Overview of MS SQL Server - Database Systems - page 318

The pubs Database: The pubs database is meant to be a learning tool. It contains
a sample database about a publisher, including information about authors, books, and
sales. Most of the examples in the SQL Server Books Online are based on the pubs
database. Most database features are highlighted via their implementation in the pubs
database. The pubs database is just under 2MB in size after installation.
The Northwind Database: The Northwind database is an alternative learning
database to the pubs database. Northwind has been the sample database supplied with
Microsoft Access for some time now. Because more and more Microsoft Access users
are migrating to SQL Server, the Northwind database was brought over to assist them in
learning the features of the product with a familiar database. Northwind is about 3.5MB
by default.
18.6 MS SQL Server Default Logins
One of the first things you should do after installing SQL Server is to log in. If you went
with the default and selected Windows Authentication Mode, you simply need to select
the Windows NT Authentication option on any dialog that asks you to connect to SQL
Server. If you choose to use Mixed Mode, you could either do that or use the default login
for SQL Server, sa (lowercase on case-sensitive sort-order servers). The letter sa stands for
system administrator.
sa: The sa user account is a member of the sysadmin fixed
server role. As a member of this role, sa can do anything
in SQL Server. The sa account always exists and cannot be
dropped. However, you cannot use it when we are in Windows
Authentication Mode. If you are in Mixed Mode, you can
select to login using this account. Still, it is more likely you
will use the next option, logging in via membership in local
administrators group.
Windows Local Administrators Group: If you are on
a Windows computer and are a member of the local
administrators group, you do not have to use the SQL Server
authentication. During setup, SQL Server adds the local
Windows Administrators group to the sysadmin role, just
as sa is added. As a result, all local administrators are made
SQL Server administrators by default. On earlier versions of
Windows platforms (prior to 2003), Windows authentication
is not available, so you must use sa . Password control is
not necessary in SQL Server when we are using Windows
authentication; SQL Server simply uses Windows login
credentials.