cengland0 (1/6/2011)
There are several ranking functions:RANK
DENSE_RANK
NTILE
ROW_NUMBER
Yes, there are several. However, this question is about the RANK() function, so why even bring these others into the mix?
When the question asked will it always return consecutive integers, I knew right away that it was false because none of them will always return consecutive integers if there is only one row. One row is still a non empty rowset but that was not explained in the provided explanation.
Are you just trying to find fault with the question?
A better argument would have been that all of the windowing functions accept a PARTITION BY clause, which re-starts the numbering - thus the results are not always sequential.
However, sometimes you just have to go with what you know the author meant to convey.
Wayne
Microsoft Certified Master: SQL Server 2008
Author - SQL Server T-SQL Recipes