SQL / Access - Left Join question, where do the values come from? - sql

Question

I have a cross tab query that looks like this:
State Building 1 2 3 4 5
NY
SC
FL
The problem I am having is that I want all of the states to show up, regardless of whether or not there is data. So, I need a Left Join. Unfortunately, when I substitute the Inner Join for Left Join in the code, nothing changes. I am just trying to figure out where the problem is coming from, and I think it may be one of the following causes:
The query doesn't know where to pull
the values from (The states are all
listed in a look up but this may
not be where it's looking)
Left Joins don't work on cross tab
queries.
Could someone please tell me what I am doing wrong?
Here's the SQL:
TRANSFORM Nz(Count(Demographics.ID))+0 AS CountOfID
SELECT Demographics.State
FROM Research
INNER JOIN ( Demographics
INNER JOIN [Status]
ON Demographics.ID=[Status].ID
)
ON (Research.ID=Demographics.ID)
AND (Research.ID=[Status].ID)
WHERE ((([Status].Building_Status)='Complete'))
GROUP BY Demographics.State,
[Status].Building_Status
PIVOT Research.Site In (1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11)
Ideally, I could specify the row values in the In statement above (which is currently specifying column values 1-10), but I don't think this can be done.

Answer 1

I didn't completely get your example, but from your comment "I want all of the states to show up, regardless of whether or not there is data", I think you want an "OUTER" join. Outer joins do just that -- they include data regardless of whether or not there is a "match". Inner joins (the default) include data only if there is a match.
Hope this helps,
John

Answer 2

You should change it this way:
TRANSFORM Nz(Count(Demographics.ID))+0 AS CountOfID
SELECT Demographics.State
FROM Demographics
LEFT JOIN ( Research
LEFT JOIN [Status]
ON Demographics.ID=[Status].ID
)
ON (Research.ID=Demographics.ID)
AND (Research.ID=[Status].ID)
WHERE ((([Status].Building_Status)='Complete'))
GROUP BY Demographics.State,
[Status].Building_Status
PIVOT Research.Site In (1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11)

Answer 3

If your problem is that there may be 0 rows in table Demographics with State = 'NY' (for example) but you want to see state 'NY' in the results anyway, then you need another table e.g. States that has all the states in it, and make this your driving table:
SELECT States.State
FROM States
LEFT OUTER JOIN Demographics ON Demographics.state = States.state
...

Answer 4

you can use a two steps solution (it is more readable)
first enclose your actual (and working) sql statment as a view
create view step1 as
TRANSFORM ....
SELECT ...
FROM ...
PIVOT ...
and then create a select like:
(you will need a state table like #Tony Andrews says)
select * -- or whatever
from state
left join step1 on state.id = step1.state
and that's all