I need to create a column name based on the value of other columns. I need to return a value from a column, but the specific name depends on the value insert on other table.
From intance:
Table A
Column1 | Column2
1 2
Base on that values I need to go to the table B to the column "VE12".
I need this dynamiclly, so the execute(#query) is my last option and I would like to avoid CASE WHEN statments because I have more than 50 options.
My query will be something like:
select case when fn.tab=8 and fo.pais=3 then cp.ve83 end
FROM fn
INNER JOIN fo ON fo.stamp = fn.stamp
INNER JOIN cp
If the value in the column tab is 8 and the value in column pais is 3 I should return the value in column ve83.
Thanks for all the help!
The only sensible option is to go back to the business meaning of the data and redesign the database according to that, instead of according to "technique-oriented abstractions" such as these that SQL was never intended to support.
The main reason for this is that SQL was founded on FIRST order logic, and this precludes supporting stuff like varying domains. Which you are doing (or at least seeking to do) because ve12 could be a DATETIME and ve83 could be a VARCHAR and ve56 coulb be a BLOB etc. etc. So there is just no way for you [or anyone else] to determine the data type of the results in your query, and it is even more impossible to attach meaning to what comes out of your desired query precisely because of this varying-domain and varying-source characteristic.
Related
I have a varchar field in my database table A let's call it store_name, this field gets its value from entity A, now entity B enters store_name into a different database table B now I want to get all records in table A where the store_name matches the values in table B.
How would you recommend me doing the query as I don't control the values of those 2 fields?
What do you think about PostgreSQL fuzzystrmatch?
The tables contain thousands of records.
Thanks
Assuming that both table A and table B are in the same database. And I guess since you don't control insertion of data, you are not sure if the values are of same case or there may be a spelling mismatch.
Case 1: If the problem is only of case-mismatch, you can use ilike:
Select a.store_name
from a, b
Where a.store_name ilike b.store_name
Case 2: If you also want to check for spelling mismatch, but words sound similar, then after installing postgresql-contrib package and creating extension fuzzystrmatch, you can use:
Select a.store_name
from a, b
Where a.store_name ilike b.store_name OR
soundex(a.store_name) = soundex(b.store_name)
If you are dealing with names, which may not always be in English, it may be more appropriate to use metaphone or dmetaphone function instead of soundex.
Documentation: Fuzzystrmatch
If you want matching you can use a straight up join.
Select a.store_name
from a
join b on a.store_name = b.store_name;
If you want to use fuzzy matching just use the various functions available in the join criteria. Documentation here
Note: there are some limitations to Fuzzy string matching so i would advise testing each out on values that you either know match or don't.
I would like to write a query that can update all values on any given table to this -- given that I have many columns across multiple tables the function needs to be universal meaning i can run it without specifying column names, for it simply to identify null values and update them with my value of -- I'm not sure the best way to accomplish this and wrap it into a function I can call when someone INSERTS into any of the tables affected.
I've looked at COALESE as a possible option but any examples would be appreciated.
My table looks like: (I have over 30 tables with 100+ fields so writing out Updates for each field individually sounds like a nightmare, there must be a better way)
ID Name Email Phone
1 John john#aol.com 234-234-2344
2 Mary mary#test.com 332-134-5424
3 Simon null null
4 Kevin null 345-453-2135
5 Kelly kelly#msn.com null
I'd like to replace all nulls with -- permanantly in my table probably using an UPDATE statement.
Any ideas appreciated.
Following SQL will help you to list down all the tables and column names. And you can build a dynamic SQL thingy around this result set to achieve what you want.
SELECT DISTINCT
--SCHEMA_NAME(schema_id) AS schema_name,
t.name AS TableName,
c.name AS ColumnName
FROM sys.tables AS t
INNER JOIN sys.columns c ON t.OBJECT_ID = c.OBJECT_ID
ORDER BY 1,2;
EDIT:
Otherwise, the following link got a solution to your problem.
SQL Server Find and Replace Values in All Tables and All Text Columns
Umm, you are really overcomplicating this. I would suggest instead:
alter table t
alter column phone not null default '--';
Before doing this, update the column so there are no NULL values:
update t
set phone = '--'
where phone is null;
And, I should throw in that I think this is a bad idea. You are confusing "data" with "representation". In an application, you want to show -- for a NULL value. But I think NULL is the best way to represent the missing value in a database.
(And, of course, you need to do the above for each column you care about.)
I have table with 3 columns. One is Id, second column is Name and the third one Description. How can I select the value in the Description field by giving the column index, 3?
Thanks in advance
You can't, from plain SQL (other than in the ORDER BY clause, which won't give you the value but will allow you to sort the result set by it).
If you are using another programming language to construct a dynamic query, you could use that to identify the column being selected by its index number.
Alternatively, you could parameterise your query to return a specific column based on a case statement - like so:
select a, b, c, d, e, ...,
case ?
when 1 then a
when 2 then b
when 3 then c
when 4 then d
when 5 then e
...
end as parameterised_column
from ...
The problem with referring to a column by an index number is that, one day, someone may add a column and break your application as the wrong value will be returned.
This principle is enforced in SQL because you can select named columns, or all columns using the * syntax.
This principle is not enforced in programming languages, where you can usually access the column by ordinal in code, but you should consider the principle before deciding to use a statement such as (psuedo code)
value = results[0].column[2].value;
It should be possible. You'd have to query the system tables (which do vary from one version of SQL to another) to get the 3rd (or Nth) column name as a string to form a following query using that column name.
