What is the difference between Natural Join and Inner Join? - sql

The most common type of join is: SQL INNER JOIN (simple join). An SQL INNER JOIN return all rows from multiple tables where the join condition is met.
This what W3Schools says about Inner Join. I was reading database management by Korth and one chapter in it was on relational algebra. In that, there was a Natural Join which, in my limited understanding, is the same as Inner Join.
Can someone please tell me if there is a difference between the two or they are different names of referring to the same thing.

A Natural Join is a form of Inner Join where the join is implicitly across all columns of matching names on both sides of the join.
E.g.
Table A
abc int
def int
ghi varchar(20)
Table B
abc int
def int
jkl int
A natural join between tables A and B would be the same as an inner join on columns abc and def.
Inner joins that could not be replaced with a Natural Join:
TableA
inner join
TableB
on
TableA.Column1 = TableB.Column2 --Column names don't match
or
TableA
inner join
TableB
on
TableA.Column1 >= TableB.Column1 --Not equality

Natural Join and Inner Join are not same commands.
Natural Join joins the tables on the basis of equality of values of common columns without typing the condition in query......while Inner join joins tables on the basis of condition specified in query which can be "=" or ">=" or "<="....
Natural Join :
tab1 NATURAL JOIN tab2;
this will automatically check for equality of values of common columns
Iner Join:
tab1 INNER JOIN tab2 ON (condition);
Moreover, NATURAL JOIN gives common column once in the output of query while INNER JOIN gives common columns of both tables

Related

MSAccess Join SQL query - Join expression not supported

Joining two tables together within vb.net but getting the following error:
"Join expression not supported"
SELECT * FROM (General_Counters_Table AS a INNER JOIN Timers_Table AS b ON b.ulProductionTime = a.Product_ID) INNER JOIN Timers_Table AS b ON b.ulSetupTime = a.Product_ID
Product_ID exists in both General_Counters_Table and Timers_Table
The parser got confused when you join for a second time the Timers_Table because you use the same alias already used for the first join.
However it seems that you just want to produce a result with all fields from the A table and some fields from the B table. If this is the case you need
to join the two tables with the common field (Product_ID) and add, to the SELECT statement, the fields required from the A and B table
SELECT a.*, b.ulProductionTime, b.ulSetupTime, .......
FROM General_Counters_Table AS a
INNER JOIN Timers_Table AS b ON b.Product_ID = a.Product_ID

In SQL outer joins, what part of the query puts a table on the "left" or "right"?

I am reading books on outer joins and they reference the "position" of a table in determining whether all of its records will be displayed.
I am confused about how exactly the position (left/right) is determined?
If we consider the standard SQL join
Select * FROM
Table_A left outer join Table_B
on Table_A.ID = Table_B.Product_ID
What part of this query is determining the position of each Table?
Is it the join part:
Table_A left outer join Table_B
Where Table_A is on the "left" because it is left of the join word?
Or is it the "=" part:
on Table_A.ID = Table_B.Product_ID
Where Table_A is on the "left" because it is left of the "=" sign?
This makes the difference, so Table name on left side of LEFT OUTER JOIN is leading one
Table_A left outer join Table_B
As per the MSDN, left outer joins include all of the records from the first (left) of two tables, even if there are no matching values for records in the second (right) table.
It's the relative position of the table name in the SQL.
table1 left join table2
means table 1 is the principle table, where as in a right join the table2 would be the principle table.

