LINQ ---> Language integrated Query is the new technology from Microsoft. It has now become core part of the .NET Framework 3.5
The modern software development revolves very much around Object Oriented concepts and Linq is very much the same.
Up till now developers were querying the tables but now with LINQ they can query the tables as well as objects. By objects I mean to say the entities or class which implements IEnumerable interface.
E.g. Arrays, Collections, Lists …. and others
Each data model has its own definition of querying, e.g. For Tables we use SQL, for XML we have Xquery or DOM. Linq is very generic in nature and same fundamentals of its can be applied in any form of the data. I know some would question what about ODBC, but my friends we are leaving in modern age where the applications have become more complex and ODBC is out of window.
Linq comes in three flavors
1) LINQ to objects
2) LINQ to ADO.NET
3) LINQ to XML

Some developers may ask what will happen to T-SQL or PL-SQL now with the invent of LINQ. This legacy technology will remain but whatever you can do in these Procedural languages the same thing can be achieved through LINQ but even more and that too keeping the modern standards. To console you further the syntax of SQL and LINQ are very much same. The same operators will work (Where, From etc)
It is the best data abstraction and unified platform to query various data sources.
I strongly recommend the developers to pull up their socks and get started with this technology. As this is new mantra of querying any data source.
I shall be publishing some video tutorials for you guys to get started with it so do visit again.
Till then Good Bye…
Happy Linquing