Cross Tabs and Pivots, Part 1 – Converting Rows to Columns

SQLServerCentral is supported by Red Gate Software Ltd.

Popular Topics

Home

Members

Calendar

Who's On

Home » Article Discussions » Article Discussions by Author » Discuss Content Posted by Jeff Moden » Cross Tabs and Pivots, Part 1 – Converting...

238 posts, Page 1 of 24

1 2 3 4 5 »»»

Cross Tabs and Pivots, Part 1 – Converting Rows to Columns

Rate Topic

Display Mode

Topic Options

Author

Message

Jeff Moden

Posted Monday, August 18, 2008 10:59 PM

SSC-Dedicated

Group: General Forum Members
Last Login: Today @ 5:13 AM
Points: 32,906, Visits: 26,793

Comments posted to this topic are about the item Cross Tabs and Pivots, Part 1 – Converting Rows to Columns

Folks, Part 2 of this article can be found at the following link...

(click here) Cross Tabs and Pivots, Part 2 - Dynamic Cross Tabs

--Jeff Moden

"RBAR is pronounced "ree-bar" and is a "Modenism" for "Row-By-Agonizing-Row".

First step towards the paradigm shift of writing Set Based code:
Stop thinking about what you want to do to a row... think, instead, of what you want to do to a column."

For better, quicker answers on T-SQL questions, click on the following...
http://www.sqlservercentral.com/articles/Best+Practices/61537/

For better answers on performance questions, click on the following...
http://www.sqlservercentral.com/articles/SQLServerCentral/66909/

Post #554742

Phil Factor

Posted Tuesday, August 19, 2008 1:41 AM

Mr or Mrs. 500

Group: General Forum Members
Last Login: Sunday, May 19, 2013 4:00 AM
Points: 533, Visits: 2,285

I hope I'm not mentioning anything that you are covering in subsequent articles, but when you need row and column totals, averages, or other aggregations, then suddenly the CUBE and ROLLUP operators start to become very useful. To take your example....

SELECT
   COALESCE(CONVERT(CHAR(4),YEAR),'Sum'),
   STR(SUM(CASE WHEN Quarter = 1 THEN Amount ELSE 0 END),5,1) AS [1st Qtr],
   STR(SUM(CASE WHEN Quarter = 2 THEN Amount ELSE 0 END),5,1) AS [2nd Qtr],
   STR(SUM(CASE WHEN Quarter = 3 THEN Amount ELSE 0 END),5,1) AS [3rd Qtr],
   STR(SUM(CASE WHEN Quarter = 4 THEN Amount ELSE 0 END),5,1) AS [4th Qtr],
        STR(SUM(Amount),5,1) AS Total
FROM #SomeTable1
GROUP BY YEAR WITH ROLLUP ORDER BY GROUPING(YEAR)

/*
     1st Qtr 2nd Qtr 3rd Qtr 4th Qtr Total
---- ------- ------- ------- ------- -----
2006   1.1     1.2     1.3     1.4     5.0
2007   2.1     2.2     2.3     2.4     9.0
2008   1.5     0.0     2.3     1.9     5.7
Sum    4.7     3.4     5.9     5.7    19.7
*/

I love crosstabs and pivot-tables. Soothing, they are, like knitting.

Best wishes,

Phil Factor
Simple Talk

Post #554784

Ian Gibson-270409

Posted Tuesday, August 19, 2008 3:55 AM

SSC Journeyman

Group: General Forum Members
Last Login: Wednesday, November 25, 2009 8:51 AM
Points: 77, Visits: 63

That's interesting. I had my doubts as to how useful pivot might be. It's good to see it backed up by examples and statistics.
I'm looking forward to what you have to say about dynamic cross tabs. I recently had to do a cross tab for an electronic voting system using proportional representation where each election can have a different number of candidates. The only solution I could come up with in the time available works but is so complicated as to be ridiculous.

Post #554831

Peter Smith-247883

Posted Tuesday, August 19, 2008 5:01 AM

Forum Newbie

Group: General Forum Members
Last Login: Thursday, August 04, 2011 1:56 AM
Points: 2, Visits: 15

Jeff Moden (8/18/2008)

Comments posted to this topic are about the item

What a performance! Access SQL had the Pivot command from 1992, it's taken 13 years for SQL proper to catch up. About to convert an Access db to a SQL Express back-end. I imagine the X-tab queries will be a major nightmare.
pj

Post #554865

Jeff Moden

Posted Tuesday, August 19, 2008 5:03 AM

SSC-Dedicated

Group: General Forum Members
Last Login: Today @ 5:13 AM
Points: 32,906, Visits: 26,793

Phil Factor (8/19/2008)

Actually, you did, Phil... I'm devestated... ;)

True enough... that will be in a subsequent article, but you've stolen no thunder. Thank you for the feedback ol' friend.

--Jeff Moden

Post #554870

Jeff Moden

Posted Tuesday, August 19, 2008 5:09 AM

SSC-Dedicated

Group: General Forum Members
Last Login: Today @ 5:13 AM
Points: 32,906, Visits: 26,793

Peter Smith (8/19/2008)

Jeff Moden (8/18/2008)

Comments posted to this topic are about the item

I agree... thanks for the feedback, Peter. You'd think that if MS wanted to make it easier, they'd have come up with something a lot easier than Pivot syntax. What would be interesting would be to do a million row test on manual cross-tab vs the automatic cross-tab functionality in Access. If it's done right, the automatic cross-tab should should win by a significant margin.

--Jeff Moden

Post #554878

Peter Smith-247883

Posted Tuesday, August 19, 2008 5:19 AM

Forum Newbie

Group: General Forum Members
Last Login: Thursday, August 04, 2011 1:56 AM
Points: 2, Visits: 15

Jeff, I've copied your code. Maybe it will reduce the bad language as the upscaling to SQL takes place. Thanks for the article.

Post #554888

ChiragNS

Posted Tuesday, August 19, 2008 5:24 AM

SSCrazy

Group: General Forum Members
Last Login: Wednesday, April 24, 2013 5:02 AM
Points: 2,365, Visits: 1,825

gr8 article Jeff. Keep them coming.

"Keep Trying"

Post #554895

Paul DB

Posted Tuesday, August 19, 2008 6:29 AM

Valued Member

Group: General Forum Members
Last Login: Tuesday, May 14, 2013 12:07 PM
Points: 60, Visits: 257

That was an amazing article. w00t

Thanks so much, Jeff.

Paul DB

Post #554947

Jack Corbett

Posted Tuesday, August 19, 2008 6:35 AM

SSChampion

Group: General Forum Members
Last Login: Friday, May 17, 2013 12:22 PM
Points: 10,571, Visits: 11,871

Hey Jeff, good article. It's funny I have answered several forum questions recently using a Case embedded in an aggregate. They weren't crosstabs exactly, but similar. So, after having answered these questions I decided to post it on my blog, hoping someone might stumble upon it on a search. I was even considering submitting an article to SSC on it, but you beat me to the punch. At least the info is out there and with much more performance testing done on it than I would have done. Looking forward to the rest of the series.

Jack Corbett

Applications Developer

Don't let the good be the enemy of the best. -- Paul Fleming

Check out these links on how to get faster and more accurate answers:
Forum Etiquette: How to post data/code on a forum to get the best help
Need an Answer? Actually, No ... You Need a Question
How to Post Performance Problems
Crosstabs and Pivots or How to turn rows into columns Part 1
Crosstabs and Pivots or How to turn rows into columns Part 2

Post #554952

« Prev Topic | Next Topic »

238 posts, Page 1 of 24

1 2 3 4 5 »»»

Permissions