Re: A MySQL Question

On Sun, 2008-12-07 at 10:03 -0500, tedd wrote: > Hi gang: > > I just interviewed for a job teaching at the local college (imagine > me taking minds of mush and molding them to the world according to > tedd -- frightening huh?) > > In any event, the interviewer asked me how long I've been using MySQL > and I replied several years. After which she asked a single question, > which was "What does EXIST mean?" Not sure about EXIST, but definitely see EXISTS when creating table dumps. DROP TABLE IF EXISTS foo; I usually do dumps via command-line so to get the DROP TABLE line you add the --add-drop-table flag. > Now without running to the manuals, please be honest and tell me how > many of you know off the top of your head what EXIST means? I would > be curious to know. > > I answered the question correctly, (I'm one of those weird types who > read manuals for fun) but I have never used EXIST in a query. Have > any of you? > > And while we're on the subject of MySQL -- while we all know how to > write it, how do you say it? > > I've read that the common way is to say "My Squell", or something > like that. But I always sounded out each letter, such as "My S-Q-L". > The interviewer pronounced it the same as I, but I have heard others > say it differently. > > What say you? I say as you do... My S. Q. L. Although, I recall hearing a long time ago that the My part was named after a person's name and is supposed to be pronounced as Me. People who say My Sequel are confusing the old database language SEQUEL with SQL. While SEQUEL was a precursor to SQL, SQL actually stands for Standard Query Language, and is not a shortening of SEQUEL. Wikipedia states that the official pronunciation is My S. Q. L. Cheers, Rob. -- http://www.interjinn.com Application and Templating Framework for PHP