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SQL Sorting Data into a Pattern

Answer 1

A:

Don't know if it works, but in Oracle I would try to create a view in which you use ROWNUM in the query of your view.

Then query the view and sort on:

rownum modulo 2
the string

I don't have my database at hand here to test this, but this tip might give you some ideas.

Patrick 2010-02-14 23:19:21

Answer 2

+5 A:

If your column were called "col", and your table were named "table", I would try something like this:

WITH Indexes AS (
    SELECT 
    ROW_NUMBER() OVER (PARTITION BY col ORDER BY col) as __row,
    col
    FROM table)
SELECT col
FROM Indexes
ORDER BY __row, col;

Dave Markle 2010-02-14 23:21:34

+1: This is more general than my solution which works only for 2 copies.

Mark Byers 2010-02-14 23:27:19

wow - that's awesome!

Daniel 2010-02-14 23:28:26

+1 I'd never have thought of using "PARTITION BY col ORDER BY col"

gbn 2010-02-15 04:58:42

Actually, it really doesn't matter what you order by, because all of the values are the same within any given partition. I just chose col because it was convenient. You could order by anything.

Dave Markle 2010-02-15 05:17:26

Answer 3

A:

Mysql, assuming you have table T(a varchar); with the data you provided:

select @t:=a from T order by @t <> a;

it works :-)

Qwerty 2010-02-14 23:24:05

Oops... just saw you need SQL Server 2005

Qwerty 2010-02-14 23:25:15

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