SELECT DISTINCT values and INSERT INTO table

sql select sql-server-2012 distinct sql-insert

44,570

Solution 1

You can use INSERT INTO... SELECT statement on this,

INSERT INTO tableName (A, B, C)
SELECT A, B, MAX(C) + 1
FROM tableName
GROUP BY A, B

SQLFiddle Demo

Solution 2

Try this:

SELECT * INTO new_table FROM
   (SELECT DISTINCT * FROM table_name) x

44,570

Author by

JohnAtrik

Updated on July 09, 2022

Comments

JohnAtrik almost 2 years
I want to take a column with values that repeat multiple times and get that value only once and store it for later use, but at the same time I would like to get another value in the same row as that distinct column.
```
A      B       C
32263  123456  44
32263  123456  45
32263  123456  46
32264  246802  44
32263  246802  45
32264  246802  46
32265  369258  44
32265  369258  45
32265  369258  46
```
A, B, C represent three columns. Ignore C for now.

My question is: How can I get this information in this table and store it for I can use it later in the script?

Here is what I tried:
```
use databaseName

select distinct A from tableName
order by A
```
The result is:
```
A
32263
32264
32265
```
I'm trying to get it to also give me B's value. (Note it does not matter at all which row I get since no matter what A I choose the value of B will be the same for given A.) We are ignoring C for now.

The result should be:
```
A      B
32263  123456
32264  246802
32265  369258
```
Now, once I get it like that I want to insert a row using the values I got from the query. This is where C comes in. I want to do something like this:
```
use databaseName

insert into tableName (A, B, C)
values (32263, 123456, 47)
```
Of course I don't want to put the values directly inside of there, instead have some type of loop that will cycle through each of the 3 distinct A values I found.

In short, my table should go from:
```
A      B       C
32263  123456  44
32263  123456  45
32263  123456  46
32264  246802  44
32263  246802  45
32264  246802  46
32265  369258  44
32265  369258  45
32265  369258  46
```
To:
```
A      B       C
32263  123456  44
32263  123456  45
32263  123456  46
32263  123456  47 -
32264  246802  44
32263  246802  45
32264  246802  46
32264  246802  47 -
32265  369258  44
32265  369258  45
32265  369258  46
32265  369258  47 -
```
I placed dashes next to the newly added rows to help you see the changes.

I figure I should perhaps do some type of loop that will cycle through all three distinct A values, but my problem is how to do that?

Thanks for your time.
Hart CO over 10 years

This would add many duplicates, OP just wants 1 row per grouping.
Vulcronos over 10 years

@GoatCO Updated my query to filter. A group by will work most of the time until you just want to group by A. Just wanted to introduce windowing function since they are very useful.
cdsaenz over 4 years

Cool. Opened my eyes to import from a populated table over to a codes table: INSERT INTO code_mst (code_value,code_field) SELECT DISTINCT app_brand,'app_brand' FROM app_mst