Question

I’m new to SQLite and I’m trying to create a view of joined tables, where table_results references table_names. The user can add, edit and remove items from table_names, but they can not change the references within table_results. What I’m trying to accomplish is that if an entry in table_names is removed, during a JOIN table_names ON (table_results.name_id=table_names._id) will return all rows in table_results, but where a name entry is removed will display “NO NAME”

Example:

table_names:
_id name
1   John
2   Bill
3   Sally
4   Nancy

table_results:
_id  name_id  score_1  score_2
1    1        50       75
2    4        80       60
3    2        83       88
4    3        75       75
5    2        93       95

where:
Select table_results._id table_names.name, table_results.score_1, table_results.score_2
FROM table_results
JOIN table_names ON (table_reults.name_id = table_names._id);

produces:
1 John   50   75
2 Nancy  80   60
3 Bill   83   88
4 Sally  75   75
5 Bill   93   95

Now if the user was to remove Bill from table_names, the same query string would produce:

1 John   50   75
2 Nancy  80   60
4 Sally  75   75

My Question:
Is there a way to have the query that substitutes values when the join doesn’t find a match? I’d like the above example to produce the following output, but I’m not sure how to write the query string for SQL.

1 John     50   75
2 Nancy    80   60
3 NO NAME  83   88
4 Sally    75   75
5 NO NAME  93   95

Thanks for your help.

Answer 1

Sure, you are doing an inner join, just change it up to a left outer join..

SELECT table_results._id
       ,COALESCE(table_names.name, 'NO NAME') AS [name]
       ,table_results.score_1
       ,table_results.score_2
FROM table_results
LEFT OUTER JOIN table_names
    ON (table_reults.name_id = table_names._id);