my bad... should have mentioned that both the owner and dog name are unique, but one owner can have multiple dogs...
so just how does the "insert ... select" work..???? it looks like it could actually do what i need, but i can't seem to get it working correctly.. -bruce -----Original Message----- From: Paul DuBois [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Sunday, July 04, 2004 12:59 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]; [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: mysql sql question At 12:54 -0700 7/4/04, bruce wrote: >hi... > >i have two hypothetical tables >create table owner ( > -> name char(20) , > -> ownerid int(10) auto_increment primary key); > >create table dog ( > -> name char(20) , > -> ownerid int(10), > -> dogid int(10) auto_increment primary key); > >i'm curious as to how i'd go about inserting a name and the id of the owner, >in table "dog", in a single sql statement. > >something like this psuedo sql.. > insert table (name, ownerid) values ($name, $ownerid) > where owner.owner = owner This won't work, because there is no guarantee that the name of your owner is unique. Some techniques that might be useful in this situation can be found here: http://www.onlamp.com/pub/a/onlamp/excerpt/mysqlckbk/index2.html > >in other words, an app would supply the values for the "dog name", and the >"owner". the sql would be able to derive the "ownerid" for the "owner" from >the owner table, and then be able to insert the "ownerid", and "dogname" >into the dog table... > >searching through google gets me to being able to write a php/perl script >where i can do this using multiple sql statements.. but i'm trying to see >how to do it in a single statement... You can't, for the reason noted above. If you happen to have a unique index on the owner.name column, then what you might want to try is the INSERT INTO ... SELECT FROM form of INSERT. http://dev.mysql.com/doc/mysql/en/INSERT_SELECT.html > >any comments/criticisms would be helpful... > >thanks... > >-bruce -- Paul DuBois, MySQL Documentation Team Madison, Wisconsin, USA MySQL AB, www.mysql.com -- MySQL General Mailing List For list archives: http://lists.mysql.com/mysql To unsubscribe: http://lists.mysql.com/[EMAIL PROTECTED]
