SELECT¶

Name

SELECT -- retrieve rows from a table or view

Synopsis

SELECT [ optimizer_hint ] [ ALL | DISTINCT | UNIQUE ]
  * | expression [ AS output_name ] [, ...]
  FROM from_item [, ...]
  [ WHERE condition ]
  [ [ START WITH start_expression ]
      CONNECT BY { PRIOR parent_expr = child_expr |
        child_expr = PRIOR parent_expr }
    [ ORDER SIBLINGS BY expression [ ASC | DESC ] [, ...] ] ]
  [ GROUP BY { expression | ROLLUP ( expr_list ) |
      CUBE ( expr_list ) | GROUPING SETS ( expr_list ) } [, ...]
      [ LEVEL ] ]
  [ HAVING condition [, ...] ]
  [ { UNION [ ALL ] | INTERSECT | MINUS } select ]
  [ ORDER BY expression [ ASC | DESC ] [, ...] ]
  [ FOR UPDATE [WAIT n|NOWAIT|SKIP LOCKED]]

where from_item can be one of:

table_name[@dblink ] [ alias ]
( select ) alias
from_item [ NATURAL ] join_type from_item
  [ ON join_condition | USING ( join_column [, ...] ) ]

Description

SELECT retrieves rows from one or more tables. The general processing of SELECT is as follows:

All elements in the FROM list are computed. (Each element in the FROM list is a real or virtual table.) If more than one element is specified in the FROM list, they are cross-joined together. (See FROM clause, below.)

If the WHERE clause is specified, all rows that do not satisfy the condition are eliminated from the output. (See WHERE clause, below.)

If the GROUP BY clause is specified, the output is divided into groups of rows that match on one or more values. If the HAVING clause is present, it eliminates groups that do not satisfy the given condition. (See GROUP BY clause and HAVING clause below.)

Using the operators UNION, INTERSECT, and MINUS, the output of more than one SELECT statement can be combined to form a single result set. The UNION operator returns all rows that are in one or both of the result sets. The INTERSECT operator returns all rows that are strictly in both result sets. The MINUS operator returns the rows that are in the first result set but not in the second. In all three cases, duplicate rows are eliminated. In the case of the UNION operator, if ALL is specified then duplicates are not eliminated. (See UNION clause, INTERSECT clause, and MINUS clause below.)

The actual output rows are computed using the SELECT output expressions for each selected row. (See SELECT list below.)

The CONNECT BY clause is used to select data that has a hierarchical relationship. Such data has a parent-child relationship between rows. (See CONNECT BY clause.)

If the ORDER BY clause is specified, the returned rows are sorted in the specified order. If ORDER BY is not given, the rows are returned in whatever order the system finds fastest to produce. (See ORDER BY clause below.)

DISTINCT | UNIQUE eliminates duplicate rows from the result. ALL (the default) will return all candidate rows, including duplicates. (See DISTINCT | UNIQUE clause below.)

The FOR UPDATE clause causes the SELECT statement to lock the selected rows against concurrent updates. (See FOR UPDATE clause below.)

You must have SELECT privilege on a table to read its values. The use of FOR UPDATE requires UPDATE privilege as well.

Parameters

optimizer_hint

Comment-embedded hints to the optimizer for selection of an execution plan. See Functions and Operators of Database Compatibility for Oracle Developers Reference Guide for information about optimizer hints.

FROM Clause¶

The FROM clause specifies one or more source tables for a SELECT statement. The syntax is:

FROM source [, ...]

Where source can be one of following elements:

table_name[@dblink ]

The name (optionally schema-qualified) of an existing table or view. dblink is a database link name identifying a remote database. See the CREATE DATABASE LINK command for information on database links.

alias

A substitute name for the FROM item containing the alias. An alias is used for brevity or to eliminate ambiguity for self-joins (where the same table is scanned multiple times). When an alias is provided, it completely hides the actual name of the table or function; for example given FROM foo AS f, the remainder of the SELECT must refer to this FROM item as f not foo.

select

A sub-SELECT can appear in the FROM clause. This acts as though its output were created as a temporary table for the duration of this single SELECT command. Note that the sub-SELECT must be surrounded by parentheses, and an alias must be provided for it.

join_type

One of the following:

[ INNER ] JOIN

LEFT [ OUTER ] JOIN

RIGHT [ OUTER ] JOIN

FULL [ OUTER ] JOIN

CROSS JOIN

For the INNER and OUTER join types, a join condition must be specified, namely exactly one of NATURAL, ON join_condition, or USING (join_column [, ...] ). See below for the meaning. For CROSS JOIN, none of these clauses may appear.

