SQL SELECT Statement

From http://www.w3schools.com (Copyright Refsnes Data)

# SQL SELECT Statement

This chapter will explain the SELECT and the SELECT * statements.

## The SQL SELECT Statement

The SELECT statement is used to select data from a database.

The result is stored in a result table, called the result-set.

### SQL SELECT Syntax

    SELECT column_name(s)
    FROM table_name

and

    SELECT * FROM table_name

Note: SQL is not case sensitive. SELECT is the same as select.

## An SQL SELECT Example

The "Persons" table:

P_Id | LastName | FirstName | Address | City
--- | --- | --- | --- | ---
1 | Hansen | Ola | Timoteivn 10 | Sandnes
2 | Svendson | Tove | Borgvn 23 | Sandnes
3 | Pettersen | Kari | Storgt 20 | Stavanger

Now we want to select the content of the columns named "LastName" and "FirstName" from the table above.

We use the following SELECT statement:

    SELECT LastName,FirstName FROM Persons

The result-set will look like this:

LastName | FirstName
--- | ---
Hansen | Ola
Svendson | Tove
Pettersen | Kari

## SELECT * Example

Now we want to select all the columns from the "Persons" table.

We use the following SELECT statement:

    SELECT * FROM Persons

Tip: The asterisk (*) is a quick way of selecting all columns!

The result-set will look like this:

P_Id | LastName | FirstName | Address | City
--- | --- | --- | --- | ---
1 | Hansen | Ola | Timoteivn 10 | Sandnes
2 | Svendson | Tove | Borgvn 23 | Sandnes
3 | Pettersen | Kari | Storgt 20 | Stavanger

## Navigation in a Result-set

Most database software systems allow navigation in the result-set with programming functions, like: Move-To-First-Record, Get-Record-Content, Move-To-Next-Record, etc.

Programming functions like these are not a part of this tutorial. To learn about accessing data with function calls, please visit our ADO tutorial or our PHP tutorial.

From http://www.w3schools.com (Copyright Refsnes Data)