DISPLAYING DATA FROM MULTIPLE TABLES

OBJECTIVES

At the end of this module, you will learn how to:

1.Write a SELECT statement to access data from more
than one table using EQUIJOINS and NON EQUIJOINS.

2. Join a table to itself by using a SELF JOIN.

3.Generate a CARTESIAN PRODUCT of all the rows from two or

more tables.
 DATA FROM MULTIPLE TABLES

 There are times when the situation demands that

you view data from more than one table using one
SELECT statement.

 If you have a department-id, and you want to post

a letter to the department, you would realize that
the post code is contained in the locations table.

 You would have to join the departments table to

the locations table, to get the post code you need.
 When you have such situations, you use the
JOIN

keyword.

 Five types of JOIN comply with standard SQL.

 These are:
 The NATURAL JOIN
 The USING Clause
 The CROSS Join
 The Full Outer Join and
 The arbitrary join conditions for outer joins.
 THE NATURAL JOIN

 NATURAL JOIN is based on all the columns in the two tables

that have the same column_name and data type.

 The joining condition for the NATURAL JOIN, is based

on the equality of these columns.
EXAMPLE:
Take a look at all the columns in the departments
table and the locations table.
 A NATURAL JOIN adds all the columns in the department
table, to all the columns in the locations table.

 Both tables are bound by the common column

which in this case is the location_id column and it
appears, as the first column in the query result.
  A NATURAL JOIN is restricted using the WHERE clause.

FORMAT:
SELECT column_name
FROM table_name1
NATURAL JOIN table_name2
WHERE condition
EXAMPLE:
 This would only display the columns with a
department_id greater than 30;

THE USING CLAUSE

 The USING clause is used when more than one column

satisfies the JOIN condition i.e both tables have more
than one column in common.

 The USING clause would specify which one column, to

be used for the JOIN.
EXAMPLE:
 Note that the NATURAL JOIN and the USING clause can’t be used
together.

TABLE ALIASES

 When joining tables that have many columns in

common, you need to specify which table a
particular column belongs to.

 This would make the SELECT statement look very

long and confusing; making it necessary to use a
table alias.
  Although the alias could be as long as
30 characters, it is better to keep it short and
simple.

FORMAT:

SELECT table_alias1.column_name1, table-aliase2.column_name2

FROM table_name1 JOIN table_name2
USING (column_name)
EXAMPLE:
 Once a table alias is specified at the beginning of a
SELECT statement, it must be used throughout the SELECT

statement.

SELF JOINS

 A self-JOIN, is used to JOIN a table to itself.

 The ON keyword, is used alongside a self-JOIN

and where it is necessary to place a restriction on
the rows displayed you use the WHERE clause.
FORMAT:
SELECT column_name1, column_name2
FROM table1 a JOIN table1 b
ON (a.column_name1 condition b.column_name2)

EXERCISE:
Query the employees table for possible father and son
relationship among employees.
 To do that, you have to know if the last_name
of any employee is the same as the
first_name of any other employee.
 We are told that no data is found, that is to
say, such scenario does not exist.
EXERCISE:
 Search the employees table for
employees who are managers.
 These are employees whose employee_id
is the same as their manager_id
 NON EQUIJOINS

 A non-equijoin, is a join condition, that uses

any conditional operator, other than the
equality.

 A typical equijoin, contains either the

BETWEEN comparison condition, or the ANY
comparison condition.
  The <, >, <= and >= are examples of
comparison conditions used in non-
equijoins.

GENERATING CARTESIAN PRODUCTS

 If you write a JOIN Query, and you fail to specify the JOIN
condition the Oracle Database optimizer returns
their CARTESIAN PRODUCT.
 Oracle combines each row of one table, with each
row of the other table, resulting in many rows that
are rarely useful.

 To avoid a , always include a valid

CARTESIAN PRODUCT
JOIN

condition, unless you specifically need a CARTESIAN PRODUCT.

 Cartesian products are not always useless, when

we need a large number of rows for analysis
purpose, we use a CARTESIAN PRODUCT.