I'm interested in learning some (ideally) database agnostic ways of selecting the nth row from a database table. It would also be interesting to see how this can be achieved using the native functionality of the following databases:
SQL Server
MySQL
PostgreSQL
SQLite
Oracle
I am currently doing something like the following in SQL Server 2005, but I'd be interested in seeing other's more agnostic approaches:
WITH Ordered AS (
SELECT ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY OrderID) AS RowNumber, OrderID, OrderDate
FROM Orders)
SELECT *
FROM Ordered
WHERE RowNumber = 1000000
Credit for the above SQL: Firoz Ansari's Weblog
Update: See Troels Arvin's answer regarding the SQL standard. Troels, have you got any links we can cite?
There are ways of doing this in optional parts of the standard, but a lot of databases support their own way of doing it.
A really good site that talks about this and other things is http://troels.arvin.dk/db/rdbms/#select-limit.
Basically, PostgreSQL and MySQL supports the non-standard:
SELECT...
LIMIT y OFFSET x
Oracle, DB2 and MSSQL supports the standard windowing functions:
SELECT * FROM (
SELECT
ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY key ASC) AS rownumber,
columns
FROM tablename
) AS foo
WHERE rownumber <= n
(which I just copied from the site linked above since I never use those DBs)
Update: As of PostgreSQL 8.4 the standard windowing functions are supported, so expect the second example to work for PostgreSQL as well.
Update: SQLite added window functions support in version 3.25.0 on 2018-09-15 so both forms also work in SQLite.
PostgreSQL supports windowing functions as defined by the SQL standard, but they're awkward, so most people use (the non-standard) LIMIT / OFFSET:
SELECT
*
FROM
mytable
ORDER BY
somefield
LIMIT 1 OFFSET 20;
This example selects the 21st row. OFFSET 20 is telling Postgres to skip the first 20 records. If you don't specify an ORDER BY clause, there's no guarantee which record you will get back, which is rarely useful.
I'm not sure about any of the rest, but I know SQLite and MySQL don't have any "default" row ordering. In those two dialects, at least, the following snippet grabs the 15th entry from the_table, sorting by the date/time it was added:
SELECT *
FROM the_table
ORDER BY added DESC
LIMIT 1,15
(of course, you'd need to have an added DATETIME field, and set it to the date/time that entry was added...)
SQL 2005 and above has this feature built-in. Use the ROW_NUMBER() function. It is excellent for web-pages with a << Prev and Next >> style browsing:
Syntax:
SELECT
*
FROM
(
SELECT
ROW_NUMBER () OVER (ORDER BY MyColumnToOrderBy) AS RowNum,
*
FROM
Table_1
) sub
WHERE
RowNum = 23
I suspect this is wildly inefficient but is quite a simple approach, which worked on a small dataset that I tried it on.
select top 1 field
from table
where field in (select top 5 field from table order by field asc)
order by field desc
This would get the 5th item, change the second top number to get a different nth item
SQL server only (I think) but should work on older versions that do not support ROW_NUMBER().
Verify it on SQL Server:
Select top 10 * From emp
EXCEPT
Select top 9 * From emp
This will give you 10th ROW of emp table!
Contrary to what some of the answers claim, the SQL standard is not silent regarding this subject.
Since SQL:2003, you have been able to use "window functions" to skip rows and limit result sets.
And in SQL:2008, a slightly simpler approach had been added, using
OFFSET skip ROWS
FETCH FIRST n ROWS ONLY
Personally, I don't think that SQL:2008's addition was really needed, so if I were ISO, I would have kept it out of an already rather large standard.
1 small change: n-1 instead of n.
