SELECT

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 6- 1

Basic Retrieval Queries in SQL
 SELECT statement
 One basic statement for retrieving information from
a database
 SQL allows a table to have two or more tuples
that are identical in all their attribute values
 Unlike relational model (relational model is strictly
set-theory based)
 Multiset or bag behavior
 Tuple-id may be used as a key

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 6- 2

EXPANDED Block Structure of SQL
Queries

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 7- 40

The SELECT-FROM-WHERE
Structure of Basic SQL Queries
 Basic form of the SELECT statement:

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 6- 4

The SELECT-FROM-WHERE Structure
of Basic SQL Queries (cont’d.)

 Logical comparison operators

 =, <, <=, >, >=, and <>
 Projection attributes
 Attributes whose values are to be retrieved
 Selection condition
 Boolean condition that must be true for any
retrieved tuple. Selection conditions include join
conditions (see Ch.8) when multiple relations are
involved.

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 6- 30

Basic Retrieval Queries

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Basic Retrieval Queries (Contd.)

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 6- 32

Ambiguous Attribute Names
 Same name can be used for two (or more)
attributes in different relations
 As long as the attributes are in different relations
 Must qualify the attribute name with the relation
name to prevent ambiguity

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 6- 33

Aliasing, and Renaming
 Aliases or tuple variables
 Declare alternative relation names E and S to refer
to the EMPLOYEE relation twice in a query:

Query 8. For each employee, retrieve the employee’s first and last name
and the first and last name of his or her immediate supervisor.
 SELECT E.Fname, E.Lname, S.Fname, S.Lname
FROM EMPLOYEE AS E, EMPLOYEE AS S
WHERE E.Super_ssn=S.Ssn;
 Recommended practice to abbreviate names and to
prefix same or similar attribute from multiple tables.

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 6- 34

Aliasing,Renaming and Tuple
Variables (contd.)
 The attribute names can also be renamed
EMPLOYEE AS E(Fn, Mi, Ln, Ssn, Bd,
Addr, Sex, Sal, Sssn, Dno)
 Note that the relation EMPLOYEE now has a

variable name E which corresponds to a tuple

variable
 The “AS” may be dropped in most SQL

implementations

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 6- 10

Unspecified WHERE Clause
and Use of the Asterisk
 Missing WHERE clause
 Indicates no condition on tuple selection
 Effect is a CROSS PRODUCT
 Result is all possible tuple combinations (or the
Algebra operation of Cartesian Product– see Ch.8)
result

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 6- 36

Unspecified WHERE Clause
and Use of the Asterisk (cont’d.)
 Specify an asterisk (*)
 Retrieve all the attribute values of the selected
tuples
 The * can be prefixed by the relation name; e.g.,
EMPLOYEE *

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 6- 37

Tables as Sets in SQL
 SQL does not automatically eliminate duplicate tuples in
query results
 For aggregate operations (See sec 7.1.7) duplicates must
be accounted for
 Use the keyword DISTINCT in the SELECT clause
 Only distinct tuples should remain in the result

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 6- 38

Tables as Sets in SQL (cont’d.)
 Set operations
 UNION, EXCEPT (difference), INTERSECT
 Corresponding multiset operations: UNION ALL,
EXCEPT ALL, INTERSECT ALL)
 Type compatibility is needed for these operations
to be valid

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 6- 39

Substring Pattern Matching and
Arithmetic Operators
 LIKE comparison operator

Used for string pattern matching

% replaces an arbitrary number of zero or more characters

underscore (_) replaces a single character

Examples: WHERE Address LIKE ‘%Houston,TX%’;

WHERE Ssn LIKE ‘_ _ 1_ _ 8901’;
 BETWEEN comparison operator
E.g., in Q14 :
WHERE(Salary BETWEEN 30000 AND 40000)
AND Dno = 5;

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 6- 40

 Arithmetic Operations

 Standard arithmetic operators:

 Addition (+), subtraction (–), multiplication (*), and
division (/) may be included as a part of SELECT

 Query 13. Show the resulting salaries if every employee working on

the ‘ProductX’ project is given a 10 percent raise.

