SELECT Statement

Introduction

The SELECT statement is used for retrieving data from a table. This SQL Statement begins with the keyword SELECT. The results from the SELECT query is called the 'Resultset'. The SELECT Statement has two basic parts:

• SELECT
• FROM

Beginning Example

This example will select the 'Name', 'Position' and 'Salary' columns' content from the 'Employees' table. Note: This example selects all of the records from the table. SELECT Name, Position, Salary
FROM Employees Here is a sample resultset from the above SELECT query:

Selecting ALL Columns - *

Previously we selected columns by specifying the column names. By using the * symbol, we can select all the columns from a table

In this example we will assume that the 'Employees' table contains the follow columns: 'Name', 'Position', 'Office' and 'Salary'. SELECT *
FROM Employees
Here is a sample resultset from the above SELECT query:

Limiting Rows - WHERE clause

The WHERE clause acts as a filter on the resultset. By adding a WHERE clause after the FROM keyword, the resultset can be limited to rows that meet particular conditions.

This example will select the 'Name', 'Position' and 'Salary' columns' content from the 'Employees' table, where the employee's Position is 'Manager'. SELECT Name, Position, Salary
FROM Employees
WHERE Position = 'Manager' Here is a sample resultset from the above SELECT query: