Getting Wrong Values For Other Columns When I Select Max(updated_date)

I am using select field1, max(updated_date) from mytable. I get the correct value for max(updated_date), i.e. the largest date. However for field1 I just get the the value for the

Solution 1:

You either need a GROUP BY clause or a more complex query.

SELECT field1, MAX(updated_date)
  FROM mytable
 GROUPBY field1

For the sample data, this will return 3 rows.

More likely, you want:

SELECT t1.field1, t3.max_date
  FROM mytable AS t1
  JOIN (SELECT MAX(t2.updated_date) AS max_date
          FROM mytable AS t2
       ) AS t3
    ON t1.updated_date = t3.max_date;

For the sample data, this will return 1 row:

ta32012-03-11 11:05:56

Of the major DBMS, only MySQL allows you to omit the GROUP BY clause when you have a mixture of aggregates and non-aggregate columns in the select-list. The SQL standard requires the GROUP BY clause and you must list all non-aggregate columns in it. Sometimes, in MySQL, omitting the GROUP BY clause produces the answer you want; as often as not, though, it manages to give an unexpected answer.

Solution 2:

Use ORDER BY and LIMIT. Then it's as simple as:

SELECT field1, updated_date 
    FROM mytable
ORDERBY updated_date DESC 
   LIMIT 1;

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If the query is needed a lot you can try this alternative:

SELECT t1.field1, t1.updated_date 
    FROM mytable t1
         LEFTJOIN mytable t2 
     AND t2.updated_date > t1.updated_date
   WHERE t2.field1 ISNULL;

Short explanation: For each row, give me any rows with a more-recent updated_date. But (WHERE clause) take only the row with no more-recent updated_date. The technique is sometimes called a self-exclusion join. This is the intermediate result (without WHERE clause, and adding t2.* to SELECT list):

ta1    2012-03-11 11:05:15    ta2     2012-03-11 11:05:32
ta1    2012-03-11 11:05:15    ta3     2012-03-11 11:05:56
ta2    2012-03-11 11:05:32    ta3     2012-03-11 11:05:56
ta3    2012-03-11 11:05:56    null    null