Joining multiple tables in SQL

Can sombody Explains me about joins?
Inner join selects common data based on where condition.
Left outer join selects all data from left irrespective of common but takes common data from right table and vice versa for Right outer.
I know the basics but question stays when it comes to join for than 5, 8, 10 tables.
Suppose I have 10 tables to join. If I have inner join with the first 5 tables and now try to apply a left join with the 6th table, now how the query will work?
I mean to say now the result set of first 5 tables will be taken as left table and the 6th one will be considerded as Right table? Or only Fifth table will be considered as left and 6th as right? Please help me regarding this.
When joining multiple tables the output of each join logically forms a virtual table that goes into the next join.
So in the example in your question the composite result of joining the first 5 tables would be treated as the left hand table.
See Itzik Ben-Gan's Logical Query Processing Poster for more about this.
The virtual tables involved in the joins can be controlled by positioning the ON clause. For example
SELECT *
FROM T1
INNER JOIN T2
ON T2.C = T1.C
INNER JOIN T3
LEFT JOIN T4
ON T4.C = T3.C
ON T3.C = T2.C
is equivalent to (T1 Inner Join T2) Inner Join (T3 Left Join T4)
It's helpful to think of JOIN's in sequence, so the former is correct.
SELECT *
FROM a
INNER JOIN b ON b.a = a.id
INNER JOIN c ON c.b = b.id
LEFT JOIN d ON d.c = c.id
LEFT JOIN e ON e.d = d.id
Would be all the fields from a and b and c where all the ON criteria match, plus the values from d where its criteria match plus all the contents of e where all its criteria match.
I know RIGHT JOIN is perfectly acceptable, but I've found in my experience that it's unnecessary - I almost always just join things from left to right.
> Simple INNER JOIN VIEW code...
CREATE VIEW room_view
AS SELECT a.*,b.*
FROM j4_booking a INNER JOIN j4_scheduling b
on a.room_id = b.room_id;
You can apply join like this..
select a.*,b.*,c.*,d.*,e.*
from [DatabaseName].[Table_a] a
INNER JOIN [DatabaseName].[Table_b] b ON a.id = b.id
INNER JOIN [DatabaseName].[Table_c] c ON b.id=c.id
INNER JOIN [DatabaseName].[Table_d] d on c.id=d.id
INNER JOIN [DatabaseName].[Table_e] e on d.id=e.id where a.con=5 and
b.con=6
Here, at place of a.* and in where condition, you can show column(filed) which you like and according condition in where condition. You can insert more table and database as per your choice. But mind that you need to mention database name and alias if you work in different database.
Just tried the following from the Example DataBase given in W3School. Worked Fine for me.
SELECT Orders.OrderID, Customers.CustomerName, Orders.OrderDate, Products.ProductName, Products.ProductID
FROM Orders
INNER JOIN Products
INNER JOIN Customers
ON Orders.CustomerID=Customers.CustomerID;
Join used to combine rows from two or more tables, based on a related column between them. This example from Adventure works:
SELECT a.[EmailAddress],b.[FirstName],b.[LastName],c.[PhoneNumber],d.[Name]
FROM [Person].[EmailAddress] a
INNER JOIN [Person].[Person] b
ON a.BusinessEntityID = b.BusinessEntityID
INNER JOIN [Person].[PersonPhone] c
ON b.BusinessEntityID = c.BusinessEntityID
INNER JOIN [Person].[PhoneNumberType] d
ON c.phoneNumberTypeID = d.phoneNumberTypeID

PL/SQL Using multiple left join

SELECT * FROM Table A LEFT JOIN TABLE B LEFT JOIN TABLE C
From the snippet above, TABLE C will left join into (TABLE B) or (data from TABLE A LEFT JOIN TABLE B) or (TABLE A)?
TABLE C will left join into 1. (TABLE B) or 2. (data from TABLE A LEFT JOIN
TABLE B) or 3. (TABLE A)?
The second. But The join condition will help you to understand more.
You can write:
SELECT *
FROM Table A
LEFT JOIN TABLE B ON (A.id = B.id)
LEFT JOIN TABLE C ON (A.ID = C.ID)
But you are able to:
SELECT *
FROM Table A
LEFT JOIN TABLE B ON (A.id = B.id)
LEFT JOIN TABLE C ON (A.id = C.id and B.code = C.code)
So, you can join on every field from previous tables and you join on "the result" (though the engine may choose its way to get the result) of the previous joins.
Think at left join as non-commutative operation (A left join B is not the same as B left join A) So, the order is important and C will be left joined at the previous joined tables.
The Oracle documentation is quite specific about how the joins are processed:
To execute a join of three or more tables, Oracle first joins two of
the tables based on the join conditions comparing their columns and
then joins the result to another table based on join conditions
containing columns of the joined tables and the new table. Oracle
continues this process until all tables are joined into the result.
This is the logic approach to handling the joins and is consistent with the ANSI standard (in other words, all database engines process the joins in order).
However, when the query is actually executed, the optimizer may choose to run the joins in a different order. The result needs to be logically the same as processing the joins in the order given in the query.
Also, the join conditions may cause some unexpected conditions to arise. So if you have:
from A left outer join
B
on A.id = B.id left outer join
C
on B.id = C.id
Then, you might have the condition where A and C each have a row with a particular id, but B does not. With this formulation, you will not see the row in C because it is joining to NULL. So, be careful with join conditions on left outer join, particularly when joining to a table other than the first table in the chain.
You need to mentioned the column name properly in order to run the query. Let´s say if you are using:
SELECT *
FROM Table A
LEFT JOIN TABLE B ON (A.id = B.id)
LEFT JOIN TABLE C ON (A.id = C.id and B.code = C.code)
Then you may get the following error:
ORA-00933:SQL command not properly ended.
So to avoid it you can try:
SELECT A.id as "Id_from_A", B.code as "Code_from_B"
FROM Table A
LEFT JOIN TABLE B ON (A.id = B.id)
LEFT JOIN TABLE C ON (A.id = C.id and B.code = C.code)
Thanks

