Monday, April 10, 2017

SQL Server Free eBooks, Softwares, Tutorials and Websites

When we start working as developer or learning, we often face this issue. Where is the best tutorials, books and other learning material? Sure, google can help you but it is difficult to keep track of all the information provided by the google. While working for more than 7 year, I have identified some resource which are really great and would like to share with you. Best part of this all are free and trustworthy.

First thing first, we need a computer with all necessary software because it doesn’t matter how much you study until you do hands on practice. Here is the list of software and official download links.

  1. SQL Server 2016 Developer Edition – it has all the necessary features and free from Microsoft. You can use this for learning purpose, please read the user agreement for all the details.


  1. Visual Studio Community Edition


  1. SQL Server Data Tools in Visual Studio 2015


I would recommend you the following installation sequence as -
  1. SQL Server
  2. Visual Studio
  3. SQL Server Data Tool
Once installation is done, you need sample database to start with. Here is the link to download sample database from Microsoft –
AdventureWorks Databases and Scripts for SQL Server 2016

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=49502

 

Wide World Importers sample database v1.0


https://github.com/Microsoft/sql-server-samples/releases/tag/wide-world-importers-v1.0



Top websites to master SQL Server –
  1. Official Microsoft website - https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/sql/sql-server/sql-server-technical-documentation
  2. https://www.mssqltips.com/
  3. https://www.w3schools.com/sql/default.asp
  4. https://www.simple-talk.com/sql/
  5. http://stackoverflow.com/

Free eBooks –
Defensive Database Programming
By Alex Kuznetsov


Mastering SQL Server Profiler


SQL Server Execution Plans


Performance Tuning with SQL Server Dynamic Management Views


Inside the SQL Server Query Optimizer


SQL Server Execution Plans, Second Edition



SQL Server Concurrency: Locking, Blocking and Row Versioning


List of all the books –


Best online Tutorials -


Stairway to T-SQL: Beyond The Basics


Stairway to T-SQL DML


Stairway to SQL Server Indexes


Stairway to Data


Stairway to Advanced T-SQL


List of all Stairway tutorials