select *
from thetable
limit n-1, 1
SQL SERVER
Select n' th record from top
SELECT * FROM (
SELECT
ID, NAME, ROW_NUMBER() OVER(ORDER BY ID) AS ROW
FROM TABLE
) AS TMP
WHERE ROW = n
select n' th record from bottom
SELECT * FROM (
SELECT
ID, NAME, ROW_NUMBER() OVER(ORDER BY ID DESC) AS ROW
FROM TABLE
) AS TMP
WHERE ROW = n
When we used to work in MSSQL 2000, we did what we called the "triple-flip":
EDITED
DECLARE #InnerPageSize int
DECLARE #OuterPageSize int
DECLARE #Count int
SELECT #Count = COUNT(<column>) FROM <TABLE>
SET #InnerPageSize = #PageNum * #PageSize
SET #OuterPageSize = #Count - ((#PageNum - 1) * #PageSize)
IF (#OuterPageSize < 0)
SET #OuterPageSize = 0
ELSE IF (#OuterPageSize > #PageSize)
SET #OuterPageSize = #PageSize
DECLARE #sql NVARCHAR(8000)
SET #sql = 'SELECT * FROM
(
SELECT TOP ' + CAST(#OuterPageSize AS nvarchar(5)) + ' * FROM
(
SELECT TOP ' + CAST(#InnerPageSize AS nvarchar(5)) + ' * FROM <TABLE> ORDER BY <column> ASC
) AS t1 ORDER BY <column> DESC
) AS t2 ORDER BY <column> ASC'
PRINT #sql
EXECUTE sp_executesql #sql
It wasn't elegant, and it wasn't fast, but it worked.
In Oracle 12c, You may use OFFSET..FETCH..ROWS option with ORDER BY
For example, to get the 3rd record from top:
SELECT *
FROM sometable
ORDER BY column_name
OFFSET 2 ROWS FETCH NEXT 1 ROWS ONLY;
Here is a fast solution of your confusion.
SELECT * FROM table ORDER BY `id` DESC LIMIT N, 1
Here You may get Last row by Filling N=0, Second last by N=1, Fourth Last By Filling N=3 and so on.
This is very common question over the interview and this is Very simple ans of it.
Further If you want Amount, ID or some Numeric Sorting Order than u may go for CAST function in MySQL.
SELECT DISTINCT (`amount`)
FROM cart
ORDER BY CAST( `amount` AS SIGNED ) DESC
LIMIT 4 , 1
Here By filling N = 4 You will be able to get Fifth Last Record of Highest Amount from CART table. You can fit your field and table name and come up with solution.
ADD:
LIMIT n,1
That will limit the results to one result starting at result n.
Oracle:
select * from (select foo from bar order by foo) where ROWNUM = x
For example, if you want to select every 10th row in MSSQL, you can use;
SELECT * FROM (
SELECT
ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY ColumnName1 ASC) AS rownumber, ColumnName1, ColumnName2
FROM TableName
) AS foo
WHERE rownumber % 10 = 0
Just take the MOD and change number 10 here any number you want.
For SQL Server, a generic way to go by row number is as such:
SET ROWCOUNT #row --#row = the row number you wish to work on.
For Example:
set rowcount 20 --sets row to 20th row
select meat, cheese from dbo.sandwich --select columns from table at 20th row
set rowcount 0 --sets rowcount back to all rows
This will return the 20th row's information. Be sure to put in the rowcount 0 afterward.
Here's a generic version of a sproc I recently wrote for Oracle that allows for dynamic paging/sorting - HTH
-- p_LowerBound = first row # in the returned set; if second page of 10 rows,
-- this would be 11 (-1 for unbounded/not set)
-- p_UpperBound = last row # in the returned set; if second page of 10 rows,
-- this would be 20 (-1 for unbounded/not set)
OPEN o_Cursor FOR
SELECT * FROM (
SELECT
Column1,
Column2
rownum AS rn
FROM
(
SELECT
tbl.Column1,
tbl.column2
FROM MyTable tbl
WHERE
tbl.Column1 = p_PKParam OR
tbl.Column1 = -1
ORDER BY
DECODE(p_sortOrder, 'A', DECODE(p_sortColumn, 1, Column1, 'X'),'X'),
DECODE(p_sortOrder, 'D', DECODE(p_sortColumn, 1, Column1, 'X'),'X') DESC,
DECODE(p_sortOrder, 'A', DECODE(p_sortColumn, 2, Column2, sysdate),sysdate),
DECODE(p_sortOrder, 'D', DECODE(p_sortColumn, 2, Column2, sysdate),sysdate) DESC
))
WHERE
(rn >= p_lowerBound OR p_lowerBound = -1) AND
(rn <= p_upperBound OR p_upperBound = -1);
But really, isn't all this really just parlor tricks for good database design in the first place? The few times I needed functionality like this it was for a simple one off query to make a quick report. For any real work, using tricks like these is inviting trouble. If selecting a particular row is needed then just have a column with a sequential value and be done with it.
Nothing fancy, no special functions, in case you use Caché like I do...
