[GLLUG] Learning SQL

[Caleb Cushing]

I agree with you on the "shelling out money for books", I hate paying for
crappy ones and have done it way to many times. However, when I was reading
one of my Linux books I read about the chattr command and something called
the immutable bit, didn't have a use for it, but thought it might come in
handy later. Few months go by and someone has a problem where he can't
delete files in his home directory even as root, remembering that the
immutable file bit does this I looked it up again and told him to check if
it was set and sure enough it had gotten set. Turned out to be a known bug
in reiserfs, I'm guessing a rather uncommon one. Had I been following
tutorials I  might have not gotten this. The real problem is finding quality
tutorials. I, of course, will check out any links you guys have sent me,
might save me money ;-) . I like both resources for learning, but I think
the internet is better when you have a specific objective and books are
better when you have a general objective.

On 3/26/06, Jeremy Bowers <jerf at jerf.org> wrote:
>
> Caleb Cushing wrote:
> > Perhaps I should explain why I'm learning SQL, I'm trying to learn LAMP
> > (Linux Apache MySQL Perl/Python/PHP) I have the Linux part down pretty
> > good (hopefully pass my tests). But the other parts I need to work on.
> > The only thing I really know about SQL is that it has something to do
> > with databases, or at least prior to what you all are telling me. Thats
> > one of the reasons I'm thinking of getting a book, books tend to be more
> > in depth than tutorials, although a lot of books are crappy. I also have
> > a problem with tutorials, I like to get lazy and copy and paste.
>
> At least the one I linked is less tutorial than a step-by-step
> explanation of SQL starting from scratch. There's not actually a project
> in it (IIRC), and you'd still have to set up databases and stuff on your
> own. It is unlikely to be all that different from a book.
>
> Your money, of course, and I'm an oddball in that I almost never buy
> books. (Not unique, I've met others with my philosophy online, but
> definitely a firm minority.) But this is one place where I *really*
> don't see an advantage to shelling out for a book. SQL is really, really
> old and the core has changed very little since the late 80s, maybe
> longer. It's just like I really wouldn't recommend a book to learn HTML
> anymore, because as a relatively static topic (emphasis "relatively";
> what advances there have been with XHTML for instance can still largely
> be ignored in practice) the free resources have had plenty of time to
> mature.
>
> By comparision, a book to learn Ruby might be worthwhile, at least if
> you've never used anything like it before. (Probably not worth it if you
> already know Perl or Python, for instance.)
>
> > I like
> > the compiler vs language comparison, however can't say as I know much
> > about compilers 10 years ago, as I would have been 11, and didn't have a
> > computer.
>
> Well, I wouldn't have been much older. That's just the next best example
> I could think of where there is a programming language standard that you
> can theoretically learn, but there are quirks.
>
> I suppose HTML would be a modern-day example if you drop the programming
> language requirement. Theoretically you shouldn't need to learn
> "Internet Explorer HTML"; in reality, you pretty much do.
>
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