In SQL, what is the letter after a table name in a select statement?

Question

In

SELECT a.NAME, a.NUMBER, a.STRING, a.RDB$DB_KEY FROM ADMIN a

what does a stand for?

Thanks.

Answer 1

The query is using a like that just so that you don't have to write ADMIN.NAME, ADMIN.NUMBER, etc etc. If you have fifteen fields on your table and your table has a name like VPCPDEEE it gets very tiresome to type the same table name over and over.