After looking at example after example of both inner joins and subqueries as fields, I'm apparently not getting some aspect, and I would appreciate help please. I am trying to write one query that must, alas, run in MS Access 2007 to talk to an Oracle database. I have to get values from several different places for various bits of data. One of those bits of data is GROUP_CODE (e.g., faculty, staff, student, alum, etc.). Getting that is non-trivial. I am trying to use two inner joins to get the specific value. The value of borrower category must be the value for my main row in the outer query. Here is what this looks like:
Patron table Patron_Barcode table Patron_Group table
Patron_id Barcode Patron_Group_iD
Barcode Patron_Group_id PATRON_Group_Code
I want to get the PATRON_GROUP.PATRON_GROUP_CODE. This is only one of 35 fields I need to get in my query. (Yes, that's terrible, but wearing my librarian hat, i can't write the Java program I'd like to write to do this in a snap.)
So as a test, I wrote this query:
select PATRON.PATRON_ID As thePatron,
(SELECT PATRON_GROUP.PATRON_GROUP_CODE As borrowwerCategory
FROM (PATRON_GROUP
INNER JOIN PATRON_BARCODE ON PATRON_GROUP.PATRON_GROUP_ID = PATRON_BARCODE.PATRON_GROUP_ID
) INNER JOIN PATRON ON PATRON_BARCODE.PATRON_ID = thePatron.PATRON_ID
));
I don't know what I'm doing wrong, but this doesn't work. I've written a fair amount of SQL in my time, but never anything quite like this. What am I doing wrong?
PATRON.BARCODE is the foreign key for the BARCODE table.
PATRON_BARCODE.PATRON_GROUP_ID is the foreign key for the PATRON_GROUP table. PATRON_GROUP_CODE in PATRON_GROUP is he column value that I need.
PATRON.BARCODE -> BARCODE.PATRON_GROUP_ID -> PATRON_GROUP.PATRON_GROUP_CODR>
The main table, PATRON, will have lots of other things, like inner and outer join to PATRON_ADDRESS, etc., and I can't just do an inner join directly to what I want in my main query. This has to happen in a subquery as a field. Thanks.
Ken
Related
What is the best way to join humongous table two or more times?
For example In this fictitious example, we have students table, student record who has TUTOR_ID column is a reference to the same table to another student.
What I am trying to accomplish is a report that will find all tutors that share the same students.
So I have built a query like this:
First time to find parent child relationships
Second time to find all tutors that share the same students
I tried to use "with clause" but query performance is really bad
Is there a better approach to take?
WITH STUDENT_TMP_TABLE AS (
select
TUTORS.STUDENT_IDENTIFIER as TUTOR_STUDENT_IDENTIFIER,
CADETS.STUDENT_IDENTIFIER as CADET_STUDENT_IDENTIFIER
FROM V_STUDENTS_RELATIONS TUTORS
INNER JOIN V_STUDENT_RELATIONS CADETS ON CADETS.TUTOR_ID = TUTORS.STUDENT_IDENTIFIER AND TUTORS.TUTOR_ID IS NULL
WHERE -- ? conditions truncated
)
SELECT
*
FROM STUDENT_TMP_TABLE STUD_TMP1
JOIN STUDENT_TMP_TABLE STUD_TMP2
ON STUD_TMP1.TUTOR_STUDENT_IDENTIFIER <> STUD_TMP2.TUTOR_STUDENT_IDENTIFIER
AND STUD_TMP1.CADET_STUDENT_IDENTIFIER = STUD_TMP2.CADET_STUDENT_IDENTIFIER;
I'm pretty sure this works universally across various SQL implementations. Suppose I have many-to-many relationship between 2 tables:
Customer: id, name
has many:
Order: id, description, total_price
and this relationship is in a junction table:
Customer_Order: order_date, customer_id, order_id
Now I want to write SQL query to join all of these together, mentioning the customer's name, the order's description and total price and the order date:
SELECT name, description, total_price FROM Customer
JOIN Customer_Order ON Customer_Order.customer_id = Customer.id
JOIN Order = Order.id = Customer_Order.order_id
This is all well and good. This query will also work if we change the order so it's FROM Customer_Order JOIN Customer or put the Order table first. Why is this the case? Somewhere I've read that JOIN works like an arithmetic operator (+, * etc.) taking 2 operands and you can chain operator together so you can have: 2+3+5, for example. Following this logic, first we have to calculate 2+3 and then take that result and add 5 to it. Is it the same with JOINs?
Is it that behind the hood, the first JOIN must first be completed in order for the second JOIN to take place? So basically, the first JOIN will create a table out of the 2 operands left and right of it. Then, the second JOIN will take that resulting table as its left operand and perform the usual joining. Basically, I want to understand how multiple JOINs work behind the hood.
In many ways I think ORMs are the bane of modern programming. Unleashing a barrage of underprepared coders. Oh well diatribe out of the way, You're asking a question about set theory. THere are potentially other options that center on relational algebra but SQL is fundamentally set theory based. here are a couple of links to get you started
Using set theory to understand SQL
A visual explanation of SQL
I'm struggling with how to structure an SQL statement involving multiple tables and was wondering if anyone could help point me in the right direction.
I assume multiple JOINS will be needed, but I'm not entirely sure of how exactly they work.
Basically the system I need to create will allow teaching staff to view an HTML table of the assignment submissions with relevant details. Below is the ER diagram representing the database.
Each row in the HTML table will relate to a particular assignment submission, and will include the following information - Forename of the student, Surname of the student, Module the assignment relates to, Assignment Name, a link to the feedback PDF document, the time the feedback was collected and the number of times the feedback was commented on.
So basically I need an SQL statement that would return the information mentioned above.
I probably haven't explained this too well, but hopefully the diagram can help fill in the parts I have missed.
SELECT
Forename,
Surname,
ModuleName,
sa.StudentID as StudentID,
sa.AssignmentID as AssignmentID,
FeedbackURL,
FirstViewed,
LastViewed,
ViewCount,
a.Name AS AssignmentName,
FROM assignment AS a
INNER JOIN student_assignment AS sa ON a.AssignmentID=sa.AssignmentID
INNER JOIN student AS s ON sa.StudentID=s.StudentID
INNER JOIN course AS c ON s.CourseID=c.CourseID
INNER JOIN course_module AS cm ON c.CourseID=cm.CourseID
INNER JOIN module AS m ON cm.CRN=m.CRN
Say you have these tables:
PHARMACY(**___id_pharmacy___**, name, addr, tel)
PHARMACIST(**___Insurance_number___**, name, surname, qualification, **id_pharmacy**)
SELLS(**___id_pharmacy___**, **___name___**, price)
DRUG(**___Name___**, chem_formula, **id_druggistshop**)
DRUGGISTSHOP(**___id_druggistshop___**, name, address)
I think this will be more specific.
So, I'm trying to construct an SQL statement, in which I will fetch the data from id_pharmacy and name FROM PHARMACY, the insurance_number, name, and surname columns from PHARMACIST, for all the pharmacies that sell the drug called Kronol.
And that's basically it. I know I'm missing the relationships in the code I wrote previously.
Note: Those column names which have underscores left and right to them are underlined(Primary keys).
The query you've written won't work in any DBMS that I know of.
You'll most likely want to use some combination of JOINs.
Since the exact schema isn't provided, consider this pseudo code, but hopefully it will get you on the right track.
SELECT PH.Ph_Number, PH.Name, PHCL.Ins_Number, PHCL.Name, PHCL.Surname
FROM PH
INNER JOIN PHCL ON PHCL.PH_Number = PH.Ph_Number
INNER JOIN MLIST ON MLIST.PH_Number = PH.PH_Number
WHERE MLIST.Name = "Andy"
I've obviously assumed some relationships between tables that may or may not exist, but hopefully this will be pretty close. The UNION operator won't work because you're selecting different columns and a different number of columns from the various tables. This is the wrong approach all together for what you're trying to do. It's also worth mentioning that a LEFT JOIN may or may not be a better option for you, depending on the exact requirements you're trying to meet.
Ok, try this query:
SELECT A.id_pharmacy, A.name AS PharmacyName, B.Insurance_number,
B.name AS PharmacistName, B.surname AS PharmacistSurname
FROM PHARMACY A
LEFT JOIN PHARMACIST B
ON A.id_pharmacy = B.id_pharmacy
WHERE A.id_pharmacy IN (SELECT id_pharmacy FROM SELLS WHERE name = 'Kronol')
Although I'm using Rails, this question is more about database design. I have several entities in my database, with the schema a bit like this: http://fishwebby.posterous.com/40423840
If I want to get a list of people and order it by surname, that's no problem. However, if I want to get a list of people, ordered by surname, enrolled in a particular group, I have to use an SQL statement that includes several joins across four tables, something like this:
SELECT group_enrolment.*, person.*
FROM person INNER JOIN member ON person.id = member.person_id
INNER JOIN enrolment ON member.id = enrolment.member_id
INNER JOIN group_enrolment ON enrolment.id = group_enrolment.enrolment_id
WHERE group_enrolment.id = 123
ORDER BY person.surname;
Although this works, it strikes me as a bit inefficient, and potentially as my schema grows, these queries could get more and more complicated.
Another option could be to join the person table to all the other tables in the query by including person_id in the other tables, then it would just be one single join, for example
SELECT group_enrolment.*, person.*
FROM person INNER JOIN group_enrolment ON group_enrolment.person_id
WHERE group_enrolment.id = 123
ORDER BY person.surname;
But this would mean that in my schema, the person table is joined to a lot of other tables. Aside from a complicated schema diagram, does anyone see any disadvantages to this?
I'd be very grateful for any comments on this - whether what I'm doing now (the many table join) or the second solution or another one that hasn't occurred to me is the best way to go.
Many thanks in advance
Well, joins are what databases do. Having said that, you may consider propagating natural keys in your model, which would then allow you to skip over some tables in joins. Take a look at this example.
EDIT
I'm not saying that this will match your model (problem), but just for fun try similar queries on something like this: