QL

QL is an acronym that has been used to refer to multiple concepts across disciplines, most prominently as a short form for 'Query Language' in computer science. In this sense, QL denotes languages designed to request, filter, and retrieve information from data stores, often enabling declarative specifications of what data to return rather than how to compute it. The best-known example is SQL, the Structured Query Language, which is the standard language for querying relational databases and reporting systems.

Beyond these basics, many specialized query languages adopt the same QL suffix, including SPARQL (Query Language for RDF graphs), GraphQL (Graph Query Language for APIs), and OQL (Object Query Language) used in some object-oriented database contexts. These languages share a common goal—expressing data retrieval and transformation in a formalized syntax—while differing in data models, execution environments, and semantics.

In practice, the exact meaning of QL depends on context; some references use 'QL' to denote a family of query languages in general, while others cite a specific language whose name ends with QL. The term is not a single, standardized language but a class designation that highlights the query capability at the core of the technology. If you encounter QL, examine the surrounding material to determine whether it refers to a particular language (like SQL, SPARQL, GraphQL) or to the broader concept of querying capabilities.