SQL Interview Questions & Answers

What is DBMS?

A Database Management System (DBMS) is a program that

controls creation, maintenance and use of a database. DBMS
can be termed as File Manager that manages data in a database
rather than saving it in file systems.
2. What is RDBMS?

RDBMS stands for Relational Database Management System.

RDBMS store the data into the collection of tables, which is
related by common fields between the columns of the table. It
also provides relational operators to manipulate the data
stored into the tables.
Example: SQL Server.
3. What is SQL?

SQL stands for Structured Query Language , and it is used to

communicate with the Database. This is a standard language
used to perform tasks such as retrieval, updation, insertion and
deletion of data from a database.

Standard SQL Commands are Select.

4. What is a Database?

Database is nothing but an organized form of data for easy

access, storing, retrieval and managing of data. This is also
known as structured form of data which can be accessed in
many ways.

Example: School Management Database, Bank Management

Database.

5. What are tables and Fields?

A table is a set of data that are organized in a model with
Columns and Rows. Columns can be categorized as vertical, and
Rows are horizontal. A table has specified number of column
called fields but can have any number of rows which is called
record.
Example:.
Table: Employee.

Field: Emp ID, Emp Name, Date of Birth.

Data: 201456, David, 11/15/1960.
6. What is a primary key?

A primary key is a combination of fields which uniquely specify

a row. This is a special kind of unique key, and it has implicit
NOT NULL constraint. It means, Primary key values cannot be
NULL.
7. What is a unique key?
A Unique key constraint uniquely identified each record in the
database. This provides uniqueness for the column or set of
columns.

A Primary key constraint has automatic unique constraint

defined on it. But not, in the case of Unique Key.

There can be many unique constraint defined per table, but

only one Primary key constraint defined per table.

8. What is a foreign key?

A foreign key is one table which can be related to the primary

key of another table. Relationship needs to be created between
two tables by referencing foreign key with the primary key of
another table.
9. What is a join?

This is a keyword used to query data from more tables based

on the relationship between the fields of the tables. Keys play a
major role when JOINs are used.
10. What are the types of join and explain each?

There are various types of join which can be used to retrieve

data and it depends on the relationship between tables.
 Inner Join.

Inner join return rows when there is at least one match of rows
between the tables.
  Right Join.

Right join return rows which are common between the tables
and all rows of Right hand side table. Simply, it returns all the
rows from the right hand side table even though there are no
matches in the left hand side table.
 Left Join.

Left join return rows which are common between the tables
and all rows of Left hand side table. Simply, it returns all the
rows from Left hand side table even though there are no
matches in the Right hand side table.
 Full Join.

Full join return rows when there are matching rows in any one
of the tables. This means, it returns all the rows from the left
hand side table and all the rows from the right hand side table.
11. What is normalization?

Normalization is the process of minimizing redundancy and

dependency by organizing fields and table of a database. The
main aim of Normalization is to add, delete or modify field that
can be made in a single table.

12. What is Denormalization.

DeNormalization is a technique used to access the data from

higher to lower normal forms of database. It is also process of
introducing redundancy into a table by incorporating data from
the related tables.
13. What are all the different normalizations?

The normal forms can be divided into 5 forms, and they are
explained below -.
 First Normal Form (1NF):.

This should remove all the duplicate columns from the table.
Creation of tables for the related data and identification of
unique columns.

 Second Normal Form (2NF):.

Meeting all requirements of the first normal form. Placing the

subsets of data in separate tables and Creation of relationships
between the tables using primary keys.
 Third Normal Form (3NF):.
This should meet all requirements of 2NF. Removing the
columns which are not dependent on primary key constraints.
 Fourth Normal Form (4NF):.

Meeting all the requirements of third normal form and it should

not have multi- valued dependencies.
14. What is a View?
A view is a virtual table which consists of a subset of data
contained in a table. Views are not virtually present, and it
takes less space to store. View can have data of one or more
tables combined, and it is depending on the relationship.
15. What is an Index?

An index is performance tuning method of allowing faster

retrieval of records from the table. An index creates an entry
for each value and it will be faster to retrieve data.

16. What are all the different types of indexes?

There are three types of indexes -.
 Unique Index.

This indexing does not allow the field to have duplicate values if
the column is unique indexed. Unique index can be applied
automatically when primary key is defined.

 Clustered Index.

