SQL Server Brain Basher of the Week #017 - Alternative names for objects

Microsoft SQL Server does not force you with hard rules for naming objects such as tables but some recommendations. Your tables, your procedures, you functions can be named as you want and we generally use Pascal notation for naming objects (for more info on notations: Camel notation, Pascal Notation, Hungarian Notation). Sometime this leads to have very lengthy names and not user-friendly in some context. The Brain Basher of the week is based on it;

Can I have alternative names for my objects?

This can be achieved with Synonym Objects. It allows us to add another name on objects that are exist in either local or remote server. For an example, assume that you have a table called dbo.SalesOrderHeaderForAsiaRegion and you want to have a shorter name for this, a synonym can be created on this as AsiaSales. Another example is, assume that you need to access a table called Customer exist in your database and link with another table called Customer in a different database in another instance, a synonym can be created for second Customer table exist in second instance on first instance.

Here is a sample code for this;

USE AdventureWorks2014;
GO

-- Check existing table
SELECT * FROM Sales.SalesOrderHeader;
GO

-- Create synonym on it
CREATE SYNONYM SalesHeader
FOR Sales.SalesOrderHeader;
GO

-- Checking synonym created
SELECT * FROM SalesHeader;

For more info on Synonym:

https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms177544.aspx

https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms187552.aspx