where statement execute before inner join - sql

Question

I'm trying to grab the first instance of each result with a sysAddress of less than 4. However my statement currently grabs the min(actionTime) result first before applying the where sysAddress < 4. I'm trying to have the input for the inner join as the where sysAddress < 4 however i cant seem to figure out how to do it.
Should i be nesting it all differently? I didnt want to create an additional layer of table joins. Is this possible? I'm a bit lost at all the answers ive found.
SELECT
tblHistoryObject.info,
tblHistory.actionTime,
tblHistoryUser.userID,
tblHistoryUser.firstName,
tblHistoryUser.surname,
tblHistory.eventID,
tblHistoryObject.objectID,
tblHistorySystem.sysAddress
FROM tblHistoryObject
JOIN tblHistory
ON (tblHistory.historyObjectID = tblHistoryObject.historyObjectID)
JOIN tblHistorySystem
ON (tblHistory.historySystemID = tblHistorySystem.historySystemID)
JOIN tblHistoryUser
ON (tblHistory.historyUserID = tblHistoryUser.historyUserID)
INNER JOIN (SELECT
MIN(actionTime) AS recent_date,
historyObjectID
FROM tblHistory
GROUP BY historyObjectID) AS t2
ON t2.historyObjectID = tblHistoryObject.historyObjectID
AND tblHistory.actionTime = t2.recent_date
WHERE sysAddress < 4
ORDER BY actionTime ASC

Answer 1

WITH
all_action_times AS
(
SELECT
tblHistoryObject.info,
tblHistory.actionTime,
tblHistoryUser.userID,
tblHistoryUser.firstName,
tblHistoryUser.surname,
tblHistory.eventID,
tblHistoryObject.objectID,
tblHistorySystem.sysAddress,
ROW_NUMBER() OVER (PARTITION BY tblHistoryObject.historyObjectID
ORDER BY tblHistory.actionTime
)
AS historyObjectID_SeqByActionTime
FROM
tblHistoryObject
INNER JOIN
tblHistory
ON tblHistory.historyObjectID = tblHistoryObject.historyObjectID
INNER JOIN
tblHistorySystem
ON tblHistory.historySystemID = tblHistorySystem.historySystemID
INNER JOIN
tblHistoryUser
ON tblHistory.historyUserID = tblHistoryUser.historyUserID
WHERE
tblHistorySystem.sysAddress < 4
)
SELECT
*
FROM
all_action_times
WHERE
historyObjectID_SeqByActionTime = 1
ORDER BY
actionTime ASC
This does exactly what your original query did, without trying to filter by action_time.
Then it appends a new column, using ROW_NUMBER() to generate sequences from 1 for each individual tblHistoryObject.historyObjectID. Then it takes only the rows where this sequence value is 1 (the first row per historyObjectID, when sorted in action_time order).