SELECT TOP 1 * FROM (
SELECT TOP n * FROM <table>
ORDER BY ID Desc
)
ORDER BY ID ASC
Given that you have an ID column or a datestamp column you can trust.
For SQL server, the following will return the first row from giving table.
declare #rowNumber int = 1;
select TOP(#rowNumber) * from [dbo].[someTable];
EXCEPT
select TOP(#rowNumber - 1) * from [dbo].[someTable];
You can loop through the values with something like this:
WHILE #constVar > 0
BEGIN
declare #rowNumber int = #consVar;
select TOP(#rowNumber) * from [dbo].[someTable];
EXCEPT
select TOP(#rowNumber - 1) * from [dbo].[someTable];
SET #constVar = #constVar - 1;
END;
LIMIT n,1 doesn't work in MS SQL Server. I think it's just about the only major database that doesn't support that syntax. To be fair, it isn't part of the SQL standard, although it is so widely supported that it should be. In everything except SQL server LIMIT works great. For SQL server, I haven't been able to find an elegant solution.
In Sybase SQL Anywhere:
SELECT TOP 1 START AT n * from table ORDER BY whatever
Don't forget the ORDER BY or it's meaningless.
T-SQL - Selecting N'th RecordNumber from a Table
select * from
(select row_number() over (order by Rand() desc) as Rno,* from TableName) T where T.Rno = RecordNumber
Where RecordNumber --> Record Number to Select
TableName --> To be Replaced with your Table Name
For e.g. to select 5 th record from a table Employee, your query should be
select * from
(select row_number() over (order by Rand() desc) as Rno,* from Employee) T where T.Rno = 5
SELECT
top 1 *
FROM
table_name
WHERE
column_name IN (
SELECT
top N column_name
FROM
TABLE
ORDER BY
column_name
)
ORDER BY
column_name DESC
I've written this query for finding Nth row.
Example with this query would be
SELECT
top 1 *
FROM
Employee
WHERE
emp_id IN (
SELECT
top 7 emp_id
FROM
Employee
ORDER BY
emp_id
)
ORDER BY
emp_id DESC
I'm a bit late to the party here but I have done this without the need for windowing or using
WHERE x IN (...)
SELECT TOP 1
--select the value needed from t1
[col2]
FROM
(
SELECT TOP 2 --the Nth row, alter this to taste
UE2.[col1],
UE2.[col2],
UE2.[date],
UE2.[time],
UE2.[UID]
FROM
[table1] AS UE2
WHERE
UE2.[col1] = ID --this is a subquery
AND
UE2.[col2] IS NOT NULL
ORDER BY
UE2.[date] DESC, UE2.[time] DESC --sorting by date and time newest first
) AS t1
ORDER BY t1.[date] ASC, t1.[time] ASC --this reverses the order of the sort in t1
It seems to work fairly fast although to be fair I only have around 500 rows of data
This works in MSSQL
SELECT * FROM emp a
WHERE n = (
SELECT COUNT( _rowid)
FROM emp b
WHERE a. _rowid >= b. _rowid
);
unbelievable that you can find a SQL engine executing this one ...
WITH sentence AS
(SELECT
stuff,
row = ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY Id)
FROM
SentenceType
)
SELECT
sen.stuff
FROM sentence sen
WHERE sen.row = (ABS(CHECKSUM(NEWID())) % 100) + 1
select * from
(select * from ordered order by order_id limit 100) x order by
x.order_id desc limit 1;
First select top 100 rows by ordering in ascending and then select last row by ordering in descending and limit to 1. However this is a very expensive statement as it access the data twice.
It seems to me that, to be efficient, you need to 1) generate a random number between 0 and one less than the number of database records, and 2) be able to select the row at that position. Unfortunately, different databases have different random number generators and different ways to select a row at a position in a result set - usually you specify how many rows to skip and how many rows you want, but it's done differently for different databases. Here is something that works for me in SQLite:
select *
from Table
limit abs(random()) % (select count(*) from Words), 1;
It does depend on being able to use a subquery in the limit clause (which in SQLite is LIMIT <recs to skip>,<recs to take>) Selecting the number of records in a table should be particularly efficient, being part of the database's meta data, but that depends on the database's implementation. Also, I don't know if the query will actually build the result set before retrieving the Nth record, but I would hope that it doesn't need to. Note that I'm not specifying an "order by" clause. It might be better to "order by" something like the primary key, which will have an index - getting the Nth record from an index might be faster if the database can't get the Nth record from the database itself without building the result set.