SELECT E.Fname, E.Lname, 1.1 * E.Salary AS Increased_sal

FROM EMPLOYEE AS E, WORKS_ON AS W, PROJECT AS P
WHERE E.Ssn=W.Essn AND W.Pno=P.Pnumber AND
P.Pname=‘ProductX’;

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 6- 16

Ordering of Query Results
 Use ORDER BY clause
 Keyword DESC to see result in a descending order
of values
 Keyword ASC to specify ascending order explicitly
 Typically placed at the end of the query

ORDER BY D.Dname DESC, E.Lname ASC,

E.Fname ASC

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Basic SQL Retrieval Query Block

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More Complex SQL Retrieval
Queries
 Additional features allow users to specify more
complex retrievals from database:
 Nested queries, joined tables, and outer joins (in
the FROM clause), aggregate functions, and
grouping

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 7- 4

Comparisons Involving NULL
and Three-Valued Logic
 Meanings of NULL
 Unknown value
 Unavailable or withheld value
 Not applicable attribute
 Each individual NULL value considered to be
different from every other NULL value
 SQL uses a three-valued logic:
 TRUE, FALSE, and UNKNOWN (like Maybe)
 NULL = NULL comparison is avoided

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 7- 5

Comparisons Involving NULL
and Three-Valued Logic (cont’d.)
 SQL allows queries that check whether an
attribute value is NULL
 IS or IS NOT NULL

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 7- 7

Nested Queries, Tuples,
and Set/Multiset Comparisons
 Nested queries
 Complete select-from-where blocks within WHERE
clause of another query
 Outer query and nested subqueries
 Comparison operator IN
 Compares value v with a set (or multiset) of values
V
 Evaluates to TRUE if v is one of the elements in V

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Nested Queries (cont’d.)

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Nested Queries (cont’d.)
 Use tuples of values in comparisons
 Place them within parentheses

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Nested Queries (cont’d.)
 Use other comparison operators to compare a
single value v
 = ANY (or = SOME) operator

Returns TRUE if the value v is equal to some value in
the set V and is hence equivalent to IN
 Other operators that can be combined with ANY (or
SOME): >, >=, <, <=, and <>
 ALL: value must exceed all values from nested
query

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 7- 11

Nested Queries (cont’d.)
 Avoid potential errors and ambiguities
 Create tuple variables (aliases) for all tables
referenced in SQL query

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 7- 26

Correlated Nested Queries
 Queries that are nested using the = or IN
comparison operator can be collapsed into one
single block: E.g., Q16 can be written as:

 Q16A: SELECT E.Fname, E.Lname

FROM EMPLOYEE AS E, DEPENDENT AS D
WHERE E.Ssn=D.Essn AND E.Sex=D.Sex
AND
E.Fname=D.Dependent_name;
 Correlated nested query
 Evaluated once for each tuple in the outer query

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 7- 13

Explicit Sets and Renaming of
Attributes in SQL
 Can use explicit set of values in WHERE clause
Q17: SELECT DISTINCT Essn
FROM WORKS_ON
WHERE Pno IN (1, 2, 3);
 Use qualifier AS followed by desired new name
 Rename any attribute that appears in the result of
a query

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 7- 18

Specifying Joined Tables in the
FROM Clause of SQL
 Joined table
 Permits users to specify a table resulting from a
join operation in the FROM clause of a query
 The FROM clause in Q1A
 Contains a single joined table. JOIN may also be
called INNER JOIN

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 7- 19

Different Types of JOINed Tables in
SQL
 Specify different types of join
 NATURAL JOIN
 Various types of OUTER JOIN (LEFT, RIGHT,
FULL )
 NATURAL JOIN on two relations R and S
 No join condition specified
 Is equivalent to an implicit EQUIJOIN condition for
each pair of attributes with same name from R and
S

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 7- 20

NATURAL JOIN
 Rename attributes of one relation so it can be joined with
another using NATURAL JOIN:

Q1B: SELECT Fname, Lname, Address

FROM (EMPLOYEE NATURAL JOIN
(DEPARTMENT AS DEPT (Dname, Dno, Mssn,
Msdate)))
WHERE Dname=‘Research’;

The above works with EMPLOYEE.Dno = DEPT.Dno as an

implicit join condition

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 7- 31

INNER and OUTER Joins
 INNER JOIN (versus OUTER JOIN)
 Default type of join in a joined table

 Tuple is included in the result only if a matching tuple exists in

the other relation

 LEFT OUTER JOIN
 Every tuple in left table must appear in result

 If no matching tuple


Padded with NULL values for attributes of right table
 RIGHT OUTER JOIN
 Every tuple in right table must appear in result

