Good books/resources on intermediate T-SQL

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Good books/resources on intermediate T-SQL

pietlinden

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Points: 63503
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November 8, 2016 at 1:55 pm

#318780

Was watching Brent Ozar explain performance tuning today (Great! Highly recommended!!) and it made me think that there's just a TON about T-SQL that I don't know... when to use Temp Tables (or not), functions etc... Is my best bet Itzik's book on T-SQL 2016?
Thanks!

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Eric M Russell SSC Guru Points: 125561 More actions · Answer 1

Yes, Itzik's books are good. You should get it.

There are also some good topical books by RedGate. This one is especially good, because it will tech optimization techniques from the perspective of execution plans.

SQL Server Execution Plans, Second Edition by Grant Fritchey

http://www.sqlservercentral.com/articles/books/94937/

"Do not seek to follow in the footsteps of the wise. Instead, seek what they sought." - Matsuo Basho

pietlinden SSC Guru Points: 63503 More actions · Answer 2

Thanks for answering... I was wondering especially about when to use Temp tables etc when writing queries. Most of the stuff I read doesn't cover really complex querying, which is frustrating. How are you supposed to learn to write good queries without writing suboptimal ones and fixing them?

I think I need a good SQL Saturday all-day precon on learning proper querying techniques. =)

Does Itzik go into TVFs and the like and using Temp tables for optimization?

I was watching Brent Ozar discuss tuning queries... hence the question(s).

Alan Burstein SSC Guru Points: 61141 More actions · Answer 3

Itzik's SQL Server 2012 Window Function book is the best SQL Books I own. His SQL Server 2012 book may be the second best.

Any article by Jeff Moden, Dwain Camps, Paul White, Adam Machanic or Gail Shaw on Performance Tuning is awesome.

"I cant stress enough the importance of switching from a sequential files mindset to set-based thinking. After you make the switch, you can spend your time tuning and optimizing your queries instead of maintaining lengthy, poor-performing code."

-- Itzik Ben-Gan 2001

pietlinden SSC Guru Points: 63503 More actions · Answer 4

Thanks, Alan... is there a book on T-SQL that discusses using Temp tables etc vs TVFs etc? and CROSS/OUTER APPLY too? (although I like SQLKiwi's explanation of the topic)...

Alan Burstein SSC Guru Points: 61141 More actions · Answer 5

pietlinden (11/8/2016)
Thanks, Alan... is there a book on T-SQL that discusses using Temp tables etc vs TVFs etc? and CROSS/OUTER APPLY too? (although I like SQLKiwi's explanation of the topic)...

Regarding temp tables and temp variables - the exam preparation book for SQL exam 70-461, Querying Microsoft SQL Server 2012 has a great chapter of temp tables vs table variables.

With respect to TVFs and APPLY - Paul White's (SqlKiwi) articles about APPLY are, IMO, the most important articles about the topic. Other good articles about TVFs and APPLY include:

* Chris Morris' article about Cascading CROSS APPLY

* Dwain Camps' article about patternsplitCM and unpivoting

* Jeff Moden's articles about Tally Tables, DelimitedSplit8k, Cross Tabs, Sample data and iSVFs (and the discussions after)

* Adam Machanic's make_parallel

* Eirikur Eiriksson's article about Lag & Lead (& DelimitedSplit8k_lead)

This is a good mix of articles about APPLY and TVFs. I'd also like to think my NGrams Article aint bad 😉

Forgive me for not including links. I'm on my phone and short on time.

"I cant stress enough the importance of switching from a sequential files mindset to set-based thinking. After you make the switch, you can spend your time tuning and optimizing your queries instead of maintaining lengthy, poor-performing code."

-- Itzik Ben-Gan 2001

pietlinden SSC Guru Points: 63503 More actions · Answer 6

I guess I should see if I can find some more books... a few more and I'm gonna have to buy a new book case, or just dump some ... thanks!