Question

Find column name by value

Asked by: maunded

Hi,
Im trying to find the name of a column using a value in that column.  I know it could be ambigious, but I'll have to deal with that.
What I have is a table like:
ID | Input1 | Input2 | Input3 | Input4
--------------------------------------------
1  | front   | back    | top      | side
2  | water | fire      | earth   | air
--------------------------------------------

I have the ID and one of the values in the table, but I need to be able to find the column that that value belongs to.
Is this possible?
Thanks
D.

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Asked On
2006-05-24 at 16:14:40ID21862981
Tags

column

,

name

,

find

Topic

MS SQL Server

Participating Experts
1
Points
500
Comments
3

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Answers

 

by: dqmqPosted on 2006-05-24 at 17:27:12ID: 16756948

Sort of an inverse cross-tab :>).

Try:

Select 'Input1' from yourtable where Input1 = 'YourValue'
Union
Select 'Input2' from yourtable where Input2 = 'YourValue'
Union
Select 'Input3' from yourtable where Input3 = 'YourValue'
Union
Select 'Input4' from yourtable where Input4 = 'YourValue'

 

by: dqmqPosted on 2006-05-24 at 17:32:32ID: 16756971

Or, here's another way, which resolves the potential ambiguity by giving preference to the first match in the case list:



Select ID
, Case when Input1 = 'yourvalue' then 'Input1'
                  when Input2 = 'yourvalue' then 'Input2'
                  when Input3 = 'yourvalue' then 'Input3'
                  when Input4 = 'yourvalue' then 'Input4'
   End
From YourTable
 

 

by: maundedPosted on 2006-05-24 at 18:14:05ID: 16757101

Both very nice, thank you.

20120131-EE-VQP-002

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