 | SQL Server Foreign Keys
The eighteenth part of the SQL Server Programming Fundamentals tutorial examines the use of foreign key constraints. These constraints define relationships between two tables, enforcing referential integrity to avoid orphaned rows in normalised tables. |
| SQL Server Indexes Part 2
The sixteenth part of the SQL Server Programming Fundamentals tutorial continues the review of indexes in SQL Server 2005 databases. This article expands upon an earlier discussion of indexes, implementing them with SQL Server Management Studio and T-SQL. |
| SQL Server Indexes Part 1
The fifteenth part of the SQL Server Programming Fundamentals tutorial describes indexes. Indexes provide a lookup facility for a table, allowing rows to be found more quickly and without the need to scan the data in every row when querying a table. |
| SQL Server Unique Constraints
The fourteenth part of the SQL Server Programming Fundamentals tutorial discusses unique constraints. This type of constraint adds a rule to a table to ensure that no two rows contain duplicate information within the constrained columns. |
| Taking a SQL Server Database Off-Line
Sometimes you will want to remove all access to a database for a period of time without detaching the database or deleting it. One option to achieve this is to take the database off-line. You can do this using standard SQL Server tools or Transact-SQL. |
| SQL Server Computed Columns
The thirteenth part of the SQL Server Programming Fundamentals tutorial investigates computed columns. Values in these columns are calculated automatically by the database management system using an expression that is attached to the column definition. |
| Inserting Values into Identity Columns
Identity columns are used in SQL Server to automatically generate sequential integer values as new rows are inserted into a table. Under normal circumstances an explicit value cannot be specified. However, sometimes this is essential. |
| SQL Server Identity Columns
The twelfth part of the SQL Server Programming Fundamentals tutorial describes identity columns. By applying an identity specification to a numeric column, the column's value is defaulted to a new value for every row inserted into the table. |
| SQL Server Default Column Values
The eleventh part of the SQL Server Programming Fundamentals tutorial considers the use of default column values. These are literal values or functions that are used to provide default values for columns when new table rows are created. |
| Get the Current SQL Server Date and Time
There are many occasions when you will want to obtain the current date and time from a Microsoft SQL Server instance. Possibly the most common of these is when auditing the time of a database operation, using either the local or the UTC date and time. |