SQL interview questions and answers

By admin | July 14, 2008

1. What are two methods of retrieving SQL?
2. What cursor type do you use to retrieve multiple recordsets?
3. What is the difference between a "where" clause and a "having" clause? - "Where" is a
kind of restiriction statement. You use where clause to restrict all the data from DB.Where
clause is using before result retrieving. But Having clause is using after retrieving the
data.Having clause is a kind of filtering command.
4. What is the basic form of a SQL statement to read data out of a table? The basic form
to read data out of table is ‘SELECT * FROM table_name; ‘ An answer: ‘SELECT * FROM
table_name WHERE xyz= ‘whatever’;’ cannot be called basic form because of WHERE clause.

5. What structure can you implement for the database to speed up table reads?- Follow
the rules of DB tuning we have to: 1] properly use indexes ( different types of indexes) 2]
properly locate different DB objects across different tablespaces, files and so on.3] create a
special space (tablespace) to locate some of the data with special datatype ( for example
CLOB, LOB and …)
6. What are the tradeoffs with having indexes? - 1. Faster selects, slower updates. 2. Extra
storage space to store indexes. Updates are slower because in addition to updating the table
you have to update the index.
7. What is a "join"? - ‘join’ used to connect two or more tables logically with or without
common field.
8. What is "normalization"? "Denormalization"? Why do you sometimes want to
denormalize? - Normalizing data means eliminating redundant information from a table and
organizing the data so that future changes to the table are easier. Denormalization means
allowing redundancy in a table. The main benefit of denormalization is improved performance
with simplified data retrieval and manipulation. This is done by reduction in the number of
joins needed for data processing.
9. What is a "constraint"? - A constraint allows you to apply simple referential integrity
checks to a table. There are four primary types of constraints that are currently supported by
SQL Server: PRIMARY/UNIQUE - enforces uniqueness of a particular table column. DEFAULT
- specifies a default value for a column in case an insert operation does not provide one.
FOREIGN KEY - validates that every value in a column exists in a column of another table.
CHECK - checks that every value stored in a column is in some specified list. Each type of
constraint performs a specific type of action. Default is not a constraint. NOT NULL is one
more constraint which does not allow values in the specific column to be null. And also it the
only constraint which is not a table level constraint.
10. What types of index data structures can you have? - An index helps to faster search
values in tables. The three most commonly used index-types are: - B-Tree: builds a tree of
possible values with a list of row IDs that have the leaf value. Needs a lot of space and is the
default index type for most databases. - Bitmap: string of bits for each possible value of the
column. Each bit string has one bit for each row. Needs only few space and is very fast.
(however, domain of value cannot be large, e.g. SEX(m,f); degree(BS,MS,PHD) - Hash: A
hashing algorithm is used to assign a set of characters to represent a text string such as a
composite of keys or partial keys, and compresses the underlying data. Takes longer to build
and is supported by relatively few databases.
 11. What is a "primary key"? - A PRIMARY INDEX or PRIMARY KEY is something which comes
mainly from
database theory. From its behavior is almost the same as an UNIQUE INDEX, i.e. there may
only be one of each value in this column. If you call such an INDEX PRIMARY instead of
UNIQUE, you say something about
your table design, which I am not able to explain in few words. Primary Key is a type of a
constraint enforcing uniqueness and data integrity for each row of a table. All columns
participating in a primary key constraint must possess the NOT NULL property.
12. What is a "functional dependency"? How does it relate to database table design? -
Functional dependency relates to how one object depends upon the other in the database. for
example, procedure/function sp2 may be called by procedure sp1. Then we say that sp1 has
functional dependency on sp2.
13. What is a "trigger"? - Triggers are stored procedures created in order to enforce integrity
rules in a database. A trigger is executed every time a data-modification operation occurs
(i.e., insert, update or delete). Triggers are executed automatically on occurance of one of the
data-modification operations. A trigger is a database object directly associated with a
particular table. It fires whenever a specific statement/type of statement is issued against that
table. The types of statements are insert,update,delete and query statements. Basically,
trigger is a set of SQL statements A trigger is a solution to the restrictions of a constraint. For
instance: 1.A database column cannot carry PSEUDO columns as criteria where a trigger can.
2. A database constraint cannot refer old and new values for a row where a trigger can.
14. Why can a "group by" or "order by" clause be expensive to process? - Processing of
"group by" or "order by" clause often requires creation of Temporary tables to process the
results of the query. Which depending of the result set can be very expensive.
15. What is "index covering" of a query? - Index covering means that "Data can be found only
using indexes, without touching the tables"
16. What types of join algorithms can you have?
17. What is a SQL view? - An output of a query can be stored as a view. View acts like small
table which meets our criterion. View is a precomplied SQL query which is used to select data
from one or more tables. A view is like a table but it doesn’t physically take any space. View is
a good way to present data in a particular format if you use that query quite often. View can
also be used to restrict users from accessing the tables directly.

