Fetching linked list in MySQL database

Question

I have a MySQL database table with this structure:

table
    id INT NOT NULL PRIMARY KEY
    data ..
    next_id INT NULL

I need to fetch t

Answer 1

This is less a solution and more of a workaround but, for a linear list (rather than the tree Bill Karwin mentioned), it might be more efficient to use a sort column on your list. For example:

TABLE `schema`.`my_table` (
    `id` INT NOT NULL PRIMARY KEY,
    `order` INT,
    data ..,
    INDEX `ix_order` (`sort_order` ASC)
);

Then:

SELECT * FROM `schema`.`my_table` ORDER BY `order`;

This has the disadvantage of slower inserts (you have to reposition all sorted elements past the insertion point) but should be fast for retrieval because the order column is indexed.