A JOIN clause combines two FROM items. Use parentheses if necessary to determine the order of nesting. In the absence of parentheses, JOINs nest left-to-right. In any case JOIN binds more tightly than the commas separating FROM items.

CROSS JOIN and INNER JOIN produce a simple Cartesian product, the same result as you get from listing the two items at the top level of FROM, but restricted by the join condition (if any). CROSS JOIN is equivalent to INNER JOIN ON (TRUE), that is, no rows are removed by qualification. These join types are just a notational convenience, since they do nothing you couldn’t do with plain FROM and WHERE.

LEFT OUTER JOIN returns all rows in the qualified Cartesian product (i.e., all combined rows that pass its join condition), plus one copy of each row in the left-hand table for which there was no right-hand row that passed the join condition. This left-hand row is extended to the full width of the joined table by inserting null values for the right-hand columns. Note that only the JOIN clause’s own condition is considered while deciding which rows have matches. Outer conditions are applied afterwards.

Conversely, RIGHT OUTER JOIN returns all the joined rows, plus one row for each unmatched right-hand row (extended with nulls on the left). This is just a notational convenience, since you could convert it to a LEFT OUTER JOIN by switching the left and right inputs.

FULL OUTER JOIN returns all the joined rows, plus one row for each unmatched left-hand row (extended with nulls on the right), plus one row for each unmatched right-hand row (extended with nulls on the left).

ON join_condition

join_condition is an expression resulting in a value of type BOOLEAN (similar to a WHERE clause) that specifies which rows in a join are considered to match.

USING (join_column [, ...] )

A clause of the form USING (a, b, ... ) is shorthand for ON left_table.a = right_table.a AND left_table.b = right_table.b .... Also, USING implies that only one of each pair of equivalent columns will be included in the join output, not both.

NATURAL

NATURAL is shorthand for a USING list that mentions all columns in the two tables that have the same names.

If multiple sources are specified, the result is the Cartesian product (cross join) of all the sources. Usually qualification conditions are added to restrict the returned rows to a small subset of the Cartesian product.

Example

The following example selects all of the entries from the dept table:

SELECT * FROM dept;
deptno |  dname      |  loc
-------+-------------+-----------
    10 |  ACCOUNTING |  NEW YORK
    20 |  RESEARCH   |  DALLAS
    30 |  SALES      |  CHICAGO
    40 | OPERATIONS  |  BOSTON
 (4 rows)

WHERE Clause¶

The optional WHERE clause has the form:

WHERE condition

where condition is any expression that evaluates to a result of type BOOLEAN. Any row that does not satisfy this condition will be eliminated from the output. A row satisfies the condition if it returns TRUE when the actual row values are substituted for any variable references.

Example

The following example joins the contents of the emp and dept tables, WHERE the value of the deptno column in the emp table is equal to the value of the deptno column in the deptno table:

SELECT d.deptno, d.dname, e.empno, e.ename, e.mgr, e.hiredate
    FROM emp e, dept d
    WHERE d.deptno = e.deptno;

 deptno |   dname    | empno | ename  | mgr  |      hiredate
--------+------------+-------+--------+------+--------------------
| ACCOUNTING |  7934 | MILLER | 7782 | 23-JAN-82 00:00:00
| ACCOUNTING |  7782 | CLARK  | 7839 | 09-JUN-81 00:00:00
| ACCOUNTING |  7839 | KING   |      | 17-NOV-81 00:00:00
| RESEARCH   |  7788 | SCOTT  | 7566 | 19-APR-87 00:00:00
| RESEARCH   |  7566 | JONES  | 7839 | 02-APR-81 00:00:00
| RESEARCH   |  7369 | SMITH  | 7902 | 17-DEC-80 00:00:00
| RESEARCH   |  7876 | ADAMS  | 7788 | 23-MAY-87 00:00:00
| RESEARCH   |  7902 | FORD   | 7566 | 03-DEC-81 00:00:00
| SALES      |  7521 | WARD   | 7698 | 22-FEB-81 00:00:00
| SALES      |  7844 | TURNER | 7698 | 08-SEP-81 00:00:00
| SALES      |  7499 | ALLEN  | 7698 | 20-FEB-81 00:00:00
| SALES      |  7698 | BLAKE  | 7839 | 01-MAY-81 00:00:00
| SALES      |  7654 | MARTIN | 7698 | 28-SEP-81 00:00:00
| SALES      |  7900 | JAMES  | 7698 | 03-DEC-81 00:00:00
(14 rows)

