Re: Inconsequences in SELECT/ORDER BY

In article <2nttv6$3r4@maicgn.SoftwareEngineering> ar@mai.de (Achim Reiners) writes: >Hello Informixers! > >I had a little problem with an ORDER BY clause: > >First of all I use the possibility to SELECT a column more than once >in a SELECT-statement: > >SELECT col_a, col_b, col_a FROM tab;> >This works fine and makes life easier for me (really!). > >Now I tried: SELECT col_a, col_b, col_a FROM tab ORDER BY col_a; > >I received the "ambiguous column" - error. I think that in this context >this error should NOT be reported. > >O.K. the workaround is quite easy using "display labels". >( SELECT col_a ca1, col_b, col_a ca2 FROM tab ORDER BY ca1; ) > >What is the opinion of the net? Is the error reporting correct or not? I have no problem with it reporting an error. It's just asking which column(s) you want your data sorted by... BTW, you could also do: SELECT col_a, col_b, col_a FROM tab ORDER BY 1;-- ------------------------------------------------------------------- * Bob Beaulieu (bobb@netcom.com) eztravel@netcom.com * * Tel: 408-978-0808 Fax: 408-978-7024 * * Corporate Travel Services * -------------------------------------------------------------------