On 03/04/2011, at 6:49 PM, Marcelo S Zanetti wrote: > I have an item to insert in the table which will be inserted only if this > item is not yet in that table otherwise I would like to return the item's key. > > like that > > IF 1==SELECT COUNT(*) from table > WHERE item==new THEN SELECT itemID from tabel WHERE item==new ELSE > INSERT INTO table (item) VALUES (new) > > It does not work in this way ... could somebody tell me please what is the > correct sintax or whether this is possible at all.
SQL is a set manipulation language, not a procedural language. So you write commands that affect a subset of data all at once. To accomplish your task, you'd write this: insert into Table (Item) select new where new not in (select item from Table); select ItemID from Table where Item = new; Furthermore, if you are returning the key for some more manipulation, it's best done in the same SQL call, rather than manipulated in your application code only to be re-injected into the SQL from which it came. Tom BareFeetWare -- iPhone/iPad/iPod and Mac software development, specialising in databases develo...@barefeetware.com -- Comparison of SQLite GUI tools: http://www.barefeetware.com/sqlite/compare/?ml _______________________________________________ sqlite-users mailing list sqlite-users@sqlite.org http://sqlite.org:8080/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/sqlite-users
