What the heck does 'ALFKI' mean?

Question

I've seen this abbreviation (or mnemonic) used in various examples in SQL and web services.

What does it mean? And if you know, what are its origins?

Answer 1

It's the unique key of "Alfreds Futterkiste", the first "Customers" table entry in Microsoft's "Northwind" sample database that ships with SQL Server.

Answer 2

It's a sample customer in Microsoft supplied Northwind database (used for tests)

Answer 3

'ALFKI' is the primary identifier of a known Customer record in the Northwind sample Database from Microsoft.

It is used here and there almost as "foobar" is used as a canonical variable name.

Answer 4

Customer key from the Northwind sample database that Microsoft used over the years.

Answer 5

It's the primary key (CustomerID) of the First Customer entry in the Microsoft Northwind Demo Database

ALFKI   
Alfreds Futterkiste 
Maria Anders    
Sales Representative    
Obere Str. 57   Berlin  
12209   
Germany 
030-0074321 
030-0076545