6 ms·

Honestly I think SQL is pretty easy. I love it. I can teach the basics to a new person in minutes. You know what we could do better at? Crappy explains from da

Honestly I think SQL is pretty easy. I love it. I can teach the basics to a new person in minutes. You know what we could do better at? Crappy explains from database engines. Crappy rate limiting capabilities. Poor feedback on keep cache pipelines fed during scans. Poor feedback on column size effects on reading stripes from disk and size alignments between the filesystem and database.

djhaskin987 6y ago
An excellent point: there are so many other problems that deserve our attention regarding databases that talking about something that's worked really well for 50 years is kind of silly. We have bigger fish to fry.
systematical 6y ago
Not only this, but resources GALORE since its been around longer than the internet and has been used by just about every developer. Java, Python, C#, Node, PHP etc... they all know SQL.
simonbarker87 6y ago
Your brain must work different to mine. SQL is by far the hardest tool I use. I’ve used all the main languages from asm up to js for real work and nothing breaks my brain like SQL. I use it daily in a business that is heavy on SPs and while I get by and am improving the jump from inner joins and selects to CTEs and the other wizardry is massive. I want to be better at SQL but so many problems I hit up against and think “well that’s a 2 minute job in js/swift/php”
- bjo590 6y ago
  > I want to be better at SQL but so many problems I hit up against and think “well that’s a 2 minute job in js/swift/php” The thing about SQL is that it's the fastest way to read&write data in a relational database. Maybe writing the code is faster in js/swift/php, but the code will run faster in SQL. If you need to do something to 100M pieces of data you can do a lot worse than SQL.
  - danielovichdk 6y ago
    You cannot compare SQL to either of those languages, since they are not built solely for data for data manipulation, but also a lot of other things, which SQL is not. SQL can do a lot too, but just because you e.g can do formatting in SQL doesn't Mean it's the correct place or choice.
  - lmm 6y ago
    That's circular reasoning though. Why do you want your data to be in a relational database? Particularly if you're not actually using its features (I don't think I've ever seen a web application that actually got any value out of database-level transactions, for example). A different kind of datastore could offer you better performance and easier querying.
    - Akronymus 6y ago
      I love SQL for making it possible to almost trivially enforce most business rules. Such as: You can only use one of the in another table specified values in this field.
      - lmm 6y ago
        I struggle to understand this viewpoint. In my experience business rules are harder to express in SQL than in practically any first-class programming language. "Is this value one of this list of values" - whether that list is hardcoded or dynamically obtained - is completely trivial. (Of course if you apply some double standard where editing your "source code" requires multiple approvals whereas changing your "database" may be done at will in production then you'll find SQL logic easier to adjust, but that's a reflection of your policies rather than any fundamental reality.)
        Akronymus 6y ago
        With SQL you can enforce it within the datastore. And if some requirement changes, you can instantly enforce it. Eg.: A new foreign key constraint. Also: It is centrally managed, so you don't need to look all over the source code to find the constraints and don't need duplicates either, if you can, for example,change the data at multiple points.
- scotty79 6y ago
  The problem for SQL is (apart from horrible syntax that makes any query re-factoring tedious) that databases are very strict structures, that through their rigidity make some operations very fast, but some operations impossible (to perform in this fast manner). When you are crafting good SQL query (crafting is the right word as each non-trivial SQL query is a little puzzle that may take you few days to solve because of the constraints) you need to stay within the bounds of the this fast db world. Whenever you are forced to open a cursor or use CTE for recursion or even have a full table scan you already left the fast land and landed in the world that all general purpose language inhibit, where you have to iterate and recurse and everything takes ages. And in that land any other language beats SQL because any other language has the syntax designed to make things easier in this world while SQL has the syntax that's just good enough for the fast world where operations are highly restricted and when it ventures into the slow world it's just a horrible mess.
- jtdev 6y ago
  You’re not thinking in sets if you’re constantly inclined to move to js/php/swift. Spend some time trying to break this mental bearier and you’ll find that SQL becomes easier and more sensible.
- exabrial 6y ago
  I had three college classes that really sealed this up for me: linear algebra, a set theory 'light' class, and a class on database mechanics itself. After than I was able to reason about mathematical sets, and scalar functions and what the database engine is doing. If you "just learn SQL" without understanding the abstraction below it, it'll be difficult to be successful, much the same with anything else.

