Make Certain Row Appear First in Result Set MySQL

[sandthipe]

The title pretty much states my question: Is there a way in PHP to force the row of my choosing to appear first in a mysql query result set? For example, I will query the db to select the names of football players and I always want "Bo Jackson" to appear first (just to remind everyone of his unmatched awesomeness). Thanks. -chris

[bradgrafelman]

Well.. you could do this in in your SQL query... something like:

(SELECT `name`, `whatever` FROM `mytable` WHERE `name` = 'Bo Jackson')
UNION
(SELECT `name`, `whatever` FROM `mytable` WHERE `name` != 'Bo Jackson')

[Piranha]

I agree that you should do it in the SQL query. But I have another way of doing it:

SELECT whatever 
FROM table 
WHERE whatever
ORDER BY CASE name
    WHEN 'Bo Jackson' THEN 1
    ELSE 999
END

[bradgrafelman]

And that's why I shouldn't be posting in the database forum! :o

[Piranha]

Lol, learned that from LarsBerg in this forum, otherwise I would not have a clue.

Edit: Nice that it is not you that are correcting me, must be the first time. :p