How can I remove duplicate rows from a table but keeping the summation of values of a column - sql

Question

Suppose there is a table which has several identical rows. I can copy the distinct values by
SELECT DISTINCT * INTO DESTINATIONTABLE FROM SOURCETABLE
but if the table has a column named value and for the sake of simplicity its value is 1 for one particular item in that table. Now that row has another 9 duplicates. So the summation of the value column for that particular item is 10. Now I want to remove the 9 duplicates(or copy the distinct value as I mentioned) and for that item now the value should show 10 and not 1. How can this be achieved?
item| value
----+----------------
A | 1
A | 1
A | 1
A | 1
B | 1
B | 1
I want to show this as below
item| value
----+----------------
A | 4
B | 2
Thanks in advance

Answer 1

You can try to use SUM and group by
SELECT item,SUM(value) value
FROM T
GROUP BY item
SQLfiddle:http://sqlfiddle.com/#!18/fac26/1
[Results]:
| item | value |
|------|-------|
| A | 4 |
| B | 2 |

Answer 2

Broadly speaking, you can just us a sum and a GROUP BY clause.
Something like:
SELECT column1, SUM(column2) AS Count
FROM SOURCETABLE
GROUP BY column1
Here it is in action: Sum + Group By
Since your table probably isn't just two columns of data, here is a slightly more complex example showing how to do this to a larger table: SQL Fiddle
Note that I've selected my rows individually so that I can access the necessary data, rather than using
SELECT *
And I have achieved this result without the need for selecting data into another table.
EDIT 2:
Further to your comments, it sounds like you want to alter the actual data in your table rather than just querying it. There may be a more elegant way to do this, but a simple way use the above query to populate a temporary table, delete the contents of the existing table, then move all the data back. To do this in my existing example:
WITH MyQuery AS (
SELECT name, type, colour, price, SUM(number) AS number
FROM MyTable
GROUP BY name, type, colour, price
)
SELECT * INTO MyTable2 FROM MyQuery;
DELETE FROM MyTable;
INSERT INTO MyTable(name, type, colour, price, number)
SELECT * FROM MyTable2;
DROP TABLE MyTable2;
WARNING: If youre going to try this, please use a development environment first (i.e one you don't mind breaking!) to ensure it does exactly what you want it to do. It's imperative that your initial query captures ALL the data you want.
Here is the SQL Fiddle of this example in action: SQL Fiddle