SQL Yesterday vs. SQL Today

Quick Tip: Use the ANSI Standard Join syntax in all of your queries.

I've been writing SQL for abotu 20 years now, and have been forcing my hands to type the new code. It's not just a good idea; it's now critical to performance. I've talked to hosts of people who claim that their performance has improved by changing format from the old syntax (where joincol = joincol) to the new syntax (ON joincol = joincol) ... I'm sure the "Why" has been documented / blogged about, so I'll just leave the top & a sample correction here...

Reproduced here with the client's permission:

SELECT
Facilities.code, Facilities.name, Trips.veh, Trips.status, Trips.priority, Trips.tdate,
Trips.dstatus, Facilities.initials, Trips.dispdate, Trips.disptime, Trips.enrdate,
Trips.enrtime, Trips.atsdate, Trips.atstime, Trips.atddate, Trips.atdtime, Trips.tradate,
Trips.tratime, Trips.cmpy, Trips.daddr2, Trips.daddr, Trips.avldate, Trips.avltime,
Trips.IncidentID, Trips.RunNumber, Notes.NoteDate, Notes.Description,
Trips.transpriority
FROM
dbo.Facilities Facilities, dbo.Trips Trips, dbo.TripNotes Tripnotes, dbo.Notes Notes
WHERE
Trips.dfac = Facilities.code AND
Tripnotes.job = Trips.job AND
Notes.code = Tripnotes.note AND
Trips.tdate = Tripnotes.tdate AND
(
Trips.dstatus IN (4,5,6) AND
Trips.tdate >= convert(char(10),getdate()-1,126) AND
Facilities.code <> 1
)

And recommend it be rewritten like this:

SELECT
Facilities.code, Facilities.name, Trips.veh, Trips.status, Trips.priority, Trips.tdate,
Trips.dstatus, Facilities.initials, Trips.dispdate, Trips.disptime, Trips.enrdate,
Trips.enrtime, Trips.atsdate, Trips.atstime, Trips.atddate, Trips.atdtime, Trips.tradate,
Trips.tratime, Trips.cmpy, Trips.daddr2, Trips.daddr, Trips.avldate, Trips.avltime,
Trips.IncidentID, Trips.RunNumber, Notes.NoteDate, Notes.Description,
Trips.transpriority
FROM
dbo.Facilities Facilities join dbo.Trips Trips on
Trips.dfac = Facilities.code JOIN
dbo.TripNotes Tripnotes on
Trips.job = Tripnotes.job AND
Trips.tdate = Tripnotes.tdate JOIN
dbo.Notes Notes ON
Notes.code = Tripnotes.note
WHERE
Trips.dstatus IN (4,5,6) AND
Trips.tdate >= convert(char(10),getdate()-1,126) AND
Facilities.code <> 1