Most suitable answer I have seen on this article for sql server
WITH myTableWithRows AS (
SELECT (ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY myTable.SomeField)) as row,*
FROM myTable)
SELECT * FROM myTableWithRows WHERE row = 3
How can one filter a grouped resultset for only those groups that meet some criterion compared against the other groups? For example, only those groups that have the maximum number of constituent records?
I had thought that a subquery as follows should do the trick:
SELECT * FROM (
SELECT *, COUNT(*) AS Records
FROM T
GROUP BY X
) t HAVING Records = MAX(Records);
However the addition of the final HAVING clause results in an empty recordset... what's going on?
In MySQL (Which I assume you are using since you have posted SELECT *, COUNT(*) FROM T GROUP BY X Which would fail in all RDBMS that I know of). You can use:
SELECT T.*
FROM T
INNER JOIN
( SELECT X, COUNT(*) AS Records
FROM T
GROUP BY X
ORDER BY Records DESC
LIMIT 1
) T2
ON T2.X = T.X
This has been tested in MySQL and removes the implicit grouping/aggregation.
If you can use windowed functions and one of TOP/LIMIT with Ties or Common Table expressions it becomes even shorter:
Windowed function + CTE: (MS SQL-Server & PostgreSQL Tested)
WITH CTE AS
( SELECT *, COUNT(*) OVER(PARTITION BY X) AS Records
FROM T
)
SELECT *
FROM CTE
WHERE Records = (SELECT MAX(Records) FROM CTE)
Windowed Function with TOP (MS SQL-Server Tested)
SELECT TOP 1 WITH TIES *
FROM ( SELECT *, COUNT(*) OVER(PARTITION BY X) [Records]
FROM T
)
ORDER BY Records DESC
Lastly, I have never used oracle so apolgies for not adding a solution that works on oracle...
EDIT
My Solution for MySQL did not take into account ties, and my suggestion for a solution to this kind of steps on the toes of what you have said you want to avoid (duplicate subqueries) so I am not sure I can help after all, however just in case it is preferable here is a version that will work as required on your fiddle:
SELECT T.*
FROM T
INNER JOIN
( SELECT X
FROM T
GROUP BY X
HAVING COUNT(*) =
( SELECT COUNT(*) AS Records
FROM T
GROUP BY X
ORDER BY Records DESC
LIMIT 1
)
) T2
ON T2.X = T.X
For the exact question you give, one way to look at it is that you want the group of records where there is no other group that has more records. So if you say
SELECT taxid, COUNT(*) as howMany
GROUP by taxid
You get all counties and their counts
Then you can treat that expressions as a table by making it a subquery, and give it an alias. Below I assign two "copies" of the query the names X and Y and ask for taxids that don't have any more in one table. If there are two with the same number I'd get two or more. Different databases have proprietary syntax, notably TOP and LIMIT, that make this kind of query simpler, easier to understand.
SELECT taxid FROM
(select taxid, count(*) as HowMany from flats
GROUP by taxid) as X
WHERE NOT EXISTS
(
SELECT * from
(
SELECT taxid, count(*) as HowMany FROM
flats
GROUP by taxid
) AS Y
WHERE Y.howmany > X.howmany
)
Try this:
SELECT * FROM (
SELECT *, MAX(Records) as max_records FROM (
SELECT *, COUNT(*) AS Records
FROM T
GROUP BY X
) t
) WHERE Records = max_records
I'm sorry that I can't test the validity of this query right now.
How can i find the fifth record in a table using sql query?
If you are feeling argumentative, consider using "SELECT * FROM table LIMIT 1" and arguing that since SQL does not promise to return results in any particular order, the row returned is spiritually equivalent to the fifth, then show your tattoo: "The nth element of an unordered set is meaningless!"