GROUP BY Clause¶

The optional GROUP BY clause has the form:

GROUP BY { expression | ROLLUP ( expr_list ) |
  CUBE ( expr_list ) | GROUPING SETS ( expr_list ) } [, ...]

GROUP BY will condense into a single row all selected rows that share the same values for the grouped expressions. expression can be an input column name, or the name or ordinal number of an output column (SELECT list item), or an arbitrary expression formed from input-column values. In case of ambiguity, a GROUP BY name will be interpreted as an input-column name rather than an output column name.

ROLLUP, CUBE, and GROUPING SETS are extensions to the GROUP BY clause for supporting multidimensional analysis.

Aggregate functions, if any are used, are computed across all rows making up each group, producing a separate value for each group (whereas without GROUP BY, an aggregate produces a single value computed across all the selected rows). When GROUP BY is present, it is not valid for the SELECT list expressions to refer to ungrouped columns except within aggregate functions, since there would be more than one possible value to return for an ungrouped column.

Example

The following example computes the sum of the sal column in the emp table, grouping the results by department number:

SELECT deptno, SUM(sal) AS total
    FROM emp
    GROUP BY deptno;

 deptno |  total
--------+----------
     10 |  8750.00
     20 | 10875.00
     30 |  9400.00
(3 rows)

HAVING Clause¶

The optional HAVING clause has the form:

HAVING condition

where condition is the same as specified for the WHERE clause.

HAVING eliminates group rows that do not satisfy the specified condition. HAVING is different from WHERE; WHERE filters individual rows before the application of GROUP BY, while HAVING filters group rows created by GROUP BY. Each column referenced in condition must unambiguously reference a grouping column, unless the reference appears within an aggregate function.

Example

To sum the column, sal of all employees, group the results by department number and show those group totals that are less than 10000:

SELECT deptno, SUM(sal) AS total
    FROM emp
    GROUP BY deptno
    HAVING SUM(sal) < 10000;

 deptno |  total
--------+---------
     10 | 8750.00
     30 | 9400.00
(2 rows)

SELECT List¶

The SELECT list (between the key words SELECT and FROM) specifies expressions that form the output rows of the SELECT statement. The expressions can (and usually do) refer to columns computed in the FROM clause. Using the clause AS output_name, another name can be specified for an output column. This name is primarily used to label the column for display. It can also be used to refer to the column’s value in ORDER BY and GROUP BY clauses, but not in the WHERE or HAVING clauses; there you must write out the expression instead.

Instead of an expression, * can be written in the output list as a shorthand for all the columns of the selected rows.

Example

The SELECT list in the following example specifies that the result set should include the empno column, the ename column, the mgr column and the hiredate column:

SELECT empno, ename, mgr, hiredate FROM emp;

 empno | ename  | mgr  |      hiredate
-------+--------+------+--------------------
| MILLER | 7782 | 23-JAN-82 00:00:00
| CLARK  | 7839 | 09-JUN-81 00:00:00
| KING   |      | 17-NOV-81 00:00:00
| SCOTT  | 7566 | 19-APR-87 00:00:00
| JONES  | 7839 | 02-APR-81 00:00:00
| SMITH  | 7902 | 17-DEC-80 00:00:00
| ADAMS  | 7788 | 23-MAY-87 00:00:00
| FORD   | 7566 | 03-DEC-81 00:00:00
| WARD   | 7698 | 22-FEB-81 00:00:00
| TURNER | 7698 | 08-SEP-81 00:00:00
| ALLEN  | 7698 | 20-FEB-81 00:00:00
| BLAKE  | 7839 | 01-MAY-81 00:00:00
| MARTIN | 7698 | 28-SEP-81 00:00:00
| JAMES  | 7698 | 03-DEC-81 00:00:00
(14 rows)

UNION Clause¶

The UNION clause has the form:

select_statement UNION [ ALL ] select_statement

select_statement is any SELECT statement without an ORDER BY or FOR UPDATE clause. (ORDER BY can be attached to a sub-expression if it is enclosed in parentheses. Without parentheses, these clauses will be taken to apply to the result of the UNION, not to its right-hand input expression.)

