No Repeats

cmdr_bond

Hello,

I am trying to grab some data off a table that has a number of rows with cells with the same value. What I want to do is to list all the rows in the table, but not to repeat those rows that are repeated... so it will output just one row.

How do I do that? (I hope it's not complicated)

Thanks a lot

thorpe

$query = "SELECT DISTINCT * FROM tbl";

cmdr_bond

Okay, I'm still getting repeats.. here's what my table looks like:

[aaa,bbb,ccc]
[aaa,zzz,ccc]
[ddd,eee,fff]

How do I make sure that there is only one of every row that has a different first cell. So it would output:
aaa and ddd and not show aaa twice.

Thanks

thorpe

show us your query and also the field names of the table your trying to query. im afraid your description of your table makes NO sense.

cmdr_bond

Sorry, I thought making it with variables would make it easy, but here's what I have:

Table Name: schools

SchoolID | SchoolName | Student

School1 | SchoolName1 | John Smith
School1 | SchoolName1 | Jane Doe
School2 | SchoolName2 | Ted Harvey

Now, I have a page where I want to display the SchoolName and not repeat the 2nd row. So all it would show is SchoolName1 and SchoolName2.

Right now I have the following script:

$result = mysql_query("SELECT * FROM schools SchoolName ORDER BY SchoolName",$db);

I tried to add the Distinct to that, but it didnt work. Should that be working?

Thanks

thorpe

sorry.... my fault. didnt explain DISTINCT.

try this;

$result = mysql_query("SELECT DISTINCT(SchoolName) * FROM schools ORDER BY SchoolName",$db);

cmdr_bond

For some reason it's actually giving me an error doing that.

thorpe

yeah.... my fault again. im only a newb here too and i was in a rush earlier.

finally.... try this;

$result = mysql_query("SELECT DISTINCT(SchoolName) FROM schools",$db);

i got rid of the order by clause only because you were'nt using it. the problem was with the *

hope this helps.

may i also suggest a link.
http://www.mysqlfreaks.com/mysql_statements.php

this place has a few basic desciptions of some of the more regularly used mySql statements.

laserlight

Your database isnt normalised to begin with.

Table: schools
school_id
name

Table: students
student_id
school_id
name

So each school is only listed once in the schools table, with a unique school_id acting as the primary key.
Each student is only listed once in the students table, but are related to their schools through the school_id

cmdr_bond

That works.

And thanks for the info on normalizatino, I'll try to edit my tables without inflicting too much damage on my code.

Thanks