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Handwritten notes · Part 6

SQL Handwritten Notes for Placements (Free PDF)

By Published

26 pages of handwritten-style SQL and DBMS notes for placements and interviews: joins, NULL traps, order of execution, GROUP BY, subqueries, CTEs, window functions, Nth highest salary, normalization, indexes, ACID and isolation levels, explained in English with Hinglish.

Pages
26
Format
A4 PDF
Language
English + Hinglish
Price
Free by email
Cover of SQL handwritten notes by Gaurav Sharma

What's inside

24 topics, one page each

  1. 01DBMS, RDBMS, SQL vs NoSQL and the sample tables
  2. 02DDL, DML, DCL, TCL and DELETE vs TRUNCATE vs DROP
  3. 03Keys and constraints: primary, foreign, candidate, composite
  4. 04SELECT, WHERE, LIKE, BETWEEN, ORDER BY, LIMIT
  5. 05NULL, three-valued logic and the NOT IN trap
  6. 06Order of execution
  7. 07GROUP BY, HAVING and WHERE vs HAVING
  8. 08Joins: inner, left, right, full, cross, with diagrams
  9. 09Self joins, anti joins and row explosion
  10. 10Subqueries, correlated subqueries, EXISTS vs IN
  11. 11CTEs and recursive CTEs
  12. 12Window functions: ROW_NUMBER, RANK, DENSE_RANK
  13. 13LAG, LEAD, running totals and moving averages
  14. 14Nth highest salary and deleting duplicates
  15. 15Classic interview queries, gaps and islands
  16. 16UNION vs UNION ALL, CASE and common functions
  17. 17Indexes: B+ tree, clustered vs non-clustered
  18. 18Normalization: 1NF, 2NF, 3NF, BCNF
  19. 19Transactions and ACID
  20. 20Isolation levels, locks and deadlocks
  21. 21Views, stored procedures, triggers and SQL injection
  22. 22Query optimization, EXPLAIN and keyset pagination
  23. 23Output-based questions
  24. 24Last-minute revision cheat sheet

Look inside

Sample pages

Preview 6 pages below. Email me to request the complete 26-page PDF at no charge.

SQL rounds in placements test two things: whether you can write the query, and whether you understand what the database does with it. These notes use one small pair of tables throughout, so every example has a concrete answer you can check, and they cover the DBMS theory that interviewers mix into the same round.

What makes these SQL notes different?

  • One dataset, every concept. Five employees and three departments, including an employee with no department and a department with no employees, so every join and NULL trap shows up clearly.
  • The queries interviewers ask. Nth highest salary, deleting duplicates, top earner per department, employees earning more than their manager, and consecutive-day streaks.
  • Theory that goes with it. Order of execution, normalization with a worked example, indexes, ACID and isolation levels with the MySQL and PostgreSQL defaults.
  • Hinglish where it helps. NULL, joins, window functions and transactions each get a short Hinglish explanation next to the English definition.

How should you use these SQL notes?

Create the two sample tables in DB Fiddle or a local database, then run each query as you read. Try the output-based questions before checking the answers, and use the last page as a one-page revision sheet.

This is Part 6 of the series. For the backend side of the same interviews, see the Node.js handwritten notes.

FAQ

Questions about these notes

Are these SQL notes really free?

Yes. The full 26-page PDF is free; email me to request the complete PDF. Share it with friends preparing for placements.

Do these notes cover DBMS theory too?

Yes. Keys, normalization from 1NF to BCNF, indexes, transactions, ACID, isolation levels, locks and deadlocks are covered alongside the SQL queries, because placement interviews mix both.

Is the Nth highest salary question covered?

Yes. The notes show it with LIMIT/OFFSET and with DENSE_RANK, explain what to return when there is no Nth salary, and also cover finding and deleting duplicate rows.

Which database do the queries use?

Standard SQL that runs on MySQL and PostgreSQL. Where the two differ, such as integer division, TRUNCATE rollback or default isolation level, the notes say so.

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