Developers often dispute the merits of SQL as a legitimate programming language, but this misses the point. SQL is a powerful 4GL for accessing data.

SQL has dominated data querying for decades. Newer query languages offer more elegance, simplicity, and flexibility for modern use cases.

Without relational databases, SQL could occupy a role similar to COBOL or FORTRAN—programming languages that are still relied on every day in legacy systems but are not at the heart of pushing ...

Maybe it's not the sexiest programming language, but SQL continues to be important--at least according to one measurement.