This type of index reorders the physical order of the table and
search based on the key values. Each table can have only one
clustered index.
 NonClustered Index.

NonClustered Index does not alter the physical order of the

table and maintains logical order of data. Each table can have
999 nonclustered indexes.
17. What is a Cursor?

A database Cursor is a control which enables traversal over the

rows or records in the table. This can be viewed as a pointer to
one row in a set of rows. Cursor is very much useful for
traversing such as retrieval, addition and removal of database
records.
18. What is a relationship and what are they?

Database Relationship is defined as the connection between

the tables in a database. There are various data basing
relationships, and they are as follows:.

 One to One Relationship.

 One to Many Relationship.
 Many to One Relationship.
 Self-Referencing Relationship.
19. What is a query?

A DB query is a code written in order to get the information

back from the database. Query can be designed in such a way
that it matched with our expectation of the result set. Simply, a
question to the Database.
20. What is subquery?

A subquery is a query within another query. The outer query is

called as main query, and inner query is called subquery.
SubQuery is always executed first, and the result of subquery is
passed on to the main query.
21. What are the types of subquery?

There are two types of subquery – Correlated and Non-

Correlated.

A correlated subquery cannot be considered as independent

query, but it can refer the column in a table listed in the FROM
the list of the main query.

A Non-Correlated sub query can be considered as independent

query and the output of subquery are substituted in the main
query.
22. What is a stored procedure?

Stored Procedure is a function consists of many SQL statement

to access the database system. Several SQL statements are
consolidated into a stored procedure and execute them
whenever and wherever required.
23. What is a trigger?

A DB trigger is a code or programs that automatically execute

with response to some event on a table or view in a database.
Mainly, trigger helps to maintain the integrity of the database.

Example: When a new student is added to the student

database, new records should be created in the related tables
like Exam, Score and Attendance tables.

24. What is the difference between DELETE and TRUNCATE

commands?
DELETE command is used to remove rows from the table, and
WHERE clause can be used for conditional set of parameters.
Commit and Rollback can be performed after delete statement.

TRUNCATE removes all rows from the table. Truncate operation

cannot be rolled back.
25. What are local and global variables and their differences?

Local variables are the variables which can be used or exist

inside the function. They are not known to the other functions
and those variables cannot be referred or used. Variables can
be created whenever that function is called.

Global variables are the variables which can be used or exist

throughout the program. Same variable declared in global
cannot be used in functions. Global variables cannot be created
whenever that function is called.
26. What is a constraint?

Constraint can be used to specify the limit on the data type of

table. Constraint can be specified while creating or altering the
table statement. Sample of constraint are.

 NOT NULL.
 CHECK.
 DEFAULT.
 UNIQUE.
 PRIMARY KEY.
 FOREIGN KEY.
27. What is data Integrity?

Data Integrity defines the accuracy and consistency of data

stored in a database. It can also define integrity constraints to
enforce business rules on the data when it is entered into the
application or database.
28. What is Auto Increment?

Auto increment keyword allows the user to create a unique

number to be generated when a new record is inserted into the
table. AUTO INCREMENT keyword can be used in Oracle and
IDENTITY keyword can be used in SQL SERVER.

Mostly this keyword can be used whenever PRIMARY KEY is

used.

29. What is the difference between Cluster and Non-Cluster

Index?

Clustered index is used for easy retrieval of data from the

database by altering the way that the records are stored.
Database sorts out rows by the column which is set to be
clustered index.

A nonclustered index does not alter the way it was stored but
creates a complete separate object within the table. It point
back to the original table rows after searching.
30. What is Datawarehouse?
Datawarehouse is a central repository of data from multiple
sources of information. Those data are consolidated,
transformed and made available for the mining and online
processing. Warehouse data have a subset of data called Data
Marts.
31. What is Self-Join?

Self-join is set to be query used to compare to itself. This is

used to compare values in a column with other values in the
same column in the same table. ALIAS ES can be used for the
same table comparison.
32. What is Cross-Join?

Cross join defines as Cartesian product where number of rows

in the first table multiplied by number of rows in the second
table. If suppose, WHERE clause is used in cross join then the
query will work like an INNER JOIN.

33. What is user defined functions?

User defined functions are the functions written to use that

logic whenever required. It is not necessary to write the same
logic several times. Instead, function can be called or executed
whenever needed.
34. What are all types of user defined functions?
Three types of user defined functions are.

