The Switch from Excel to SQL Is Worth It — Towards Better Business Analytics
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Excel can become so slow and frustrating when it comes to large dataset management and manipulation.
You might have always been faithful to Excel and its formulas, for the visual comfort and ease it offers, especially when it comes to data representation in charts and graphs and for the sake of the preparation of your reports.
However, the use of Excel has its limitations that cannot be grasped sometimes unless we compare it to another way of handling data. Whether you are managing your personal data or your company’s data, you must have noticed the ugliness of some Excel formulas, especially when complex formulas are nested.
Fortunately, there are other amazing fashions to manage and analyze our data . One of them is through SQL, which is short for Structured Query Language.
What is a query language?
It is simply a language we use to investigate data. That is to say, a language that allows us to look at data in the way that we choose. SQL is a query language that allows us to retrieve and manipulate the stored data according to our needs and purpose.
If your company’s data is big and you need to navigate it in a smooth way, SQL could be of great use. If the data is already there: in an already-created database, and all you need is to delve deeper into it, then all you need is a query language that corresponds to the type of database you have at hands. For example, if the database you would love to investigate is a relational one, then using SQL is the right choice. So, if you would like to use SQL, you’ll need to make sure you are working with a relational database — one that SQL can communicate with.
What is a Relational Database?
A relational database is a collection of data made up of tables. This is just one type of database.
Now why would SQL be better than Excel for analytics and business intelligence?
