If Prompt warns you of use of the asterisk, or 'star' (*), in SELECT statements, consider replacing it with an explicit column list. It will prevent unnecessary network load and query performance problems, and avoid problems if the column order changes, when inserting into a table. Read more
SQL Prompt’s code analysis rule, BP013, will alert you to use of Execute(string) to execute a batch in a string, often assembled dynamically from user input. This technique is dangerous because the parameter values are injected before the statement is parsed by SQL Server, allowing an attacker to "tag on" extra statements. Use sp_ExecuteSql... Read more
Phil Factor suggests a philosophy of "the SQL query optimizer knows best" when it comes to choosing the right execution plan. Use hints as a last resort, and evaluate them carefully whenever SQL Prompt warns you of their presence in your SQL code. Read more
Avoid using the IsNumeric() function, because it can often lead to data type conversion errors, when importing data. On SQL Server 2012 or later, use the Try_Convert() or Try_Cast() function instead. On earlier SQL Server versions, the only way to avoid it is by using LIKE expressions. Read more
Data in relational tables is never guaranteed to be returned in a particular order, so adding an ORDER BY to an INSERT INTO statement is meaningless and, pre-SQL Server 2012, could cause performance issues. If you really need to impose a particular order on rows in the table, use a Row_Number() window clause instead. Read more
If you declare a column alias using equals SQL Prompt will raise a violation of a style rule (ST002). It's best to follow the ANSI-SQL92 standard of assigning aliases using the AS keyword. If the alias is not a standard identifier, delimit it with double quotes. using single quotes has long been deprecated (DEP021). Read more
If you want to use TOP with an expression or subquery, or in INSERT, UPDATE, MERGE, and DELETE statements, then use of brackets is required, so it's a good habit to adopt everywhere. Read more
SQL Prompt code analysis, introduced in v9.2, provides a quick and easy way to assess the overall health and quality of your SQL scripts. It will help the team prevent technical debt from entering the code base, to remove it from existing code during code reviews, and to ensure that the released code conforms... Read more
This article shows how to define SQL code analysis rules using SQL Prompt and them run them automatically from a PowerShell script, displaying the detected code issues in a handy HTML report. Read more
Use of the MONEY and SMALLMONEY datatypes can lead to unintentional loss of precision, due to rounding errors, during calculations. It is generally far better to use the DECIMAL, a.k.a. NUMERIC, type. Read more
