Question

I’m trying to learn Oracle SQL by database Supplied by it.
I found somewhere tasks to be done.
Database structure is supplied by Oracle:

CREATE TABLE EMP
(EMPNO NUMERIC(4) NOT NULL,
ENAME VARCHAR(10),
JOB VARCHAR(9),
MGR NUMERIC(4),
HIREDATE DATETIME,
SAL NUMERIC(7, 2),
COMM NUMERIC(7, 2),
DEPTNO NUMERIC(2))

INSERT INTO EMP VALUES
(7369, 'SMITH', 'CLERK', 7902, '17-DEC-1980', 800, NULL, 20)
INSERT INTO EMP VALUES
(7499, 'ALLEN', 'SALESMAN', 7698, '20-FEB-1981', 1600, 300, 30)
INSERT INTO EMP VALUES
(7521, 'WARD', 'SALESMAN', 7698, '22-FEB-1981', 1250, 500, 30)
INSERT INTO EMP VALUES
(7566, 'JONES', 'MANAGER', 7839, '2-APR-1981', 2975, NULL, 20)
INSERT INTO EMP VALUES
(7654, 'MARTIN', 'SALESMAN', 7698, '28-SEP-1981', 1250, 1400, 30)
INSERT INTO EMP VALUES
(7698, 'BLAKE', 'MANAGER', 7839, '1-MAY-1981', 2850, NULL, 30)
INSERT INTO EMP VALUES
(7782, 'CLARK', 'MANAGER', 7839, '9-JUN-1981', 2450, NULL, 10)
INSERT INTO EMP VALUES
(7788, 'SCOTT', 'ANALYST', 7566, '09-DEC-1982', 3000, NULL, 20)
INSERT INTO EMP VALUES
(7839, 'KING', 'PRESIDENT', NULL, '17-NOV-1981', 5000, NULL, 10)
INSERT INTO EMP VALUES
(7844, 'TURNER', 'SALESMAN', 7698, '8-SEP-1981', 1500, 0, 30)
INSERT INTO EMP VALUES
(7876, 'ADAMS', 'CLERK', 7788, '12-JAN-1983', 1100, NULL, 20)
INSERT INTO EMP VALUES
(7900, 'JAMES', 'CLERK', 7698, '3-DEC-1981', 950, NULL, 30)
INSERT INTO EMP VALUES
(7902, 'FORD', 'ANALYST', 7566, '3-DEC-1981', 3000, NULL, 20)
INSERT INTO EMP VALUES
(7934, 'MILLER', 'CLERK', 7782, '23-JAN-1982', 1300, NULL, 10)

CREATE TABLE DEPT
(DEPTNO NUMERIC(2),
DNAME VARCHAR(14),
LOC VARCHAR(13) )

INSERT INTO DEPT VALUES (10, 'ACCOUNTING', 'NEW YORK')
INSERT INTO DEPT VALUES (20, 'RESEARCH', 'DALLAS')
INSERT INTO DEPT VALUES (30, 'SALES', 'CHICAGO')
INSERT INTO DEPT VALUES (40, 'OPERATIONS', 'BOSTON')

CREATE TABLE BONUS
(ENAME VARCHAR(10),
JOB VARCHAR(9),
SAL NUMERIC,
COMM NUMERIC)

CREATE TABLE SALGRADE
(GRADE NUMERIC,
LOSAL NUMERIC,
HISAL NUMERIC)

INSERT INTO SALGRADE VALUES (1, 700, 1200)
INSERT INTO SALGRADE VALUES (2, 1201, 1400)
INSERT INTO SALGRADE VALUES (3, 1401, 2000)
INSERT INTO SALGRADE VALUES (4, 2001, 3000)
INSERT INTO SALGRADE VALUES (5, 3001, 9999)

Now I would like to Select employees that earn most in their department and salgrade.

I wrote something like this one:

select ename, salgrade.grade, dept.dname from emp, salgrade, dept
WHERE emp.sal BETWEEN salgrade.losal AND salgrade.hisal
AND emp.deptno = dept.deptno group by salgrade.grade,  dept.dname, emp.ename

But it’s not working properly.
The output is:

ENAME    GRADE   DNAME
SMITH    1   RESEARCH
BLAKE    4   SALES
FORD     4   RESEARCH
KING     5   ACCOUNTING
SCOTT    4   RESEARCH
MILLER   2   ACCOUNTING
TURNER   3   SALES
WARD     2   SALES
MARTIN   2   SALES
ADAMS    1   RESEARCH
JONES    4   RESEARCH
JAMES    1   SALES
CLARK    4   ACCOUNTING
ALLEN    3   SALES

Note rows:

WARD 2 SALES
MARTIN 2 SALES

2 people from same department and salgrade.

Could you point me my mistakes?

Answer 1

You are not filtering your query this is why you have all the employees displayed.

This would filter the employees that earn less than the max for their dept/grade:

SELECT ename, salgrade.grade, dept.dname
  FROM emp, salgrade, dept
 WHERE emp.sal BETWEEN salgrade.losal AND salgrade.hisal
   AND emp.deptno = dept.deptno
   AND emp.sal = (SELECT MAX(sal)
                    FROM emp emp_in, salgrade grade_in
                   WHERE emp_in.sal BETWEEN grade_in.losal AND grande_in.hisal
                     AND emp_in.deptno = emp.deptno
                     AND grade_in.losal = salgrade.losal)

You will still find duplicates because for instance, two people in sales earn the max salary for grade 2 (both Martin and Ward earn 1250). Either this is acceptable or you need some other criteria to only select one of them.

You can use the row_number analytic function to ensure that only one row is returned by grade/dept (note that Oracle will select arbitrarily one row when there are duplicates) :

SELECT * FROM (
  SELECT ename, salgrade.grade, dept.dname,
         row_number() OVER (PARTITION BY dept.deptno, salgrade.grade 
                            ORDER BY emp.sal DESC) rnk
    FROM emp, salgrade, dept
   WHERE emp.sal BETWEEN salgrade.losal AND salgrade.hisal
     AND emp.deptno = dept.deptno
) WHERE rnk = 1;

ENAME       GRADE DNAME          RNK
---------- ------ -------------- ---
MILLER          2 ACCOUNTING       1 
CLARK           4 ACCOUNTING       1 
KING            5 ACCOUNTING       1 
ADAMS           1 RESEARCH         1 
FORD            4 RESEARCH         1 
JAMES           1 SALES            1 
MARTIN          2 SALES            1 
ALLEN           3 SALES            1 
BLAKE           4 SALES            1