The UNION operator computes the set union of the rows returned by the involved SELECT statements. A row is in the set union of two result sets if it appears in at least one of the result sets. The two SELECT statements that represent the direct operands of the UNION must produce the same number of columns, and corresponding columns must be of compatible data types.

The result of UNION does not contain any duplicate rows unless the ALL option is specified. ALL prevents elimination of duplicates.

Multiple UNION operators in the same SELECT statement are evaluated left to right, unless otherwise indicated by parentheses.

Currently, FOR UPDATE may not be specified either for a UNION result or for any input of a UNION.

INTERSECT Clause¶

The INTERSECT clause has the form:

select_statement INTERSECT select_statement

select_statement is any SELECT statement without an ORDER BY or FOR UPDATE clause.

The INTERSECT operator computes the set intersection of the rows returned by the involved SELECT statements. A row is in the intersection of two result sets if it appears in both result sets.

The result of INTERSECT does not contain any duplicate rows.

Multiple INTERSECT operators in the same SELECT statement are evaluated left to right, unless parentheses dictate otherwise. INTERSECT binds more tightly than UNION. That is, A UNION B INTERSECT C will be read as A UNION (B INTERSECT C).

MINUS Clause¶

The MINUS clause has this general form:

select_statement MINUS select_statement

select_statement is any SELECT statement without an ORDER BY or FOR UPDATE clause.

The MINUS operator computes the set of rows that are in the result of the left SELECT statement but not in the result of the right one.

The result of MINUS does not contain any duplicate rows.

Multiple MINUS operators in the same SELECT statement are evaluated left to right, unless parentheses dictate otherwise. MINUS binds at the same level as UNION.

CONNECT BY Clause¶

The CONNECT BY clause determines the parent-child relationship of rows when performing a hierarchical query. It has the general form:

CONNECT BY { PRIOR parent_expr = child_expr |
  child_expr = PRIOR parent_expr }

parent_expr is evaluated on a candidate parent row. If parent_expr = child_expr results in TRUE for a row returned by the FROM clause, then this row is considered a child of the parent.

The following optional clauses may be specified in conjunction with the CONNECT BY clause:

START WITH start_expression

The rows returned by the FROM clause on which start_expression evaluates to TRUE become the root nodes of the hierarchy.

ORDER SIBLINGS BY expression [ ASC | DESC ] [, ...]

Sibling rows of the hierarchy are ordered by expression in the result set.

Note

Advanced Server does not support the use of AND (or other operators) in the CONNECT BY clause.

ORDER BY Clause¶

The optional ORDER BY clause has the form:

ORDER BY expression [ ASC | DESC ] [, ...]

expression can be the name or ordinal number of an output column (SELECT list item), or it can be an arbitrary expression formed from input-column values.

The ORDER BY clause causes the result rows to be sorted according to the specified expressions. If two rows are equal according to the leftmost expression, they are compared according to the next expression and so on. If they are equal according to all specified expressions, they are returned in an implementation-dependent order.

The ordinal number refers to the ordinal (left-to-right) position of the result column. This feature makes it possible to define an ordering on the basis of a column that does not have a unique name. This is never absolutely necessary because it is always possible to assign a name to a result column using the AS clause.

It is also possible to use arbitrary expressions in the ORDER BY clause, including columns that do not appear in the SELECT result list. Thus the following statement is valid:

SELECT ename FROM emp ORDER BY empno;

A limitation of this feature is that an ORDER BY clause applying to the result of a UNION, INTERSECT, or MINUS clause may only specify an output column name or number, not an expression.

If an ORDER BY expression is a simple name that matches both a result column name and an input column name, ORDER BY will interpret it as the result column name. This is the opposite of the choice that GROUP BY will make in the same situation. This inconsistency is made to be compatible with the SQL standard.

Optionally one may add the key word ASC (ascending) or DESC (descending) after any expression in the ORDER BY clause. If not specified, ASC is assumed by default.

The null value sorts higher than any other value. In other words, with ascending sort order, null values sort at the end, and with descending sort order, null values sort at the beginning.

