MS Access and SQL

[Masaud]

Hi,
I am starting to learn SQL. I was practicing some quries in Access, but Functions do not work there. (For example COCAT, UPPER, LOWER, etc). LIKe operator did not work either. I am wondering if this is ACCESS's limitation? If yes, can anyone suggest me some better tool where I can practice?

Thanks in advance!!!

 

[smuckers]

Good afternoon Masaud:

This is how I got started.

I learned SQL with a free program called WinSQL. It can be used for MS Access, SQL Server 2000, MySQL, AS-400 and many other applications with tables. The interface is very user friendly.

Using WinSQL and MS Access Query interface, I was able to learn SQL quickly. Advance queries do not work well with MS Access and sometimes the Access design GUI does not work at all. It forces you to use the SQL view. Using the SQL view in MS Access is very difficult and there is no debugger. For this reason WinSQL is my choice for advance queries and once its working, I cut and paste the code over to MS Access SQL query view screen.

One last thing. Syntax, syntax, syntax(3 actually). Syntax is so important that I worked in WinSQL first, got the code working and then copy and pasted over to MS Access. This separated the learning of SQL coding from the learning of MS Access syntax.

Syntax for the Like statement is different for MS Access and SQL Server 2000. -- Like "S%" -- is the syntax for MS Access and -- Like 'S%' for SQL Server 2000. Notice the difference? The syntax of the double quotes for MS Access and the single quotes for SQL Server 2000 is critical. So if it works in WinSQL and it does not work in MS Access or SQL Server 2000 then its most likely a syntax issue.

Good luck.

Smuckers

May your hysterical randomness be cured!