Modifying data with UPDATE

Next in our examination of the subject of data manipulation is the ability to change existing database data. This section looks at a number of the common methods to update data within our database.

Understanding the purpose and syntax of the UPDATE statement

The first of our DML statements allowed us to insert new data into a table. However, often the data we're interested in already exists in the table and simply needs to be altered in some way. In these circumstances, we need to modify the data, not insert it. In such situations, we use an UPDATE statement. Its syntax tree is shown as follows: