Pattern matching on strings from a table in SQL - sql

Just wanted to know if it was possible to do a pattern matching on a set of data from a table.
Like:
select * from Table where Column like any(select Pattern from PatternTable)
Note that the Pattern is always a substring of Column. Hence the use of like. Is it even possible to do this at a database level without the use of stored procedures?
If it helps, my RDBMS is MS SQL-Server
Edit:
Alright, I have a table containing a set of data like
PatternTable
____________
test1
test2
test3
test4
Now, a table Table has the following data:
Table
______
SomeDatatest4SomeData
SomeDataSomeData
Now, can I use a query as mentioned above to find a match: For the above query, this should return SomeDatatest4SomeData

You can do this using exists:
select *
from Table t
where exists (select 1
from PatternTable pt
where t.Column like pt.Pattern
);

SELECT t.*
FROM [Table] t
INNER JOIN PatternTable p ON t.[Column] LIKE '%' + p.Pattern + '%'

Related

select TableData where ColumnData start with list of strings

Following is the query to select column data from table, where column data starts with a OR b OR c. But the answer i am looking for is to Select data which starts with List of Strings.
SELECT * FROM Table WHERE Name LIKE '[abc]%'
But i want something like
SELECT * FROM Table WHERE Name LIKE '[ab,ac,ad,ae]%'
Can anybody suggest what is the best way of selecting column data which starts with list of String, I don't want to use OR operator, List of strings specifically.
The most general solution you would have to use is this:
SELECT *
FROM Table
WHERE Name LIKE 'ab%' OR Name LIKE 'ac%' OR Name LIKE 'ad%' OR Name LIKE 'ae%';
However, certain databases offer some regex support which you might be able to use. For example, in SQL Server you could write:
SELECT *
FROM Table
WHERE NAME LIKE 'a[bcde]%';
MySQL has a REGEXP operator which supports regex LIKE operations, and you could write:
SELECT *
FROM Table
WHERE NAME REGEXP '^a[bcde]';
Oracle and Postgres also have regex like support.
To add to Tim's answer, another approach could be to join your table with a sub-query of those values:
SELECT *
FROM mytable t
JOIN (SELECT 'ab' AS value
UNION ALL
SELECT 'ac'
UNION ALL
SELECT 'ad'
UNION ALL
SELECT 'ae') v ON t.vame LIKE v.value || '%'

When using SQL (Teradata) to fuzzy search multiple words, in the result, how can you list which word is matched?

I want to use like to query some records like:
select table1.survey_txt where table1.survey_txt like any (
'%aaaa%',
'%bbbb%',
'%cccc%',
'%dddd%',
'%eeee%',
'%[^a-z0-9]ffff[^a-z0-9]%'
)
The result will be like:
survey_txt
heheaaaahehe
kekeaaaakeke
uueabbbbk
jioewccccfjo
esjoffffownr
So how can I make the result like:
survey_txt..........matched_word
heheaaaahehe........aaaa
kekeaaaakeke.........aaaa
uueabbbbk...............bbbb
jioewccccfjo..............cccc
esjoffffownr..................ffff
This is a table but I don't know how to make a table here so I just used "....." to make it look like table.
Use REGEXP_SUBSTR instead of LIKE:
SELECT survey_txt,
RegExp_Substr(survey_txt, '(aaaa|bbbb|cccc|dddd|eeee|[^a-z0-9]ffff[^a-z0-9])') AS matched_word
FROM surveys
WHERE matched_word IS NOT NULL
Try building a table with the search words and like strings, then inner joining. Since you are using Teradata something like this example should work:
CREATE VOLATILE TABLE searchwordslist
(searchword VARCHAR(32)
, likestring VARCHAR(32))
ON COMMIT PRESERVE ROWS
;
INSERT INTO searchwordslist VALUES('aaaa', '%aaaa%');
INSERT INTO searchwordslist VALUES('bbbb', '%bbbb%');
--and so on for all the words
So now our searchwordlist table looks like:
searchword likestring
bbbb %bbbb%
aaaa %aaaa%
Then your query is:
SELECT a.survey_txt
, b.searchword
FROM table1 a
INNER JOIN searchwordslist b
ON a.survey_txt LIKE b.likestring
;
Giving your desired result:
survey_txt searchword
heheaaaahehehe aaaa
kekebbbbkeke bbbb

sql searching multiple words in a string

What is the most efficient and elegant SQL query looking for a string containing the words "David", "Moses" and "Robi". Assume the table is named T and the column C.
Select * from table where
columnname like'%David%' and
columnname like '%Moses%' and columnname like'%Robi%'
In SQL Server 2005+ with Full-Text indexing switched on, I'd do the following:
SELECT *
FROM T
WHERE CONTAINS(C, '"David" OR "Robi" OR "Moses"');
If you wanted your search to bring back results where the result is prefixed with David, Robi or Moses you could do:
SELECT *
FROM T
WHERE CONTAINS(C, '"David*" OR "Robi*" OR "Moses*"');
Here is what I uses to search for multiple words in multiple columns - SQL server
Hope my answer help someone :) Thanks
declare #searchTrm varchar(MAX)='one two three ddd 20 30 comment';
--select value from STRING_SPLIT(#searchTrm, ' ') where trim(value)<>''
select * from Bols
WHERE EXISTS (SELECT value
FROM STRING_SPLIT(#searchTrm, ' ')
WHERE
trim(value)<>''
and(
BolNumber like '%'+ value+'%'
or UserComment like '%'+ value+'%'
or RequesterId like '%'+ value+'%' )
)
If you care about the sequence of the terms, you may consider using a syntax like
select * from T where C like'%David%Moses%Robi%'
Oracle SQL :
select *
from MY_TABLE
where REGEXP_LIKE (company , 'Microsodt industry | goglge auto car | oracles database')
company - is the database column name.
results - this SQL will show you if company column rows contain one of those companies (OR phrase)
please note that : no wild characters are needed, it's built in.
more info at : http://www.techonthenet.com/oracle/regexp_like.php
if you put all the searched words in a temporaray table say #tmp and column col1, then you could try this:
Select * from T where C like (Select '%'+col1+'%' from #temp);
Maybe EXISTS can help.
and exists (select 1 from #DocumentNames where pcd.Name like DocName+'%' or CD.DocumentName like DocName+'%')
Oracle SQL:
There is the "IN" Operator in Oracle SQL which can be used for that:
select
namet.customerfirstname, addrt.city, addrt.postalcode
from schemax.nametable namet
join schemax.addresstable addrt on addrt.adtid = namet.natadtid
where namet.customerfirstname in ('David', 'Moses', 'Robi');

Using LIKE in an Oracle IN clause

I know I can write a query that will return all rows that contain any number of values in a given column, like so:
Select * from tbl where my_col in (val1, val2, val3,... valn)
but if val1, for example, can appear anywhere in my_col, which has datatype varchar(300), I might instead write:
select * from tbl where my_col LIKE '%val1%'
Is there a way of combing these two techniques. I need to search for some 30 possible values that may appear anywhere in the free-form text of the column.
Combining these two statements in the following ways does not seem to work:
select * from tbl where my_col LIKE ('%val1%', '%val2%', 'val3%',....)
select * from tbl where my_col in ('%val1%', '%val2%', 'val3%',....)
What would be useful here would be a LIKE ANY predicate as is available in PostgreSQL
SELECT *
FROM tbl
WHERE my_col LIKE ANY (ARRAY['%val1%', '%val2%', '%val3%', ...])
Unfortunately, that syntax is not available in Oracle. You can expand the quantified comparison predicate using OR, however:
SELECT *
FROM tbl
WHERE my_col LIKE '%val1%' OR my_col LIKE '%val2%' OR my_col LIKE '%val3%', ...
Or alternatively, create a semi join using an EXISTS predicate and an auxiliary array data structure (see this question for details):
SELECT *
FROM tbl t
WHERE EXISTS (
SELECT 1
-- Alternatively, store those values in a temp table:
FROM TABLE (sys.ora_mining_varchar2_nt('%val1%', '%val2%', '%val3%'/*, ...*/))
WHERE t.my_col LIKE column_value
)
For true full-text search, you might want to look at Oracle Text: http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/database/enterprise-edition/index-098492.html
A REGEXP_LIKE will do a case-insensitive regexp search.
select * from Users where Regexp_Like (User_Name, 'karl|anders|leif','i')
This will be executed as a full table scan - just as the LIKE or solution, so the performance will be really bad if the table is not small. If it's not used often at all, it might be ok.
If you need some kind of performance, you will need Oracle Text (or some external indexer).
To get substring indexing with Oracle Text you will need a CONTEXT index. It's a bit involved as it's made for indexing large documents and text using a lot of smarts. If you have particular needs, such as substring searches in numbers and all words (including "the" "an" "a", spaces, etc) , you need to create custom lexers to remove some of the smart stuff...
If you insert a lot of data, Oracle Text will not make things faster, especially if you need the index to be updated within the transactions and not periodically.
No, you cannot do this. The values in the IN clause must be exact matches. You could modify the select thusly:
SELECT *
FROM tbl
WHERE my_col LIKE %val1%
OR my_col LIKE %val2%
OR my_col LIKE %val3%
...
If the val1, val2, val3... are similar enough, you might be able to use regular expressions in the REGEXP_LIKE operator.
Yes, you can use this query (Instead of 'Specialist' and 'Developer', type any strings you want separated by comma and change employees table with your table)
SELECT * FROM employees em
WHERE EXISTS (select 1 from table(sys.dbms_debug_vc2coll('Specialist', 'Developer')) mt
where em.job like ('%' || mt.column_value || '%'));
Why my query is better than the accepted answer: You don't need a CREATE TABLE permission to run it. This can be executed with just SELECT permissions.
In Oracle you can use regexp_like as follows:
select *
from table_name
where regexp_like (name, '^(value-1|value-2|value-3....)');
The caret (^) operator to indicate a beginning-of-line character &
The pipe (|) operator to indicate OR operation.
This one is pretty fast :
select * from listofvalue l
inner join tbl on tbl.mycol like '%' || l.value || '%'
Just to add on #Lukas Eder answer.
An improvement to avoid creating tables and inserting values
(we could use select from dual and unpivot to achieve the same result "on the fly"):
with all_likes as
(select * from
(select '%val1%' like_1, '%val2%' like_2, '%val3%' like_3, '%val4%' as like_4, '%val5%' as like_5 from dual)
unpivot (
united_columns for subquery_column in ("LIKE_1", "LIKE_2", "LIKE_3", "LIKE_4", "LIKE_5"))
)
select * from tbl
where exists (select 1 from all_likes where tbl.my_col like all_likes.united_columns)
I prefer this
WHERE CASE WHEN my_col LIKE '%val1%' THEN 1
WHEN my_col LIKE '%val2%' THEN 1
WHEN my_col LIKE '%val3%' THEN 1
ELSE 0
END = 1
I'm not saying it's optimal but it works and it's easily understood. Most of my queries are adhoc used once so performance is generally not an issue for me.
select * from tbl
where exists (select 1 from all_likes where all_likes.value = substr(tbl.my_col,0, length(tbl.my_col)))
You can put your values in ODCIVARCHAR2LIST and then join it as a regular table.
select tabl1.* FROM tabl1 LEFT JOIN
(select column_value txt from table(sys.ODCIVARCHAR2LIST
('%val1%','%val2%','%val3%')
)) Vals ON tabl1.column LIKE Vals.txt WHERE Vals.txt IS NOT NULL
You don't need a collection type as mentioned in https://stackoverflow.com/a/6074261/802058. Just use an subquery:
SELECT *
FROM tbl t
WHERE EXISTS (
SELECT 1
FROM (
SELECT 'val1%' AS val FROM dual
UNION ALL
SELECT 'val2%' AS val FROM dual
-- ...
-- or simply use an subquery here
)
WHERE t.my_col LIKE val
)

