ORDER BY date and time BEFORE GROUP BY name in mysql

Question

i have a table like this:

name    date         time
tom | 2011-07-04 | 01:09:52
tom | 2011-07-04 | 01:09:52
mad | 2011-07-04 | 02:10:53
mad | 2009-06-03 | 00         


        

Answer 1

Another method:

SELECT * 
FROM (
    SELECT * FROM table_name
    ORDER BY date ASC, time ASC 
) AS sub
GROUP BY name

GROUP BY groups on the first matching result it hits. If that first matching hit happens to be the one you want then everything should work as expected.

I prefer this method as the subquery makes logical sense rather than peppering it with other conditions.