<p>Does anybody know of any sample databases I could download, preferably in CSV or some similar easy to import format so that I could get more practice in working with different types of data sets?  </p>

<p>I know that the Canadian Department of Environment has <a href="http://www.climate.weatheroffice.ec.gc.ca/Welcome_e.html" rel="noreferrer">historical weather data</a> that you can download.  However, it's not in a common format I can import into any other database.  Moreover, you can only run queries based on the included program, which is actually quite limited in what kind of data it can provide.  </p>

<p>Does anybody know of any interesting data sets that are freely available in a common format that I could use with mySql, Sql Server, and other types of database engines?</p>

[{'answer_id': 57077, 'author': 'Kilhoffer', 'author_id': 5469, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/5469', 'pm_score': 2, 'selected': False, 'text': '<p>What database engine are you importing into? That will help determine what formats you can include in your search.</p>\n\n<p>The <a href="http://www.ferc.gov/docs-filing/eqr/soft-tools/sample-csv.asp" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Federal Energy Regulatory</a> Commission has some sample data for download in CSV format.</p>\n'}, {'answer_id': 57078, 'author': 'Corey', 'author_id': 1595, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/1595', 'pm_score': 3, 'selected': False, 'text': '<p>For Microsoft SQL Server, there is the <a href="http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=06616212-0356-46A0-8DA2-EEBC53A68034&amp;displaylang=en" rel="noreferrer">Northwind Sample DB</a> and <a href="http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms124659.aspx" rel="noreferrer">AdventureWorks</a>.</p>\n'}, {'answer_id': 57081, 'author': 'Adam Hollidge', 'author_id': 4069, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/4069', 'pm_score': 6, 'selected': True, 'text': '<p>The datawrangling blog posted a nice list a while back:</p>\n\n<p><a href="http://www.datawrangling.com/some-datasets-available-on-the-web" rel="noreferrer">http://www.datawrangling.com/some-datasets-available-on-the-web</a></p>\n\n<p>Includes financial, government data (labor, housing, etc.), and too many more to list here.</p>\n'}, {'answer_id': 57083, 'author': 'George Mauer', 'author_id': 5056, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/5056', 'pm_score': 2, 'selected': False, 'text': '<p>You can probably find the Northwind sample database for SQLServer</p>\n\n<p>It might be overkill but you can <a href="http://www.oracle.com/technology/products/database/xe/index.html" rel="nofollow noreferrer">install OracleXE</a>, I think it comes with some sample schemas or you can find the old Scott schema online.</p>\n\n<p>Also, in stephen bohlen\'s <a href="http://summerofnhibernate.com/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Summer of NHibernate</a> screen-cast series he creates a sample database, the code comes with it in xml files and you can import it like he describes in the screencast (maybe episode 2 or 3) and just not delete it later.</p>\n'}, {'answer_id': 57085, 'author': 'andyuk', 'author_id': 2108, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/2108', 'pm_score': 2, 'selected': False, 'text': '<p><a href="http://data.un.org/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">UnData</a> and <a href="http://www.swivel.com/" rel="nofollow noreferrer">Swivel</a> are both good sources for data. Any database should be able to import CSV files.</p>\n'}, {'answer_id': 1146159, 'author': 'Kibbee', 'author_id': 1862, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/1862', 'pm_score': 4, 'selected': False, 'text': '<p>A lot of the data in Stack Overflow is licensed under the create commons.  Every 3 months they release a <a href="https://blog.stackoverflow.com/category/cc-wiki-dump/">data dump</a> with all the questions, answers, comments, and votes.</p>\n'}, {'answer_id': 1805520, 'author': 'Yada', 'author_id': 45066, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/45066', 'pm_score': 3, 'selected': False, 'text': '<p>For MySQL there are quite a few sample database at <a href="http://dev.mysql.com/doc/index-other.html" rel="nofollow noreferrer">http://dev.mysql.com/doc/index-other.html</a></p>\n\n<ol>\n<li>world (world countries and cities)</li>\n<li>sakila(video rental)</li>\n<li>employee</li>\n<li>menagerie</li>\n</ol>\n'}, {'answer_id': 1810755, 'author': 'Hugues Van Landeghem', 'author_id': 87736, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/87736', 'pm_score': 2, 'selected': False, 'text': '<p>For Firebird you have employee.fdb</p>\n\n<p>on windows OS,  it is located there C:\\Program Files\\Firebird\\Firebird_2_1\\examples\\empbuild</p>\n'}, {'answer_id': 1810793, 'author': 'gorilla', 'author_id': 210199, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/210199', 'pm_score': 2, 'selected': False, 'text': '<p>The Guardian newspaper in the UK has a data-store, <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/data-store" rel="nofollow noreferrer">http://www.guardian.co.uk/data-store</a>, full of categorized datasets. They\'re all ultimately stored as Google Documents, so you can export them into csv &amp; Excel.</p>\n'}, {'answer_id': 2308473, 'author': 'nathanchere', 'author_id': 243557, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/243557', 'pm_score': 2, 'selected': False, 'text': '<p>There\'s a whole bunch of free SQL Server sample databases on CodePlex:\n<a href="http://www.codeplex.com/Wikipage?ProjectName=SqlServerSamples#databases" rel="nofollow noreferrer">http://www.codeplex.com/Wikipage?ProjectName=SqlServerSamples#databases</a></p>\n\n<p>One very simple way to get sample data is use full applications. I needed some sample data to practice what I was learning with MySQL at the time and just downloaded PHPBB and used their provided database. If you need to add users etc, just use the program to do it.</p>\n\n<p>Think generic. You can get weather data from common sources for free, thetvdb.com has a pretty nifty set of data for TV show episodes for free, sites like last.fm have a tonne of data available for music listening habits. If you just want sample data, the easiest way to get it is not thinking in terms of "I want a database". Think "what freely available data is out there".</p>\n'}, {'answer_id': 13915497, 'author': 'good experience', 'author_id': 1910151, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/1910151', 'pm_score': 2, 'selected': False, 'text': '<p>For FileMaker, see Sample Database:\n<a href="http://www.yzysoft.com/printouts/yzy_soft___Sample_Database.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.yzysoft.com/printouts/yzy_soft___Sample_Database.html</a></p>\n'}, {'answer_id': 23268261, 'author': 'Stphane', 'author_id': 1463336, 'author_profile': 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/1463336', 'pm_score': 3, 'selected': False, 'text': '<p>I use <a href="http://www.generatedata.com/" rel="noreferrer">generatedata.com</a> to generate custom databases schemes with entries.</p>\n\n<p>To use it, you can simply register a new account, or download its sources and install it on your server.</p>\n\n<p>You can export generated code in SQL, XML, JSON, or even server-side scripting language like php etc.</p>\n'}]
['https://Stackoverflow.com/questions/57068', 'https://Stackoverflow.com', 'https://Stackoverflow.com/users/1862/']