Respond

Challenges and Successes

CS362 has been both challenging and rewarding thus far. One of the biggest challenges so far throughout individual projects 1 through 3 has been utilizing a database without any prior experience or knowledge of doing so. Of all the courses so far I’ve taken at CTU, this is the first one that I have essentially “walked blindly into”. I have never actually touched the back end of a database. Instead, I have solely worked on implementations that require database integrations – mainly SQL Server.

Since the assignments for CS362 have essentially been building upon each other, each week presents a challenge to continue learning and further developing SQL skills. While this has been a challenge at times, I do believe that I have learned a great amount of database skills in these last 3 weeks. I went from only knowing how to launch SQL Server Management Studio to understanding how to create tables, add data to tables, make data diagrams, make table modifications, and more.

Regarding successes, I now understand the importance of SQL commands, such as INSERT, DELETE, and so forth. I know how to create primary keys their importance in relevance to databases. One of the most interesting things I feel I’ve gained from this course is the various data types that can be utilized in SQL, and what their significance are – such as varchar, nchar, init, bit, data, etc. I also understand that certain data types can only be utilized for certain things.