Question

Why am I getting ERROR 1222 (21000): The used SELECT statements have a different number of columns from the following?

SELECT * FROM friends
LEFT JOIN users AS u1 ON users.uid = friends.fid1
LEFT JOIN users AS u2 ON users.uid = friends.fid2
WHERE (friends.fid1 = 1) AND (friends.fid2 > 1)
UNION SELECT fid2 FROM friends
WHERE (friends.fid2  = 1) AND (friends.fid1 < 1)
ORDER BY RAND()
LIMIT 6;

users:

+------------+---------------+------+-----+---------+----------------+
| Field      | Type          | Null | Key | Default | Extra          |
+------------+---------------+------+-----+---------+----------------+
| uid        | int(11)       | NO   | PRI | NULL    | auto_increment |
| first_name | varchar(50)   | NO   |     | NULL    |                |
| last_name  | varchar(50)   | NO   |     | NULL    |                |
| email      | varchar(128)  | NO   | UNI | NULL    |                |
| mid        | varchar(40)   | NO   |     | NULL    |                |
| active     | enum('N','Y') | NO   |     | NULL    |                |
| password   | varchar(64)   | NO   |     | NULL    |                |
| sex        | enum('M','F') | YES  |     | NULL    |                |
| created    | datetime      | YES  |     | NULL    |                |
| last_login | datetime      | YES  |     | NULL    |                |
| pro        | enum('N','Y') | NO   |     | NULL    |                |
+------------+---------------+------+-----+---------+----------------+

friends:

+---------------+--------------------------------------+------+-----+---------+----------------+
| Field         | Type                                 | Null | Key | Default | Extra          |
+---------------+--------------------------------------+------+-----+---------+----------------+
| friendship_id | int(11)                              | NO   | MUL | NULL    | auto_increment |
| fid1          | int(11)                              | NO   | PRI | NULL    |                |
| fid2          | int(11)                              | NO   | PRI | NULL    |                |
| status        | enum('pending','accepted','ignored') | NO   |     | NULL    |                |
+---------------+--------------------------------------+------+-----+---------+----------------+

Answer 1

UNIONs (UNION and UNION ALL) require that all the queries being UNION’d have:

1. The same number of columns in the SELECT clause
2. The column data type has to match at each position

Your query has:

SELECT f.*, u1.*, u2.* ...
UNION 
SELECT fid2 FROM friends

The easiest re-write I have is:

   SELECT f.*, u.*
     FROM FRIENDS AS f
     JOIN USERS AS u ON u.uid = f.fid2
    WHERE f.fid1 = 1 
      AND f.fid2 > 1
UNION 
   SELECT f.*, u.*
     FROM FRIENDS AS f
     JOIN USERS AS u ON u.uid = f.fid1
    WHERE f.fid2  = 1 
      AND f.fid1 < 1
ORDER BY RAND()
LIMIT 6;

You’ve LEFT JOIN’d to the USERS table twice, but don’t appear to be using the information.