Benefits Of Using SQL Ordinal Position Notation?

Question

Background Information

Ordinal position notation, AKA ordinals, is column shorthand based on the column order in the list of columns in the SELECT cla

Answer 1

The two use cases for me are:

• I am in a hurry and don't want to type, so I use the ordinal. I would always convert this to the column name for any non-temporary use
• the column I am ordering by is a lengthy CASE statement; rather than retyping the CASE statement for the ORDER BY clause, I use the ordinal which keeps it DRY. There are ways around this, e.g., using CTEs, subqueries, or view, but I often find the ordinal is the simplest solution.