What are temp tables? What is the difference between

global and local temp tables?
Temporary tables are temporary storage structures. You may use temporary tables as buckets to
store data that you will manipulate before arriving at a final format. The hash (#) character is used to
declare a temporary table as it is prepended to the table name. A single hash (#) specifies a local
temporary table.

CREATE TABLE #tempLocal ( nameid int, fname varchar(50), lname

varchar(50) )

Local temporary tables are available to the current connection for the user, so they disappear when
the user disconnects.
Global temporary tables may be created with double hashes (##). These are available to all users
via all connections, and they are deleted only when all connections are closed.

CREATE TABLE ##tempGlobal ( nameid int, fname varchar(50), lname

varchar(50) )

Once created, these tables are used just like permanent tables; they should be deleted when you
are finished with them. Within SQL Server, temporary tables are stored in the Temporary Tables
folder of the tempdb database.

How are transactions used?

Transactions allow you to group SQL commands into a single unit. The transaction begins with a
certain task and ends when all tasks within it are complete. The transaction completes successfully
only if all commands within it complete successfully. The whole thing fails if one command fails. The
BEGIN TRANSACTION, ROLLBACK TRANSACTION, and COMMIT TRANSACTION statements
are used to work with transactions. A group of tasks starts with the begin statement. If any problems
occur, the rollback command is executed to abort. If everything goes well, all commands are
permanently executed via the commit statement.

What is the difference between a clustered and a

nonclustered index?
A clustered index affects the way the rows of data in a table are stored on disk. When a clustered
index is used, rows are stored in sequential order according to the index column value; for this
reason, a table can contain only one clustered index, which is usually used on the primary index
value.

A nonclustered index does not affect the way data is physically stored; it creates a new object for the
index and stores the column(s) designated for indexing with a pointer back to the row containing the
indexed values.

You can think of a clustered index as a dictionary in alphabetical order, and a nonclustered index as
a book’s index.

What are DBCC commands?

Basically, the Database Consistency Checker (DBCC) provides a set of commands (many of which
are undocumented) to maintain databases — maintenance, validation, and status checks. The
syntax is DBCC followed by the command name. Here are three examples:

DBCC CHECKALLOC — Check disk allocation consistency.

DBCC OPENTRAN — Display information about recent transactions.

DBCC HELP — Display Help for DBCC commands.

What is the difference between truncate and delete?
Truncate is a quick way to empty a table. It removes everything without logging each row. Truncate
will fail if there are foreign key relationships on the table. Conversely, the delete command removes
rows from a table, while logging each deletion and triggering any delete triggers that may be present.

What does the NOLOCK query hint do?

Table hints allow you to override the default behavior of the query optimizer for statements. They are
specified in the FROM clause of the statement. While overriding the query optimizer is not always
suggested, it can be useful when many users or processes are touching data. The NOLOCK query
hint is a good example because it allows you to read data regardless of who else is working with the
data; that is, it allows a dirty read of data — you read data no matter if other users are manipulating
it. A hint like NOLOCK increases concurrency with large data stores.

SELECT * FROM table_name (NOLOCK)

Microsoft advises against using NOLOCK, as it is being replaced by the READUNCOMMITTED

query hint. There are lots more query hints with plenty of information online.
What is a CTE?
A common table expression (CTE) is a temporary named result set that can be used within other
statements like SELECT, INSERT, UPDATE, and DELETE. It is not stored as an object and its
lifetime is limited to the query. It is defined using the WITH statement as the following example
shows:

WITH ExampleCTE (id, fname, lname)

AS
(
SELECT id, firstname, lastname FROM table
)
SELECT * FROM ExampleCTE

A CTE can be used in place of a view in some instances.

What is the default port number for SQL Server?

If enabled, the default instance of Microsoft SQL Server listens on TCP port 1433. Named instances
are configured for dynamic ports, so an available port is chosen when SQL Server starts. When
connecting to a named instance through a firewall, configure the Database Engine to listen on a
specific port, so that the appropriate port can be opened in the firewall.