SQL Hacks 72
Scott Walters writes "Many of the recipes in SQL Hacks
will improve the SQL you write day to day, and
many will give you the confidence to attempt much more involved tasks with SQL.
Other recipes will rarely if ever be needed, but make for a entertaining and
education reading in a similar way that "worse case survival scenario" books do — SQL is pitted against the most difficult analysis tasks just as survival scenario
books pit humans against pavement and lions.
SQL Hacks fits well in the Hacks series, which raises the bar on advanced books by offering
large, eclectic sets of tricks for problems that an unambitious person (a non-hacker)
wouldn't ever push technology hard enough to run into.
Put another way, the questions answered in a good Hacks book are ones that would get a
"good question" comment rather than a an "RTFM!" response.
It does a good job continuing where O'Reilly's SQL Cookbook left off, which is always
difficult with two books written at slightly different times by different authors.
Still, it's harder to review a Hacks book than a Learning book as, with hacks, the
sky is the limit, and the reader will always find herself wishing for more.
To this end, I hope O'Reilly continues to publish newer editions of their various
Hacks books, drawing in more and more content in each edition, and identifying recipes
that might better serve in the Cookbook counterpart." Read the rest of Scott's review.
