Question

In a not normalized table structure I need to select the first not empty (length != 0 and not null) column for each zip code.

Table Layout (Both columns are text):

| ZIP   | Contact | ...
| 69123 |         | 
| 69123 | WS      | 
| 54516 | null    | 
| 54516 | CS      | 
| 72226 | RH      | 
| 72226 | PH      | 

The Result should look like this:

| ZIP   | Contact | ...
| 69123 | WS      | 
| 54516 | CS      | 
| 72226 | RH      | 

Something like this:

SELECT ZIP, fristNotEmpty(Contact) 
FROM masterdata GROUP BY ZIP

Answer 1

SELECT ZIP, 
       min(Contact)
FROM masterdata
where Contact is not null and length(Contact) > 0
GROUP BY ZIP