How can I SELECT rows with MAX(Column value), DISTINCT by another column in SQL?

My table is:

id  home  datetime     player   resource
---|-----|------------|--------|---------
1  | 10  | 04/03/2009 | john   | 399 
2  | 11  | 04/03/2009 | juliet | 244
5  | 12  | 04/03/2009 | borat  | 555
3  | 10  | 03/03/2009 | john   | 300
4  | 11  | 03/03/2009 | juliet | 200
6  | 12  | 03/03/2009 | borat  | 500
7  | 13  | 24/12/2008 | borat  | 600
8  | 13  | 01/01/2009 | borat  | 700

I need to select each distinct home holding the maximum value of datetime.

Result would be:

id  home  datetime     player   resource 
---|-----|------------|--------|---------
1  | 10  | 04/03/2009 | john   | 399
2  | 11  | 04/03/2009 | juliet | 244
5  | 12  | 04/03/2009 | borat  | 555
8  | 13  | 01/01/2009 | borat  | 700

I have tried:

-- 1 ..by the MySQL manual: 

SELECT DISTINCT
  home,
  id,
  datetime AS dt,
  player,
  resource
FROM topten t1
WHERE datetime = (SELECT
  MAX(t2.datetime)
FROM topten t2
GROUP BY home)
GROUP BY datetime
ORDER BY datetime DESC

Doesn't work. Result-set has 130 rows although database holds 187. Result includes some duplicates of home.

-- 2 ..join

SELECT
  s1.id,
  s1.home,
  s1.datetime,
  s1.player,
  s1.resource
FROM topten s1
JOIN (SELECT
  id,
  MAX(datetime) AS dt
FROM topten
GROUP BY id) AS s2
  ON s1.id = s2.id
ORDER BY datetime 

Nope. Gives all the records.

-- 3 ..something exotic: 

With various results.

 Answers

You are so close! All you need to do is select BOTH the home and its max date time, then join back to the topten table on BOTH fields:

SELECT tt.*
FROM topten tt
INNER JOIN
    (SELECT home, MAX(datetime) AS MaxDateTime
    FROM topten
    GROUP BY home) groupedtt 
ON tt.home = groupedtt.home 
AND tt.datetime = groupedtt.MaxDateTime

---

The fastest MySQL solution, without inner queries and without GROUP BY:

SELECT m.*                    -- get the row that contains the max value
FROM topten m                 -- "m" from "max"
    LEFT JOIN topten b        -- "b" from "bigger"
        ON m.home = b.home    -- match "max" row with "bigger" row by `home`
        AND m.datetime < b.datetime           -- want "bigger" than "max"
WHERE b.datetime IS NULL      -- keep only if there is no bigger than max

Explanation:

Join the table with itself using the home column. The use of LEFT JOIN ensures all the rows from table m appear in the result set. Those that don't have a match in table b will have NULLs for the columns of b.

The other condition on the JOIN asks to match only the rows from b that have bigger value on the datetime column than the row from m.

Using the data posted in the question, the LEFT JOIN will produce this pairs:

+------------------------------------------+--------------------------------+
|              the row from `m`            |    the matching row from `b`   |
|------------------------------------------|--------------------------------|
| id  home  datetime     player   resource | id    home   datetime      ... |
|----|-----|------------|--------|---------|------|------|------------|-----|
| 1  | 10  | 04/03/2009 | john   | 399     | NULL | NULL | NULL       | ... | *
| 2  | 11  | 04/03/2009 | juliet | 244     | NULL | NULL | NULL       | ... | *
| 5  | 12  | 04/03/2009 | borat  | 555     | NULL | NULL | NULL       | ... | *
| 3  | 10  | 03/03/2009 | john   | 300     | 1    | 10   | 04/03/2009 | ... |
| 4  | 11  | 03/03/2009 | juliet | 200     | 2    | 11   | 04/03/2009 | ... |
| 6  | 12  | 03/03/2009 | borat  | 500     | 5    | 12   | 04/03/2009 | ... |
| 7  | 13  | 24/12/2008 | borat  | 600     | 8    | 13   | 01/01/2009 | ... |
| 8  | 13  | 01/01/2009 | borat  | 700     | NULL | NULL | NULL       | ... | *
+------------------------------------------+--------------------------------+

Finally, the WHERE clause keeps only the pairs that have NULLs in the columns of b (they are marked with * in the table above); this means, due to the second condition from the JOIN clause, the row selected from m has the biggest value in column datetime.

Read the SQL Antipatterns: Avoiding the Pitfalls of Database Programming book for other SQL tips.

---

I think this will give you the desired result:

SELECT   home, MAX(datetime)
FROM     my_table
GROUP BY home

BUT if you need other columns as well, just make a join with the original table (check Michael La Voie answer)

Best regards.

---

You can also try this one and for large tables query performance will be better. It works when there no more than two records for each home and their dates are different. Better general MySQL query is one from Michael La Voie above.

SELECT t1.id, t1.home, t1.date, t1.player, t1.resource
FROM   t_scores_1 t1 
INNER JOIN t_scores_1 t2
   ON t1.home = t2.home
WHERE t1.date > t2.date

Or in case of Postgres or those dbs that provide analytic functions try

SELECT t.* FROM 
(SELECT t1.id, t1.home, t1.date, t1.player, t1.resource
  , row_number() over (partition by t1.home order by t1.date desc) rw
 FROM   topten t1 
 INNER JOIN topten t2
   ON t1.home = t2.home
 WHERE t1.date > t2.date 
) t
WHERE t.rw = 1

---

SELECT  tt.*
FROM    TestTable tt 
INNER JOIN 
        (
        SELECT  coord, MAX(datetime) AS MaxDateTime 
        FROM    rapsa 
        GROUP BY
                krd 
        ) groupedtt
ON      tt.coord = groupedtt.coord
        AND tt.datetime = groupedtt.MaxDateTime

---

SELECT c1, c2, c3, c4, c5 FROM table1 WHERE c3 = (select max(c3) from table)

SELECT * FROM table1 WHERE c3 = (select max(c3) from table1)

---

Try this

select * from mytable a join
(select home, max(datetime) datetime
from mytable
group by home) b
 on a.home = b.home and a.datetime = b.datetime

Regards K

---

Why not using: SELECT home, MAX(datetime) AS MaxDateTime,player,resource FROM topten GROUP BY home Did I miss something?

---

@Michae The accepted answer will working fine in most of the cases but it fail for one for as below.

In case if there were 2 rows having HomeID and Datetime same the query will return both rows, not distinct HomeID as required, for that add Distinct in query as below.

SELECT DISTINCT tt.home  , tt.MaxDateTime
FROM topten tt
INNER JOIN
    (SELECT home, MAX(datetime) AS MaxDateTime
    FROM topten
    GROUP BY home) groupedtt 
ON tt.home = groupedtt.home 
AND tt.datetime = groupedtt.MaxDateTime