[HN Gopher] Waiting for SQL:202y: Group by All
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       Waiting for SQL:202y: Group by All
        
       Author : ingve
       Score  : 33 points
       Date   : 2025-11-11 09:08 UTC (5 days ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (peter.eisentraut.org)
 (TXT) w3m dump (peter.eisentraut.org)
        
       | Exuma wrote:
       | Also just let me reference the damn alias in a group by, FUCK
        
         | mberning wrote:
         | Some do. It would also be nice to reference by ordinal number
         | similar to order by. Very handy for quick and dirty queries. I
         | can see the issue though that people start to lean on it too
         | much.
        
         | sbuttgereit wrote:
         | At least in PostgreSQL, both by alias and ordinal are possible:
         | localhost(from SCB-MUSE-BOXX).postgres.scb.5432 [Sun Nov 16
         | 12:02:15 PST 2025]       > create table test (a_key integer
         | primary key, a_group integer, a_val numeric);       CREATE
         | TABLE       Time: 3.102 ms            localhost(from SCB-MUSE-
         | BOXX).postgres.scb.5432 [Sun Nov 16 12:02:25 PST 2025]       >
         | insert into test (a_key, a_group, a_val) values (1, 1, 5.5),
         | (2, 1, 2.6), (3, 2, 1.1), (4, 2, 6.5);       INSERT 0 4
         | Time: 2.302 ms            localhost(from SCB-MUSE-
         | BOXX).postgres.scb.5432 [Sun Nov 16 12:02:58 PST 2025]       >
         | select a_group AS my_group, sum(a_val) from test group by
         | my_group;        my_group | sum       ----------+-----
         | 2 | 7.6               1 | 8.1       (2 rows)              Time:
         | 4.124 ms       localhost(from SCB-MUSE-BOXX).postgres.scb.5432
         | [Sun Nov 16 12:03:15 PST 2025]       > select a_group AS
         | my_group, sum(a_val) from test group by 1;        my_group |
         | sum       ----------+-----               2 | 7.6
         | 1 | 8.1       (2 rows)              Time: 0.360 ms
        
         | kermatt wrote:
         | PostgreSQL and DuckDB support this, which makes MSSQL feel like
         | a dinosaur in context.
        
         | zX41ZdbW wrote:
         | I think it should be not only in GROUP BY, but in every
         | context, e.g., inside expressions in SELECT, WHERE, etc.
        
       | elygre wrote:
       | Let me reference fields as I create them:                 select
       | xxxxx as a            , a * 2 as b
        
         | zX41ZdbW wrote:
         | This will be great! One of the things ClickHouse has had since
         | 2016.
        
       | dorianmariecom wrote:
       | would be nice
        
       | cm2187 wrote:
       | Snowflake has that, once you start using it, it's painful to go
       | back.
        
       | elchief wrote:
       | duckdb has it
       | 
       | https://duckdb.org/docs/stable/sql/query_syntax/groupby
        
       | oulipo2 wrote:
       | Not directly related, but I saw this project recently of a data
       | language by google which is quite cool
       | https://www.malloydata.dev/
        
       | chewxy wrote:
       | BigQuery has that and I've been loving using it since they
       | introduced it
        
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       (page generated 2025-11-16 23:00 UTC)