FAQ: Why Learn SQL? - A Day in the Life - Data Analyst

This community-built FAQ covers the “A Day in the Life - Data Analyst” exercise from the lesson “Why Learn SQL?”.

Paths and Courses
This exercise can be found in the following Codecademy content:

Analyze Data with SQL

FAQs on the exercise A Day in the Life - Data Analyst

There are currently no frequently asked questions associated with this exercise – that’s where you come in! You can contribute to this section by offering your own questions, answers, or clarifications on this exercise. Ask or answer a question by clicking reply (reply) below.

If you’ve had an “aha” moment about the concepts, formatting, syntax, or anything else with this exercise, consider sharing those insights! Teaching others and answering their questions is one of the best ways to learn and stay sharp.

Join the Discussion. Help a fellow learner on their journey.

Ask or answer a question about this exercise by clicking reply (reply) below!

Agree with a comment or answer? Like (like) to up-vote the contribution!

Need broader help or resources? Head here.

Looking for motivation to keep learning? Join our wider discussions.

Learn more about how to use this guide.

Found a bug? Report it!

Have a question about your account or billing? Reach out to our customer support team!

None of the above? Find out where to ask other questions here!

Most of my comp sci colleagues speak highly of NoSQL databases such as MongoDB vs SQL/SQLite/PostGRE. Given that data can also come in formats that excludes tabular data/relational data is the purpose of SQL relative? Would it be wise to focus on both type of database as a student?

1 Like

Need help on Creating Usage Funnels Section
In the answer there are:

c.user_id,
b.user_id,
p.user_id

what do they represent?

And why am I able to run

select *
from browse b
limit 10;

select *
from browse
limit 10;

but not

select *
from b
limit 10;

?

Thank you!

Hi!

“c.user_id, b.user_id, p.user_id” are just columns that have the same name but belong to different tables, the names of these tables are not fully written because aliases are used, each representing a table used in the exercise.

You can run:

select *
from browse b
limit 10;

select *
from browse
limit 10;

because they are syntactically correct, you want all the columns from the table “browse”, in the first example using the alias “b”, and you want only 10 rows to be shown.

And you can’t run:

select *
from b
limit 10;

because “b” is not a table present in the database, you have to specify what table you want to use and, in case you want it, use an alias.

I hope It was helpfull!

2 Likes

Hi, I thought it all boils down to the problem statement. and yes, you are correct that the data can be in an unstructured form