In SQL 2000 the tables you'll need to start with are syscolumns with a join to sysobjects for the table name. Then the rank() function on "Colid" will give you the Nth column and "name" (shockingly) the name of the column. Once you've got that in a variable the following command can return the value, compare to it, order by it or whatever you need.
This is how you can retrieve a Column's name by passing it's index.
Here variable AcID is used as the index of the column.
Below is the code e.g
dim gFld as string
vSqlText1 = "Select * from RecMast where ID = 1000"
vSql1 = New SqlClient.SqlCommand(vSqlText1, cnnRice)
vRs1 = vSql1.ExecuteReader
if vRs1.Read then
gFld = vRs1.GetName(AcID)
msgbox gfld
end if
declare #searchIndex int
set #searchIndex = 3
select Description from tbl_name t where t.Id = #searchIndex
I have a table which has essentially boolean values in a legacy database. The column names are stored as string values in another table so I need to match the column names of one table to a string value in another table. I know there has to be a way to do this directly with SQL in SQL Server but it is beyond me.
My initial thought was to use PIVOT but it is not enabled by default and enabling it would likely be a difficult process with pushing that change to the Production database. I would prefer to use what is enabled by default.
I am considering using COALESCE to translate the boolean value to the string that value that I need. This will be a manual process.
I think I will also use a table variable to insert the results of the first query into that variable and use those results to do the second query. I still have the problem that the columns are on a single row so I wish I could easily pivot the values to put the column names in the result set as strings. But if I could easily do that I could easily write the query with a sub-select.
Any tips are welcome.
Checkout Sysobjects and SysColumns in SQL Server. They are 2 SQL tables that gives you the names of the tables in your DB and the names of the columns that go with that table.
The system view INFORMATION_SCHEMA.COLUMNS will also give you what you want.
You can build a SQL string and then execute that string as a query. Not the prettiest by any means but I think it would work the way you want it to. You would just use a cursor or while loop to build the string.
If you're comfortable with .Net you could just write your own stored proc in your language of choice and manipulate the data in code instead.
Heres a link to get started
CLR Stored Procedures
I'm not quite sure I understand how your design is currently put together (could you post an example?), but the information_schema.columns view will give you a table containing all the column names as string values. If you join your second table against that I think you'll probably get what you need.
For Example, i have a table STATEtbl having 3 columns and i want to get all the column names of this table as ROW values... i use the below query
Select SC.name as Columns from Syscolumns SC
Join Sysobjects SO On SC.id = SO.Id
where Object_name(SO.Id) = 'STATEtbl'
Result of the query:
Columns
--------
State
StateCode
StateFullName
I have a query in MS Access which creates a table from two subqueries. For two of the columns being created, I'm dividing one column from the first subquery into a column from the second subquery.
The datatype of the first column is a double; the datatype of the second column is decimal, with scale of 2, but I want the second column to be a double as well.
Is there a way to force the datatype when creating a table through a standard make-table Access query?
One way to do it is to explicitly create the table before putting anything into it.
Your current statement is probably like this:
SELECT Persons.LastName,Orders.OrderNo
INTO Persons_Order_Backup
FROM Persons
INNER JOIN Orders
ON Persons.P_Id=Orders.P_Id
WHERE FirstName = 'Alistair'
But you can also do this:
----Create NewTable
CREATE TABLE NewTable(FirstName VARCHAR(100), LastName VARCHAR(100), Total DOUBLE)
----INSERT INTO NewTableusing SELECT
INSERT INTO NewTable(FirstName, LastName, Total)
SELECT FirstName, LastName,
FROM Person p
INNER JOIN Orders o
ON p.P_Id = o.P_Id
WHERE p.FirstName = 'Alistair'
This way you have total control over the column types. You can always drop the table later if you need to recreate it.
You can use the cast to FLOAT function CDBL() but, somewhat bizarrely, the Access Database Engine cannot handle the NULL value, so you must handle this yourself e.g.
SELECT first_column,
IIF(second_column IS NULL, NULL, CDBL(second_column))
AS second_column_as_float
INTO Table666
FROM MyTest;
...but you're going to need to ALTER TABLE to add your keys, constraints, etc. Better to simply CREATE TABLE first then use INSERT INTO..SELECT to populate it.
You can use CDbl around the columns.
An easy way to do this is to create an empty table with the correct field types and then to an Append-To query and Access will automatically convert the data to the destination field.
I had a similar situation, but I had a make-table query creating a field with NUMERIC datatype that I wanted to be short text.
What I did (and I got the idea from Stack) is to create the table with the field in question as Short Text, and at the same time build a delete query to scrub the records. I think it's funny that a DELETE query in access doesn't delete the table, just the records in it - I guess you have to use a DROP TABLE function for that, to purge a table...
Then, I converted my make-table query to an APPEND query, which I'd never done before... and I just added the running of the DELETE query to my process.
Thank you, Stack Overflow !
Steve
I add a '& ""' to the field I want to make sure are stored as text, and a ' *1 ' (as in multiplying the amount by 1) to the fields I want to store as numeric.
Seems to do the trick.
To get an Access query to create a table with three numeric output fields from input numeric fields, (it kept wanting to make the output fields text fields), had to combine several of the above suggestions. Pre-establish an empty output table with pre-defined output fields as integer, double and double. In the append query itself, multiply the numeric fields by one. It worked. Finally.