 Scalar Functions.
  Inline Table valued functions.
 Multi statement valued functions.

Scalar returns unit, variant defined the return clause. Other two
types return table as a return.

35. What is collation?

Collation is defined as set of rules that determine how
character data can be sorted and compared. This can be used
to compare A and, other language characters and also depends
on the width of the characters.
ASCII value can be used to compare these character data.
36. What are all different types of collation sensitivity?

Following are different types of collation sensitivity -.

 Case Sensitivity – A and a and B and b.

 Accent Sensitivity.
 Kana Sensitivity – Japanese Kana characters.
 Width Sensitivity – Single byte character and double byte
character.
37. Advantages and Disadvantages of Stored Procedure?

Stored procedure can be used as a modular programming –

means create once, store and call for several times whenever
required. This supports faster execution instead of executing
multiple queries. This reduces network traffic and provides
better security to the data.
Disadvantage is that it can be executed only in the Database
and utilizes more memory in the database server.
38. What is Online Transaction Processing (OLTP)?

Online Transaction Processing (OLTP) manages transaction

based applications which can be used for data entry, data
retrieval and data processing. OLTP makes data management
simple and efficient. Unlike OLAP systems goal of OLTP systems
is serving real-time transactions.

Example – Bank Transactions on a daily basis.

39. What is CLAUSE?

SQL clause is defined to limit the result set by providing

condition to the query. This usually filters some rows from the
whole set of records.
Example – Query that has WHERE condition

Query that has HAVING condition.

40. What is recursive stored procedure?

A stored procedure which calls by itself until it reaches some

boundary condition. This recursive function or procedure helps
programmers to use the same set of code any number of times.
41. What is Union, minus and Interact commands?

UNION operator is used to combine the results of two tables,

and it eliminates duplicate rows from the tables.
MINUS operator is used to return rows from the first query but
not from the second query. Matching records of first and
second query and other rows from the first query will be
displayed as a result set.

INTERSECT operator is used to return rows returned by both

the queries.
42. What is an ALIAS command?

ALIAS name can be given to a table or column. This alias name

can be referred in WHERE clause to identify the table or
column.
Example-.

Select st.StudentID, Ex.Result from student st, Exam as Ex wher

e st.studentID = Ex. StudentID
Here, st refers to alias name for student table and Ex refers to
alias name for exam table.

43. What is the difference between TRUNCATE and DROP

statements?

TRUNCATE removes all the rows from the table, and it cannot
be rolled back. DROP command removes a table from the
database and operation cannot be rolled back.
44. What are aggregate and scalar functions?

Aggregate functions are used to evaluate mathematical

calculation and return single values. This can be calculated from
the columns in a table. Scalar functions return a single value
based on the input value.
Example -.
Aggregate – max(), count - Calculated with respect to numeric.
Scalar – UCASE(), NOW() – Calculated with respect to strings.
45. How can you create an empty table from an existing table?
Example will be -.

Select * into studentcopy from student where 1=2

Here, we are copying student table to another table with the
same structure with no rows copied.
46. How to fetch common records from two tables?
Common records result set can be achieved by -.

Select studentID from student. <strong>INTERSECT </strong> S

elect StudentID from Exam
47. How to fetch alternate records from a table?
Records can be fetched for both Odd and Even row numbers -.

To display even numbers-.

Select studentId from (Select rowno, studentId from student) w

here mod(rowno,2)=0
To display odd numbers-.

Select studentId from (Select rowno, studentId from student) w

here mod(rowno,2)=1
from (Select rowno, studentId from student) where
mod(rowno,2)=1.[/sql]
48. How to select unique records from a table?

Select unique records from a table by using DISTINCT keyword.

Select DISTINCT StudentID, StudentName from Student.

49. What is the command used to fetch first 5 characters of
the string?

There are many ways to fetch first 5 characters of the string -.

Select SUBSTRING(StudentName,1,5) as studentname from stu

dent
Select LEFT(Studentname,5) as studentname from student
50. Which operator is used in query for pattern matching?

LIKE operator is used for pattern matching, and it can be used

as -.

1. % - Matches zero or more characters.

2. _(Underscore) – Matching exactly one character.
Example -.

Select * from Student where studentname like 'a%'

Select * from Student where studentname like 'ami_'