Is inner join the same as equi-join?

Can you tell me if inner join and equi-join are the same or not ?
An 'inner join' is not the same as an 'equi-join' in general terms.
'equi-join' means joining tables using the equality operator or equivalent. I would still call an outer join an 'equi-join' if it only uses equality (others may disagree).
'inner join' is opposed to 'outer join' and determines how to join two sets when there is no matching value.
Simply put: an equi-join is a possible type of inner-joins
For a more in-depth explanation:
An inner-join is a join that returns only rows from joined tables where a certain condition is met. This condition may be of equality, which means we would have an equi-join; if the condition is not that of equality - which may be a non-equality, greater than, lesser than, between, etc. - we have a nonequi-join, called more precisely theta-join.
If we do not want such conditions to be necessarily met, we can have
outer joins (all rows from all tables returned), left join (all rows
from left table returned, only matching for right table), right join
(all rows from right table returned, only matching for left table).
The answer is NO.
An equi-join is used to match two columns from two tables using explicit operator =:
Example:
select *
from table T1, table2 T2
where T1.column_name1 = T2.column_name2
An inner join is used to get the cross product between two tables, combining all records from both tables. To get the right result you can use a equi-join or one natural join (column names between tables must be the same)
Using equi-join (explicit and implicit)
select *
from table T1 INNER JOIN table2 T2
on T1.column_name = T2.column_name
select *
from table T1, table2 T2
where T1.column_name = T2.column_name
Or Using natural join
select *
from table T1 NATURAL JOIN table2 T2
The answer is No,here is the short and simple for readers.
Inner join can have equality (=) and other operators (like <,>,<>) in the join condition.
Equi join only have equality (=) operator in the join condition.
Equi join can be an Inner join,Left Outer join, Right Outer join
If there has to made out a difference then ,I think here it is .I tested it with DB2.
In 'equi join'.you have to select the comparing column of the table being joined , in inner join it is not compulsory you do that . Example :-
Select k.id,k.name FROM customer k
inner join dealer on(
k.id =dealer.id
)
here the resulted rows are only two columns rows
id name
But I think in equi join you have to select the columns of other table too
Select k.id,k.name,d.id FROM customer k,dealer d
where
k.id =d.id
and this will result in rows with three columns , there is no way you cannot have the unwanted compared column of dealer here(even if you don't want it) , the rows will look like
id(from customer) name(from Customer) id(from dealer)
May be this is not true for your question.But it might be one of the major difference.
The answer is YES, But as a resultset. So here is an example.
Consider three tables:
orders(ord_no, purch_amt, ord_date, customer_id, salesman_id)
customer(customer_id,cust_name, city, grade, salesman_id)
salesman(salesman_id, name, city, commission)
Now if I have a query like this:
Find the details of an order.
Using INNER JOIN:
SELECT * FROM orders a INNER JOIN customer b ON a.customer_id=b.customer_id
INNER JOIN salesman c ON a.salesman_id=c.salesman_id;
Using EQUI JOIN:
SELECT * FROM orders a, customer b,salesman c where
a.customer_id=b.customer_id and a.salesman_id=c.salesman_id;
Execute both queries. You will get the same output.
Coming to your question There is no difference in output of equijoin and inner join. But there might be a difference in inner executions of both the types.