SELECT TOP 1 * FROM (SELECT TOP 5 * FROM Table T ORDER BY Column ASC) ORDER BY Column Desc
If you are using SqlServer you could use the TOP keyword to achieve this.
select top 1 * from(
select top 5 * from myTable order by orderingColumn) as A
order by orderingColumn desc
If you are using Oracle this should work (however i am not able to test this now)
select *
from (
select *, row_number() over (order by orderingColumn) r
from items
)
where r = 5;
SELECT * FROM table LIMIT 1 OFFSET 4;
Fifth record only in MySQL
SELECT * FROM anytable LIMIT ORDER BY id LIMIT 4,1
For SQL Server (recent-ish incarnations, anyway) something like this should work:
SELECT
*
FROM
(
SELECT
*,
ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY the_table.the_column) 'row_num'
FROM
the_table
) numbered_rows
WHERE
row_num = 5
However, I'd actually put my vote with Thomas L Holaday's answer :)
I have an SQL Query that i'm running but I only want to select a specific row. For example lets say my query was:
Select * from Comments
Lets say this returns 10 rows, I only want to select the 8th record returned by this query. I know I can do:
Select Top 5 * from Comments
To get the top 5 records of that query but I only want to select a certain record, is there anything I can put into this query to do that (similar to top).
Thanks
jack
This is a classic interview question.
In Ms SQL 2005+ you can use the ROW_NUMBER() keyword and have the Predicate ROW_NUMBER = n
USE AdventureWorks;
GO
WITH OrderedOrders AS
(
SELECT SalesOrderID, OrderDate,
ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY OrderDate) AS 'RowNumber'
FROM Sales.SalesOrderHeader
)
SELECT *
FROM OrderedOrders
WHERE RowNumber = 5;
In SQL2000 you could do something like
SELECT Top 1 *FROM
[tblApplications]
where [ApplicationID] In
(
SELECT TOP 5 [ApplicationID]
FROM [dbo].[tblApplications]
order by applicationId Desc
)
How about
SELECT TOP 1 * FROM
(SELECT TOP 8 * FROM Comments ORDER BY foo ASC)
ORDER BY foo DESC
First, you should say which RDBMS you're using.
Second, you should give careful thought to what it is you're trying to accomplish. Relational Databases are set-based. In general, the order of elements in a set does not matter. You'll want to ask why it matters in this case, then see if there's a better way to embed the concept of order into the query itself.
For instance, in SQL Server 2005 (and other RDBMS), you can use the ROW_NUMBER function to assign a sequential number to each row returned, based on the criteria you specify. You could then select rows based on the row number. Example from Books Online:
USE AdventureWorks;
GO
WITH OrderedOrders AS
(
SELECT SalesOrderID, OrderDate,
ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY OrderDate) AS 'RowNumber'
FROM Sales.SalesOrderHeader
)
SELECT *
FROM OrderedOrders
WHERE RowNumber BETWEEN 50 AND 60;
SELECT * FROM comments WHERE ...conditions... LIMIT 1 OFFSET 8
OFFSET is a good thing for MySQL
For SQL Server 2005:
select rank() OVER (ORDER BY c.subject, c.date) as rank, c.subject, c.date
from comments c
where rank = 8
Well, in T-SQL (the dialect for SQL Server) you can do the following:
SELECT TOP 1 *
FROM (SELECT TOP 8 *
FROM Table
ORDER
BY SortField)
ORDER
BY SortField DESC
This way you get the 8th record.
I have read the question & your comments on you would want next 3 blog comments etc.
How is your tables structured?
Assume that you have blog post Id & comment Id is generated in ascending order for each blog post, you could do a SELECT based on the current Id.
e.g. if the blogpostId = 101, you get the top 3 comments order by posted Id. Now lets say, you want to get the next 3 comments - you could do a SELECT WHERE commentId between the last comment id shown TO the comment id - 3
But all that depends on how your tables are defined.
In SQL 2000 where you do not have ROW_NUMBER() function you could use a work-around like this:
SELECT CommentsTableFieldList, IDENTITY(INT, 1,1) as seqNo
INTO #SeqComments
FROM Comments
SELECT * FROM #SeqComments
WHERE seqNo = 8
select top 1 *
from TableName
where ColumnName1 in
(
select top nth ColumnName1
from TableName
order by ColumnName1 desc
)
order by ColumnName1 desc
From the SELECT reference, use the LIMIT keyword:
SELECT * FROM tbl LIMIT 5,10; # Retrieve rows 6-15
SELECT * FROM tbl LIMIT 5; # Retrieve first 5 rows
Note: this is for MySQL, other SQL engines may have a different keyword.
Select from tablename limit nthrow,1;
try This
Let us assume , We want select 5th row of WC_Video Table
And
Select * from (Select Row_Number() over (Order by Uploadedon) as 'rownumber',* from Wc_Video )as Temp where rownumber=5