Question

I need to do a join on two tables, I need EVERYTHING from table A, and just the stuff from table B where the ‘REF’ for each row, is not already in table A’s results.

Key Facts:
Table B contains the complete amount of ID’s/Names however all the other information is blank. Its basically just a table with all employee’s name’s and id’s but its a complete list.
Table A contains a limited amount of results but all the other columns have data in them.

What I need is to use Table B as a complete reference rather than just see what exists in table A so basically:

“Show me everything from table A, and add the extra people’s details
found in table B where they dont already exist in table A to give me a complete result set”

select
ID,
Name,
StartDate,
EndDate,
State,
Status,
Comment,
IsComment
from
tableA


select
ID,
Name,
StartDate,
EndDate,
State,
Status,
Comment,
IsComment
from
tableB

Table A contents:

ID       Name     START_DATE       END_DATE      STATE    Status     Comment    Is_Comment
6760    chris       2012-09-03      2012-09-09   4       Applied                   0
6524     dave     2012-09-03        2012-09-09    4        Applied                 0
4268     james    2012-09-03        2012-09-09    4        Applied    Friday-Off   1
7851     rob      2012-09-03        2012-09-09    4       Applied                  0

Table B contents

    ID        Name     START_DATE       END_DATE      STATE    Status     Comment    Is_Comment
    6760    Chris   
    6524    dave    
    4268    james   
    7851    rob      
    4521    ryan
    5698   julie
    4596    rory
    1111     mary
    5621     owain
    9999     jacob

After the join what I want to see:

    ID       Name     START_DATE       END_DATE      STATE    Status     Comment    Is_Comment

    6760    chris       2012-09-03      2012-09-09   4       Applied                   0
    6524     dave     2012-09-03        2012-09-09    4        Applied                 0
    4268     james    2012-09-03        2012-09-09    4        Applied    Friday-Off   1
    7851     rob      2012-09-03        2012-09-09    4       Applied                  0   
   4521    ryan
   5698    julie
   4596    rory
  1111     mary
  5621     owain
  9999     jacob

Answer 1

Use a Left join

SELECT [columnsListYouNeed]
FROM  TableB 
LEFT JOIN TableA ON TableA.ID = TableB.ID