Posts in Category: sql azure

Understanding SQL Grouping and Date Formats

No matter how many times you do it, you always find yourself having to go back and look up silly information on how to do things in something you haven’t done in awhile.

Case in point, I had to do some SQL magic on some data and had completely forgotten how to do proper groupings and summation of data by weeks and months – so here it is for all your future references.

Retrieving Results for a Month

This is easier than doing things by week and is easily done by using a derived table to get an initial result set and then using the outer query to present everything nicely.

 SELECT MONTH, COUNT(TOTAL) AS TOTAL, FORMAT(SUM(TOTAL),'C') AS SUM
FROM (
SELECT FORMAT(DO.SomeDateField,'MMM') + '-' + CAST(FORMAT(DATEADD(YEAR, 1, DA.SomeDateField), 'yy') AS VARCHAR(40)) AS MONTH,
MONTH(DA.SomeDateField) AS CALENDAR_MONTH_ORDER,
CAST(YEAR(DA.SomeDateField)															
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Connecting to Azure Db via Code

Getting started with a new platform can be a little daunting, after all, there is so much to learn and where do you start.

From a client-side perspective, the only difference in connecting to an Azure Db over a server Db is the connection string.

string connectionstring = "Server=tcp:#SERVER#,1433;Initial Catalog=Signal;PersistSecurityInfo=False;User ID=#USERNAME#;Password=#PASSWORD#;MultipleActiveResultSets=False;Encrypt=True;TrustServerCertificate=False;Connection Timeout=30";

SqlConnection cn = new SqlConnection();
cn.ConnectionString = connectionstring;

cn.Open();

From there, it’s a simple job of opening a connection, creating a command and querying your data.

The biggest problem I ran into was having to create the firewall rule to allow access (this will not be enabled by default).  Thankfully Visual Studio took care of this, giving me the prompt to do so and quickly enable.

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Creating you First Azure Database

If you’re still creating databases locally for all your development and testing needs, it’s time to give yourself the kick you need to start doing things a little differently and learn something new in the process.

Going to Azure isn’t as complicated as you think (if you start small).  If you’re worried about costs, there are tons of credits floating around to make the learning cycle quick and painless.

First, setup a Resource Group, for a listing of all Azure related terminology, check here.  When you’re done doing this, navigate down to SQL Databases and create a database server (a URL) and whatever associated database you want to go along with it.

In my portal view, this looks a little like this where I now have a server and a database.

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