I'm looking for a beginner's tutorial for both T-SQL and SQL Server. Where's the best place to start?
This would be a good site to start with:
http://www.w3schools.com/SQl/default.asp
as would this:
http://www.microsoft.com/Sqlserver/2005/en/us/learning-resources.aspx
This would be a good choice for a book:
Also, take advantage of the online forums, post questions... here, also at the MSDN Forums.
Read the articles on SSC, try the question of the day.
Also, Jacob Sebastian runs the http://beyondrelational.com/ web site and just started the TSQL Challenges for Beginners, try and work through them. Follow-up and see the solutions that were picked as winners....
I clicked on the "beyondrelational" link you provided and it's changed a whole lot from years ago... is there a version that's still in English that you know of?
I would suggest you start with RDBMS theory first. The Manga guide to RDBMS is a good starting point Amazon Link. Once upto speed on that many of the concepts that you will encounter will make a lot more sense.
I would recommend:
It's not organized in lessons for a beginner, but it is definitely helpful for beginners.
The above link asks for username and password! is there a link to sing up or registration?
I think that we have some good basic SQL articles on SQLServerCentral.
Basic joins: http://www.sqlservercentral.com/redirect/articles/65234/ Understanding NULL: http://www.sqlservercentral.com/articles/Basic+Querying/understandingthedifferencebetweenisnull/871/ Writing Simple Selects (3 part) - http://www.sqlservercentral.com/redirect/articles/2675/
SQLShare (www.sqlshare.com) has a lot of video content. I own part of that site, so I'll list it first, but MidnightDBA and Database Journal have videos as well.
I would recommend a couple basic books as well. SQL in a Nutshell by Kevin Kline, and Beginning T-SQL 2008 by Kathi Kellenburger are good choices.
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