Character-string data is sorted according to the locale-specific collation order that was established when the database cluster was initialized.

Note

If SELECT DISTINCT is specified or if a SELECT statement includes the SELECT DISTINCT ...ORDER BY clause then all the expressions in ORDER BY must be present in the select list of the SELECT DISTINCT query.

Examples

The following two examples are identical ways of sorting the individual results according to the contents of the second column (dname):

SELECT * FROM dept ORDER BY dname;

 deptno |   dname    |   loc
--------+------------+----------
     10 | ACCOUNTING | NEW YORK
     40 | OPERATIONS | BOSTON
     20 | RESEARCH   | DALLAS
     30 | SALES      | CHICAGO
(4 rows)

SELECT * FROM dept ORDER BY 2;

 deptno |   dname    |   loc
--------+------------+----------
     10 | ACCOUNTING | NEW YORK
     40 | OPERATIONS | BOSTON
     20 | RESEARCH   | DALLAS
     30 | SALES      | CHICAGO
(4 rows)

The following example uses the SELECT DISTINCT ...ORDER BY clause to fetch the job and deptno from table emp:

CREATE TABLE EMP(EMPNO NUMBER(4) NOT NULL,
ENAME VARCHAR2(10),
JOB VARCHAR2(9),
DEPTNO NUMBER(2));

INSERT INTO EMP VALUES (7369, 'SMITH', 'CLERK', 20);
INSERT 0 1
INSERT INTO EMP VALUES (7499, 'ALLEN', 'SALESMAN', 30);
INSERT 0 1
INSERT INTO EMP VALUES (7521, 'WARD', 'SALESMAN', 30);
INSERT 0 1
INSERT INTO EMP VALUES (7566, 'JONES', 'MANAGER', 20);
INSERT 0 1

SELECT DISTINCT e.job, e.deptno FROM emp e ORDER BY e.job, e.deptno;
 job      | deptno
----------+--------
 CLERK    |     20
 MANAGER  |     20
 SALESMAN |     30
(3 rows)

DISTINCT | UNIQUE Clause¶

If a SELECT statement specifies DISTINCT or UNIQUE, all duplicate rows are removed from the result set (one row is kept from each group of duplicates). The DISTINCT or UNIQUE clause are synonymous when used with a SELECT statement. The ALL keyword specifies the opposite: all rows are kept; that is the default.

Error messages resulting from the improper use of a SELECT statement that includes the DISTINCT or UNIQUE keywords will include both the DISTINCT | UNIQUE keywords as shown below:

psql: ERROR: FOR UPDATE is not allowed with DISTINCT/UNIQUE clause

FOR UPDATE Clause¶

The FOR UPDATE clause takes the form:

FOR UPDATE [WAIT n|NOWAIT|SKIP LOCKED]

FOR UPDATE causes the rows retrieved by the SELECT statement to be locked as though for update. This prevents a row from being modified or deleted by other transactions until the current transaction ends; any transaction that attempts to UPDATE, DELETE, or SELECT FOR UPDATE a selected row will be blocked until the current transaction ends. If an UPDATE, DELETE, or SELECT FOR UPDATE from another transaction has already locked a selected row or rows, SELECT FOR UPDATE will wait for the first transaction to complete, and will then lock and return the updated row (or no row, if the row was deleted).

FOR UPDATE cannot be used in contexts where returned rows cannot be clearly identified with individual table rows (for example, with aggregation).

Use FOR UPDATE options to specify locking preferences:

Include the WAIT n keywords to specify the number of seconds (or fractional seconds) that the SELECT statement will wait for a row locked by another session. Use a decimal form to specify fractional seconds; for example, WAIT 1.5 instructs the server to wait one and a half seconds. Specify up to 4 digits to the right of the decimal.

Include the NOWAIT keyword to report an error immediately if a row cannot be locked by the current session.

Include SKIP LOCKED to instruct the server to lock rows if possible, and skip rows that are already locked by another session.

SELECT¶

FROM Clause¶

WHERE Clause¶

GROUP BY Clause¶

HAVING Clause¶

SELECT List¶

UNION Clause¶

INTERSECT Clause¶

MINUS Clause¶

CONNECT BY Clause¶

ORDER BY Clause¶

DISTINCT | UNIQUE Clause¶

FOR UPDATE Clause¶

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