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Article:
  What I Hate About Your Programming Language
Subject:   Re: What I Hate About SQL
Date:   2005-12-29 04:29:23
From:   Scott_Kirkwood
Response to: Re: What I Hate About SQL

What I hate about SQL is that it's so inconsistent:
SELECT <columns> FROM <tables> WHERE <conditionals>


UPDATE <table> SET <column>=<value> WHERE <conditionals>


INSERT INTO <table> (<columns>) VALUES (<values)


Converting an insert into an update or select is more painful than it needs to be. I'd prefer:


UPDATE <columns>=<value> FROM <tables> WHERE <conditional>


and


INSERT <columns>=<values> INTO <tables> WHERE <conditionals>


I'd also make AND interchangeable with WHERE and trailing commas would be acceptable (like in Python), for example:


SELECT
A,
B,
C,
FROM myTable
AND a > 1
AND b < 1
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  • Re: What I Hate About SQL
    2005-12-29 09:53:44  ababiec [Reply | View]

    Don't forget you can also use a subquery instead of a values list, so I'm not sure how your example address that scenario...


    INSERT INTO <table> (<columns>) SELECT <columns> FROM <tables> WHERE <conditionals>


    And INSERTs don't require a columns list if the values match the column order of the table.

    Never mind examples such as...

    INSERT ALL
    WHEN order_total < 1000000 THEN
    INTO small_orders
    WHEN order_total > 1000000 AND order_total < 2000000 THEN
    INTO medium_orders
    WHEN order_total > 2000000 THEN
    INTO large_orders
    SELECT order_id, order_total, sales_rep_id, customer_id
    FROM orders;