Question

This may sound like a strange question but I am trying to use the distinct clause in order to get all the names in a database however I want the first name to be unique

Table structure

id   fname   lname   haircolor
1    john    doe     brown
2    bob     seagal  blonde
3    kevin   smith   red
4    bob     doe     green

Desired output

john doe brown
bob seagal blonde
kevin smith red

I have tried

SELECT fname, lname, haircolor
FROM MainTable
INNER JOIN (select distinct frame from MainTable) as Names
ON MainTable.fname=Names.fname 

This has not worked. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

Answer 1

Try using GROUP BY instead:

SELECT fname, lname, haircolor
FROM yourtable
WHERE id IN
(
    SELECT MIN(id) FROM yourtable GROUP BY fname
)