Is there any way to combine IN with LIKE in an SQL statement?

I am trying to find a way, if possible, to use IN and LIKE together. What I want to accomplish is putting a subquery that pulls up a list of data into an IN statement. The problem is the list of data contains wildcards. Is there any way to do this?
Just something I was curious on.
Example of data in the 2 tables
Parent table
ID Office_Code Employee_Name
1 GG234 Tom
2 GG654 Bill
3 PQ123 Chris
Second table
ID Code_Wildcard
1 GG%
2 PQ%
Clarifying note (via third-party)
Since I'm seeing several responses which don't seems to address what Ziltoid asks, I thought I try clarifying what I think he means.
In SQL, "WHERE col IN (1,2,3)" is roughly the equivalent of "WHERE col = 1 OR col = 2 OR col = 3".
He's looking for something which I'll pseudo-code as
WHERE col IN_LIKE ('A%', 'TH%E', '%C')
which would be roughly the equivalent of
WHERE col LIKE 'A%' OR col LIKE 'TH%E' OR col LIKE '%C'
The Regex answers seem to come closest; the rest seem way off the mark.
I'm not sure which database you're using, but with Oracle you could accomplish something equivalent by aliasing your subquery in the FROM clause rather than using it in an IN clause. Using your example:
select p.*
from
(select code_wildcard
from second
where id = 1) s
join parent p
on p.office_code like s.code_wildcard
In MySQL, use REGEXP:
WHERE field1 REGEXP('(value1)|(value2)|(value3)')
Same in Oracle:
WHERE REGEXP_LIKE(field1, '(value1)|(value2)|(value3)')
Do you mean somethign like:
select * FROM table where column IN (
SELECT column from table where column like '%%'
)
Really this should be written like:
SELECT * FROM table where column like '%%'
Using a sub select query is really beneficial when you have to pull records based on a set of logic that you won't want in the main query.
something like:
SELECT * FROM TableA WHERE TableA_IdColumn IN
(
SELECT TableA_IdColumn FROM TableB WHERE TableA_IDColumn like '%%'
)
update to question:
You can't combine an IN statement with a like statement:
You'll have to do three different like statements to search on the various wildcards.
You could use a LIKE statement to obtain a list of IDs and then use that in the IN statement.
But you can't directly combine IN and LIKE.
Perhaps something like this?
SELECT DISTINCT
my_column
FROM
My_Table T
INNER JOIN My_List_Of_Value V ON
T.my_column LIKE '%' + V.search_value + '%'
In this example I've used a table with the values for simplicity, but you could easily change that to a subquery. If you have a large list (like tens of thousands) then performance might be rough.
select *
from parent
where exists( select *
from second
where office_code like trim( code_wildcard ) );
Trim code_wildcard just in case it has trailing blanks.
You could do the Like part in a subquery perhaps?
Select * From TableA Where X in (Select A from TableB where B Like '%123%')
tsql has the contains statement for a full-text-search enabled table.
CONTAINS(Description, '"sea*" OR "bread*"')
If I'm reading the question correctly, we want all Parent rows that have an Office_code that matches any Code_Wildcard in the "Second" table.
In Oracle, at least, this query achieves that:
SELECT *
FROM parent, second
WHERE office_code LIKE code_wildcard;
Am I missing something?