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| <div class="refentry" id="SQL-VALUES"> |
| <div class="titlepage"></div><a class="indexterm" id="id-1.9.3.185.1" name="id-1.9.3.185.1"></a> |
| <div class="refnamediv"> |
| <h2><span class="refentrytitle">VALUES</span></h2> |
| <p>VALUES — compute a set of rows</p> |
| </div> |
| <div class="refsynopsisdiv"> |
| <h2>Synopsis</h2> |
| <pre class="synopsis">VALUES ( <em class="replaceable"><code>expression</code></em> [, ...] ) [, ...] |
| [ ORDER BY <em class="replaceable"><code>sort_expression</code></em> [ ASC | DESC | USING <em class="replaceable"><code>operator</code></em> ] [, ...] ] |
| [ LIMIT { <em class="replaceable"><code>count</code></em> | ALL } ] |
| [ OFFSET <em class="replaceable"><code>start</code></em> [ ROW | ROWS ] ] |
| [ FETCH { FIRST | NEXT } [ <em class="replaceable"><code>count</code></em> ] { ROW | ROWS } ONLY ] |
| </pre> |
| </div> |
| <div class="refsect1" id="id-1.9.3.185.5"> |
| <h2>Description</h2> |
| <p><code class="command">VALUES</code> computes a row value or set of row values specified by value expressions. It is most commonly used to generate a <span class="quote">“<span class="quote">constant table</span>”</span> within a larger command, but it can be used on its own.</p> |
| <p>When more than one row is specified, all the rows must have the same number of elements. The data types of the resulting table's columns are determined by combining the explicit or inferred types of the expressions appearing in that column, using the same rules as for <code class="literal">UNION</code> (see <a class="xref" href="/docs/current/static/typeconv-union-case.html" title="10.5. UNION, CASE, and Related Constructs">Section 10.5</a>).</p> |
| <p>Within larger commands, <code class="command">VALUES</code> is syntactically allowed anywhere that <code class="command">SELECT</code> is. Because it is treated like a <code class="command">SELECT</code> by the grammar, it is possible to use the <code class="literal">ORDER BY</code>, <code class="literal">LIMIT</code> (or equivalently <code class="literal">FETCH FIRST</code>), and <code class="literal">OFFSET</code> clauses with a <code class="command">VALUES</code> command.</p> |
| </div> |
| <div class="refsect1" id="id-1.9.3.185.6"> |
| <h2>Parameters</h2> |
| <div class="variablelist"> |
| <dl class="variablelist"> |
| <dt><span class="term"><em class="replaceable"><code>expression</code></em></span></dt> |
| <dd> |
| <p>A constant or expression to compute and insert at the indicated place in the resulting table (set of rows). In a <code class="command">VALUES</code> list appearing at the top level of an <code class="command">INSERT</code>, an <em class="replaceable"><code>expression</code></em> can be replaced by <code class="literal">DEFAULT</code> to indicate that the destination column's default value should be inserted. <code class="literal">DEFAULT</code> cannot be used when <code class="command">VALUES</code> appears in other contexts.</p> |
| </dd> |
| <dt><span class="term"><em class="replaceable"><code>sort_expression</code></em></span></dt> |
| <dd> |
| <p>An expression or integer constant indicating how to sort the result rows. This expression can refer to the columns of the <code class="command">VALUES</code> result as <code class="literal">column1</code>, <code class="literal">column2</code>, etc. For more details see <a class="xref" href="/docs/current/static/sql-select.html#SQL-ORDERBY" title="ORDER BY Clause">ORDER BY Clause</a> in the <a class="xref" href="/docs/current/static/sql-select.html" title="SELECT"><span class="refentrytitle">SELECT</span></a> documentation.</p> |
| </dd> |
| <dt><span class="term"><em class="replaceable"><code>operator</code></em></span></dt> |
| <dd> |
| <p>A sorting operator. For details see <a class="xref" href="/docs/current/static/sql-select.html#SQL-ORDERBY" title="ORDER BY Clause">ORDER BY Clause</a> in the <a class="xref" href="/docs/current/static/sql-select.html" title="SELECT"><span class="refentrytitle">SELECT</span></a> documentation.</p> |
| </dd> |
| <dt><span class="term"><em class="replaceable"><code>count</code></em></span></dt> |
| <dd> |
| <p>The maximum number of rows to return. For details see <a class="xref" href="/docs/current/static/sql-select.html#SQL-LIMIT" title="LIMIT Clause">LIMIT Clause</a> in the <a class="xref" href="/docs/current/static/sql-select.html" title="SELECT"><span class="refentrytitle">SELECT</span></a> documentation.</p> |
| </dd> |
| <dt><span class="term"><em class="replaceable"><code>start</code></em></span></dt> |
| <dd> |
| <p>The number of rows to skip before starting to return rows. For details see <a class="xref" href="/docs/current/static/sql-select.html#SQL-LIMIT" title="LIMIT Clause">LIMIT Clause</a> in the <a class="xref" href="/docs/current/static/sql-select.html" title="SELECT"><span class="refentrytitle">SELECT</span></a> documentation.</p> |
| </dd> |
| </dl> |
