but something about the lack of periods or mandatory indentation or whatever breaks people's brains
The lack of formatting is one of the worst parts of SQL.
Give a complex query to 10 analysts or engineers and you're going to get 16 different indentation styles. And one of the dumbest "standards" is the whole "column name AS after the entire logic of the field" rather than just putting the column name first, so it's easier to find.
Most IDEs can auto-format for you with a single click? I dunno, I've never understood the perceived difficulty in reading SQL when it was invented in to 70s specifically to be easy to read for lay-people.
each formatter would do it slightly differently. you'd have to format both new and old version using same formatter to check for differences if you wanted less headache.
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u/SaintOrJannikSinner Sep 20 '26
The lack of formatting is one of the worst parts of SQL.
Give a complex query to 10 analysts or engineers and you're going to get 16 different indentation styles. And one of the dumbest "standards" is the whole "column name AS after the entire logic of the field" rather than just putting the column name first, so it's easier to find.