djhaskin987 6y ago

An excellent point: there are so many other problems that deserve our attention regarding databases that talking about something that's worked really well for 50 years is kind of silly. We have bigger fish to fry.

systematical 6y ago

Not only this, but resources GALORE since its been around longer than the internet and has been used by just about every developer. Java, Python, C#, Node, PHP etc... they all know SQL.

simonbarker87 6y ago

Your brain must work different to mine. SQL is by far the hardest tool I use. I’ve used all the main languages from asm up to js for real work and nothing breaks my brain like SQL. I use it daily in a business that is heavy on SPs and while I get by and am improving the jump from inner joins and selects to CTEs and the other wizardry is massive. I want to be better at SQL but so many problems I hit up against and think “well that’s a 2 minute job in js/swift/php”

bjo590 6y ago
> I want to be better at SQL but so many problems I hit up against and think “well that’s a 2 minute job in js/swift/php” The thing about SQL is that it's the fastest way to read&write data in a relational database. Maybe writing the code is faster in js/swift/php, but the code will run faster in SQL. If you need to do something to 100M pieces of data you can do a lot worse than SQL.
- danielovichdk 6y ago
  You cannot compare SQL to either of those languages, since they are not built solely for data for data manipulation, but also a lot of other things, which SQL is not. SQL can do a lot too, but just because you e.g can do formatting in SQL doesn't Mean it's the correct place or choice.
- lmm 6y ago
  That's circular reasoning though. Why do you want your data to be in a relational database? Particularly if you're not actually using its features (I don't think I've ever seen a web application that actually got any value out of database-level transactions, for example). A different kind of datastore could offer you better performance and easier querying.
  - Akronymus 6y ago
    I love SQL for making it possible to almost trivially enforce most business rules. Such as: You can only use one of the in another table specified values in this field.
    - lmm 6y ago
      I struggle to understand this viewpoint. In my experience business rules are harder to express in SQL than in practically any first-class programming language. "Is this value one of this list of values" - whether that list is hardcoded or dynamically obtained - is completely trivial. (Of course if you apply some double standard where editing your "source code" requires multiple approvals whereas changing your "database" may be done at will in production then you'll find SQL logic easier to adjust, but that's a reflection of your policies rather than any fundamental reality.)
      - Akronymus 6y ago
        With SQL you can enforce it within the datastore. And if some requirement changes, you can instantly enforce it. Eg.: A new foreign key constraint. Also: It is centrally managed, so you don't need to look all over the source code to find the constraints and don't need duplicates either, if you can, for example,change the data at multiple points.
scotty79 6y ago
The problem for SQL is (apart from horrible syntax that makes any query re-factoring tedious) that databases are very strict structures, that through their rigidity make some operations very fast, but some operations impossible (to perform in this fast manner). When you are crafting good SQL query (crafting is the right word as each non-trivial SQL query is a little puzzle that may take you few days to solve because of the constraints) you need to stay within the bounds of the this fast db world. Whenever you are forced to open a cursor or use CTE for recursion or even have a full table scan you already left the fast land and landed in the world that all general purpose language inhibit, where you have to iterate and recurse and everything takes ages. And in that land any other language beats SQL because any other language has the syntax designed to make things easier in this world while SQL has the syntax that's just good enough for the fast world where operations are highly restricted and when it ventures into the slow world it's just a horrible mess.
jtdev 6y ago
You’re not thinking in sets if you’re constantly inclined to move to js/php/swift. Spend some time trying to break this mental bearier and you’ll find that SQL becomes easier and more sensible.
exabrial 6y ago
I had three college classes that really sealed this up for me: linear algebra, a set theory 'light' class, and a class on database mechanics itself. After than I was able to reason about mathematical sets, and scalar functions and what the database engine is doing. If you "just learn SQL" without understanding the abstraction below it, it'll be difficult to be successful, much the same with anything else.