 If no matching tuple


Padded with NULL values for attributes of left table

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 7- 22

Example: LEFT OUTER JOIN

SELECT E.Lname AS Employee_Name

S.Lname AS Supervisor_Name

FROM Employee AS E LEFT OUTER JOIN EMPLOYEE AS S

ON E.Super_ssn = S.Ssn)

ALTERNATE SYNTAX:
SELECT E.Lname , S.Lname
FROM EMPLOYEE E, EMPLOYEE S
WHERE E.Super_ssn + = S.Ssn

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 7- 33

Multiway JOIN in the FROM clause
 FULL OUTER JOIN – combines result if LEFT
and RIGHT OUTER JOIN
 Can nest JOIN specifications for a multiway join:

Q2A: SELECT Pnumber, Dnum, Lname, Address, Bdate

FROM ((PROJECT JOIN DEPARTMENT ON
Dnum=Dnumber) JOIN EMPLOYEE ON
Mgr_ssn=Ssn)
WHERE Plocation=‘Stafford’;

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 7- 34

Aggregate Functions in SQL
 Used to summarize information from multiple
tuples into a single-tuple summary
 Built-in aggregate functions
 COUNT, SUM, MAX, MIN, and AVG
 Grouping
 Create subgroups of tuples before summarizing
 To select entire groups, HAVING clause is used
 Aggregate functions can be used in the SELECT
clause or in a HAVING clause

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 7- 35

Renaming Results of Aggregation
 Following query returns a single row of computed values
from EMPLOYEE table:

Q19: SELECT SUM (Salary), MAX (Salary), MIN (Salary),

AVG (Salary)
FROM EMPLOYEE;
 The result can be presented with new names:

Q19A: SELECT SUM (Salary) AS Total_Sal, MAX (Salary)

AS Highest_Sal, MIN (Salary) AS Lowest_Sal,
AVG (Salary) AS Average_Sal
FROM EMPLOYEE;

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 7- 36

Aggregate Functions in SQL (cont’d.)
 NULL values are discarded when aggregate
functions are applied to a particular column

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 7- 37

Aggregate Functions on Booleans
 SOME and ALL may be applied as functions on
Boolean Values.
 SOME returns true if at least one element in the
collection is TRUE (similar to OR)
 ALL returns true if all of the elements in the
collection are TRUE (similar to AND)

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 7- 38

Grouping: The GROUP BY Clause
 Partition relation into subsets of tuples
 Based on grouping attribute(s)
 Apply function to each such group independently
 GROUP BY clause
 Specifies grouping attributes
 COUNT (*) counts the number of rows in the
group

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 7- 39

Examples of GROUP BY
 The grouping attribute must appear in the SELECT clause:
Q24: SELECT Dno, COUNT (*), AVG (Salary)
FROM EMPLOYEE
GROUP BY Dno;
 If the grouping attribute has NULL as a possible value,
then a separate group is created for the null value (e.g.,
null Dno in the above query)
 GROUP BY may be applied to the result of a JOIN:
Q25: SELECT Pnumber, Pname, COUNT (*)
FROM PROJECT, WORKS_ON
WHERE Pnumber=Pno
GROUP BY Pnumber, Pname;

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 7- 40

Grouping: The GROUP BY and
HAVING Clauses (cont’d.)
 HAVING clause
 Provides a condition to select or reject an entire
group:
 Query 26. For each project on which more than two employees work,
retrieve the project number, the project name, and the number of
employees who work on the project.

Q26: SELECT Pnumber, Pname, COUNT (*)

FROM PROJECT, WORKS_ON
WHERE Pnumber=Pno
GROUP BY Pnumber, Pname
HAVING COUNT (*) > 2;

Copyright © 2016 Ramez Elmasri and Shamkant B. Navathe Slide 7- 31

Combining the WHERE and the
HAVING Clause
 Consider the query: we want to count the total number of
employees whose salaries exceed $40,000 in each
department, but only for departments where more than
five employees work.

 INCORRECT QUERY:
SELECT Dno, COUNT (*)
FROM EMPLOYEE
WHERE Salary>40000
GROUP BY Dno
HAVING COUNT (*) > 5;

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Combining the WHERE and the
HAVING Clause (continued)
Correct Specification of the Query:
Note: the WHERE clause applies tuple by tuple

whereas HAVING applies to entire group of tuples

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