Hidden RBAR: Triangular Joins

January 16, 2009

If you've been around the forums on SQLServerCentral.com, you've probably seen me use the term "RBAR". "RBAR" is pronounced "ree-bar" and is a "Modernism" for "Row-By-Agonizing-Row". I use the term "RBAR" for anything that isn't set based. Some others have picked up on it because it's easy to remember as a form of "Death By SQL".

Many folks think that "set-based" programming means one of two things...

1. It's all done in a single query or...
2. It simply doesn't have a Cursor or a While Loop

Both of those are very bad misconceptions as to what set based programming is.

The article continues at http://www.sqlservercentral.com/articles/T-SQL/61539/