You can use SQL statements such as SELECT, INSERT, UPDATE, DELETE, CREATE, and DROP to accomplish almost everything that you need to do with a database. Although these SQL statements are part of the SQL standard, many database management systems also have their own additional proprietary extensions to handle the specifics of that database management system. These extensions provide functionality not covered by the SQL standard, and include areas such as security management and programmability. For example, Microsoft SQL Server, and Azure database services that are based on the SQL Server database engine, use Transact-SQL. This implementation includes proprietary extensions for writing stored procedures and triggers (application code that can be stored in the database), and managing user accounts. PostgreSQL and MySQL also have their own versions of these features.
Some popular dialects of SQL include:
- Transact-SQL (T-SQL). This version of SQL is used by Microsoft SQL Server and Azure SQL services.
- pgSQL. This is the dialect, with extensions implemented in PostgreSQL.
- PL/SQL. This is the dialect used by Oracle. PL/SQL stands for Procedural Language/SQL.
Users who plan to work specifically with a single database system should learn the intricacies of their preferred SQL dialect and platform.
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