| </div> |
| </div> |
| <div class="refsect1" id="id-1.9.3.185.7"> |
| <h2>Notes</h2> |
| <p><code class="command">VALUES</code> lists with very large numbers of rows should be avoided, as you might encounter out-of-memory failures or poor performance. <code class="command">VALUES</code> appearing within <code class="command">INSERT</code> is a special case (because the desired column types are known from the <code class="command">INSERT</code>'s target table, and need not be inferred by scanning the <code class="command">VALUES</code> list), so it can handle larger lists than are practical in other contexts.</p> |
| </div> |
| <div class="refsect1" id="id-1.9.3.185.8"> |
| <h2>Examples</h2> |
| <p>A bare <code class="command">VALUES</code> command:</p> |
| <pre class="programlisting">VALUES (1, 'one'), (2, 'two'), (3, 'three'); |
| </pre> |
| <p>This will return a table of two columns and three rows. It's effectively equivalent to:</p> |
| <pre class="programlisting">SELECT 1 AS column1, 'one' AS column2 |
| UNION ALL |
| SELECT 2, 'two' |
| UNION ALL |
| SELECT 3, 'three'; |
| </pre> |
| <p>More usually, <code class="command">VALUES</code> is used within a larger SQL command. The most common use is in <code class="command">INSERT</code>:</p> |
| <pre class="programlisting">INSERT INTO films (code, title, did, date_prod, kind) |
| VALUES ('T_601', 'Yojimbo', 106, '1961-06-16', 'Drama'); |
| </pre> |
| <p>In the context of <code class="command">INSERT</code>, entries of a <code class="command">VALUES</code> list can be <code class="literal">DEFAULT</code> to indicate that the column default should be used here instead of specifying a value:</p> |
| <pre class="programlisting">INSERT INTO films VALUES |
| ('UA502', 'Bananas', 105, DEFAULT, 'Comedy', '82 minutes'), |
| ('T_601', 'Yojimbo', 106, DEFAULT, 'Drama', DEFAULT); |
| </pre> |
| <p><code class="command">VALUES</code> can also be used where a sub-<code class="command">SELECT</code> might be written, for example in a <code class="literal">FROM</code> clause:</p> |
| <pre class="programlisting">SELECT f.* |
| FROM films f, (VALUES('MGM', 'Horror'), ('UA', 'Sci-Fi')) AS t (studio, kind) |
| WHERE f.studio = t.studio AND f.kind = t.kind; |
|
|
| UPDATE employees SET salary = salary * v.increase |
| FROM (VALUES(1, 200000, 1.2), (2, 400000, 1.4)) AS v (depno, target, increase) |
| WHERE employees.depno = v.depno AND employees.sales >= v.target; |
| </pre> |
| <p>Note that an <code class="literal">AS</code> clause is required when <code class="command">VALUES</code> is used in a <code class="literal">FROM</code> clause, just as is true for <code class="command">SELECT</code>. It is not required that the <code class="literal">AS</code> clause specify names for all the columns, but it's good practice to do so. (The default column names for <code class="command">VALUES</code> are <code class="literal">column1</code>, <code class="literal">column2</code>, etc. in <span class="productname">PostgreSQL</span>, but these names might be different in other database systems.)</p> |
| <p>When <code class="command">VALUES</code> is used in <code class="command">INSERT</code>, the values are all automatically coerced to the data type of the corresponding destination column. When it's used in other contexts, it might be necessary to specify the correct data type. If the entries are all quoted literal constants, coercing the first is sufficient to determine the assumed type for all:</p> |
| <pre class="programlisting">SELECT * FROM machines |
| WHERE ip_address IN (VALUES('192.168.0.1'::inet), ('192.168.0.10'), ('192.168.1.43')); |
| </pre> |
| <div class="tip"> |
| <h3 class="title">Tip</h3> |
| <p>For simple <code class="literal">IN</code> tests, it's better to rely on the <a class="link" href="/docs/current/static/functions-comparisons.html#FUNCTIONS-COMPARISONS-IN-SCALAR" title="9.25.1. IN">list-of-scalars</a> form of <code class="literal">IN</code> than to write a <code class="command">VALUES</code> query as shown above. The list of scalars method requires less writing and is often more efficient.</p> |
| </div> |
| </div> |
| <div class="refsect1" id="id-1.9.3.185.9"> |
| <h2>Compatibility</h2> |
| <p><code class="command">VALUES</code> conforms to the SQL standard. <code class="literal">LIMIT</code> and <code class="literal">OFFSET</code> are <span class="productname">PostgreSQL</span> extensions; see also under <a class="xref" href="/docs/current/static/sql-select.html" title="SELECT"><span class="refentrytitle">SELECT</span></a>.</p> |
| </div> |
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| <h2>See Also</h2><span class="simplelist"><a class="xref" href="/docs/current/static/sql-insert.html" title="INSERT"><span class="refentrytitle">INSERT</span></a>, <a class="xref" href="/docs/current/static/sql-select.html" title="SELECT"><span class="refentrytitle">SELECT</span></a></span> |
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