what exactly is sql?

As Mr. Priebe pointed out, SQL stands for Structured Query Language. It is a type of code used by programs to communicate with a relational database server. SQL is not a product of a particular company; common servers include MySQL, PostgreSQL, Oracle, and Microsoft SQL Server.

In general, you can think of a SQL database to be similar to a giant spreadsheet. A database can contain one or more tables, each of which contain fields and records. A table can be thought of as similar to a spreadsheet, a field similar to a column, and a record is similar to a row in a spreadsheet application.

However, unlike a spreadsheet, a database can be accessed by more than one person (or web site visitor) at a time. There are a few sources you may wish to review for more information, including:

• http://www.w3schools.com/sql/sql_intro.asp
• http://www.smallbusinesscomputing.com/biztools/article.php/3374941

Suppose you have a simple database, called Directory, that includes three fields:

• Name
• Phone
• City

A simple SQL query to list every record in the database would be:
SELECT * FROM Directory;

However, you can do interesting things such as only return results from a particular city with:
SELECT Name, Phone FROM Directory WHERE City LIKE 'Atlanta';

Clearly SQL can be used for much more interesting things than the above simple examples. I hope this helps.

Best regards,
Frank R.