We've used this exact technique in a table called "ANY_DATE_FORMAT" since 1997... admittedly in Oracle, but the principle still applies.
It's great for coalescing the number of states necessary to implement parsers. :) --andy On 8/18/07, Rod Dav4is <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > Conventional usage is as follows: > > ... WHERE column-name LIKE "string" > > Which, of course, selects rows where the values in the named column > match the string, which can, and usually does, have wildcards. > > I have been using an inverted arrangement: > > ... WHERE "string" LIKE column-name > > This allows the wildcards to be in the named column of the database. > What possible use could this be? It's hard to even get your head around > it. >