I’m increasingly meeting people at data and tech community events who need to query SQL Server databases, but who don’t need to know how the database engine works, how to create databases – in fact how to do anything other than connect and retrieve data.  That can be a problem for some training materials as they want to cover everything or make you think you need to know everything.  There’s also generic SQL language training resources, but SQL Server’s SQL language, T-SQL, has some proprietary performance enhancing features which are too good to overlook.

Below then are some links to some training resources for those wanting to query SQL Server databases.

• SQL Server 2016 Developer Edition
  This is a free download of a free to use version of SQL Server.  It’s got a relatively simple installation wizard so it shouldn’t require much more than a few clicks to get it installed.
  https://my.visualstudio.com/Downloads?q=sql%20server%202016%20developer

• Querying with Transact-SQL
  Almost a whole day’s worth of free online training videos from Microsoft about querying databases with T-SQL
  https://mva.microsoft.com/en-us/training-courses/querying-with-transact-sql-10530?l=TjT07f87_9804984382

• Querying SQL Server 2012 Databases Jump Start
  Don’t worry about the version of SQL Server these similar free Microsoft online training videos are for as they cover a broad range of useful topics
  https://mva.microsoft.com/en-US/training-courses/querying-microsoft-sql-server-2012-databases-jump-start-8241?l=WFbhCtJy_7204984382

• Querying Microsoft SQL Server Exam
  If you want a benchmark for knowing how good your querying skills could be, then this exam’s learning objectives are useful (even if you don’t take the exam0
  https://www.microsoft.com/en-gb/learning/exam-70-461.aspx

Non-Microsoft training videos, books, and blog articles obviously exist but you often have to know which you can trust before assuming everything you read is correct.

Need more assistance?

If there’s something you need to learn that’s not covered by one of those links, then please feel free to email me gavin@coeo.com