From the September 17, 2011 blog post on the new SQL 2012 FORMAT function we learned how to format currency and time using different cultures. This is an improvement on what came before and also gives us new possibilities for getting date labels without needing to use DATEPART. In this post we will compare the FORMAT function to the previous techniques and also show you an easy way to grab the part of the date you need for reports. Let us learn about CONVERT FORMAT Function.
In business we often hear the phrase, “We had a good quarter.” Immediately, we know this means a three month span where sales and profits have been aggregated together for the company. Take a company like Costco that might have $65 billion in total sales during the 4th Quarter (October, November and December). Of course, this total comes not from a single sale of a 65 billon dollar yacht, rather from millions of sales of common items like snacks, drinks, clothes, and light bulbs. We know how to use GROUP BY and SUM to calculate totals and combine similar data. In the case of Costco we group by calendar quarter and then sums on the sales. Although aggregates are commonly used with numbers, they can also be used with spatial land coordinates to assemble them together, much like a jigsaw puzzle. Let us learn about Spatial Unions.
Old classic movies utter this famous phrase “Gentlemen, this is off the record”. In movies this is used when talking to the press and letting them know a certain comment or two will be said, however it is not meant for publication in the media. Sometimes, we want to use words or phrases within a query window that we want SQL Server to ignore when executing the code. Fortunately, SQL Server allows us to write words or phrases that are “off the record”, with a coding technique called a commenting. Let us understand why we code comments.
