, you can get away with some basic SQL knowledge in simple CRUD applications, but any kind of complex reporting and analytics software with a complex data set is going to take a bit more than simple SQL. It's a career specialization, there are people getting paid astronomical amounts of money for their knowledge of SQL alone, and it's their full time job. Some queries are hundreds of lines long, conjure up entirely new databases from the query itself, and trigger complex procedures across the entire application, all within SQL. It can be as complex as any application logic. Simple SQL is pretty easy to learn, but I wouldn't say you "have a handle" on it if all you've got is the basics.

ehnto 8y ago

Normally if you need a guru it's because you are at a level of SQL complexity that can't be navigated without intuitive knowledge of SQL and it's various nuances.

qaq 8y ago

well it might be a bit too late when you start googling if you didn't have a person on the team that understands your database well. I am always surprised to see that very few people care enough to learn about isolation levels for example.

war1025 8y ago

There is a big difference between "get's the correct data out of the database" and "get's the data efficiently" A significant percentage of my time over the past few years has been spent optimizing queries that other people did in obvious, but non-ideal ways.