Question

I have a categories table that looks like this:

id | name       | parent    
-----------------------    
1  | Toys       | 1
2  | Clothing   | 1
3  | Kid's Toys | 0 

I have another table called category_relationships which looks like this:

id | category_id | parent_id    
----------------------------    
1  | 3           | 1

I want to have the following output:

Categories:

Toys
  - Kid's Toys
Clothing

How to achieve this with one query?

Answer 1

A better/proper/robust answer will probably be create a MySQL PROCEDURE for this, but if your data can fit in these limitations, you can use the below:

• no more than 5 levels (or expand the pattern as required)
• IDs are no more than 6 digits (or change the concat expressions)

This query uses Concat to build a sortable reference so that children of A come after A etc. The names are indented manually using concat and leading spaces.

    select concat(1000000 + a.id, '|') SORT
          ,a.name
    from categories a
    where a.parent = 1 # top level parents only
union all
    select concat(1000000 + a.id, '|', 
             1000000 + IFNULL(b.id,0), '|')
          ,concat('  - ', b.name)
    from categories a
    inner join category_relationships a1 on a1.parent_id = a.id
    inner join categories b on b.id = a1.category_id
    where a.parent = 1
union all
    select concat(1000000 + a.id, '|', 
             1000000 + IFNULL(b.id,0), '|',
             1000000 + IFNULL(c.id,0), '|')
          ,concat('    - ', c.name)
    from categories a
    inner join category_relationships a1 on a1.parent_id = a.id
    inner join categories b on b.id = a1.category_id
    inner join category_relationships b1 on b1.parent_id = b.id
    inner join categories c on c.id = b1.category_id
    where a.parent = 1
union all
    select concat(1000000 + a.id, '|', 
             1000000 + IFNULL(b.id,0), '|',
             1000000 + IFNULL(c.id,0), '|',
             1000000 + IFNULL(d.id,0), '|')
          ,concat('      - ', d.name)
    from categories a
    inner join category_relationships a1 on a1.parent_id = a.id
    inner join categories b on b.id = a1.category_id
    inner join category_relationships b1 on b1.parent_id = b.id
    inner join categories c on c.id = b1.category_id
    inner join category_relationships c1 on c1.parent_id = c.id
    inner join categories d on d.id = c1.category_id
    where a.parent = 1
union all
    select concat(1000000 + a.id, '|', 
             1000000 + IFNULL(b.id,0), '|',
             1000000 + IFNULL(c.id,0), '|',
             1000000 + IFNULL(d.id,0), '|',
             1000000 + IFNULL(e.id,0))
          ,concat('        - ', e.name)
    from categories a
    inner join category_relationships a1 on a1.parent_id = a.id
    inner join categories b on b.id = a1.category_id
    inner join category_relationships b1 on b1.parent_id = b.id
    inner join categories c on c.id = b1.category_id
    inner join category_relationships c1 on c1.parent_id = c.id
    inner join categories d on d.id = c1.category_id
    inner join category_relationships d1 on d1.parent_id = d.id
    inner join categories e on e.id = d1.category_id
    order by SORT