SQL: SELECT statement

In a relational database, data is stored in tables. The Select statement allows you to retrieve records from one or more tables in your database. 

The reductive syntax for the Select statement is:

SELECT column_name 
INTO new_table 
FROM derived_table 
WHERE conditions 
HAVING conditions 
ORDER BY expression 

Example #1

SELECT * 
FROM EmployeeAddressTable

This example demonstrates a very simple Select query, which uses * to select all of the fields in EmployeeAddressTable.

Example #2

SELECT FirstName 
FROM EmployeeAddressTable 
WHERE State = 'Ohio' 

By using the Where clause, you can focus your selection by specifying certain criteria to be met by the values. The above example returns the names of all employees who live in state Ohio.

Example #3

SELECT EmployeeStatisticsTable.Salary, EmployeeAddressTable.LastName 
FROM EmployeeStatisticsTable,EmployeeAddressTable 
WHERE EmployeeStatisticsTable.EmployeeIDNo = EmployeeAddressTable.EmployeeIDNo 

The result set would display the salary and employee name fields where the EmployeeIDNo value existed in both the EmployeeStatisticsTable and EmployeeAddressTable.