Question

I have a table with the following data:

CUSIP   SEDOL   DESC
1111    NULL    ABC Corp
1234    NULL    ABCD Corp
NULL    12      ABCDE Corp

Now I have another table on a different databse server:

CUSIP   SEDOL   DESC
1111    18      ABC Corp
1234    19      ABCD Corp
1246    12      ABCDE Corp

How do i go about in populating the NULL values in the first table based on the values provided in table in a different database server? (I’m using SQL Server 2005)

Answer 1

update table1 set
sedol = (select sedol from database2.table2 where desc = table1.desc)
where sedol is null;

It is not clear from your question if cusip is what’s important, so you might need instead:

update table1 set
sedol = (select sedol from database2.table2 where cusip = table1.cusip)
where sedol is null;

To update cusip, use this:

update table1 set
cusip = (select cusip from database2.table2
         where desc = table1.desc
         and sedol = table2.sedol)
where cusip is null;