Select top 10 records for each category

Question

I want to return top 10 records from each section in one query. Can anyone help with how to do it? Section is one of the columns in the table.

Database is SQL Serve

Answer 1

If we use SQL Server >= 2005, then we can solve the task with one select only:

declare @t table (
    Id      int ,
    Section int,
    Moment  date
);

insert into @t values
(   1   ,   1   , '2014-01-01'),
(   2   ,   1   , '2014-01-02'),
(   3   ,   1   , '2014-01-03'),
(   4   ,   1   , '2014-01-04'),
(   5   ,   1   , '2014-01-05'),

(   6   ,   2   , '2014-02-06'),
(   7   ,   2   , '2014-02-07'),
(   8   ,   2   , '2014-02-08'),
(   9   ,   2   , '2014-02-09'),
(   10  ,   2   , '2014-02-10'),

(   11  ,   3   , '2014-03-11'),
(   12  ,   3   , '2014-03-12'),
(   13  ,   3   , '2014-03-13'),
(   14  ,   3   , '2014-03-14'),
(   15  ,   3   , '2014-03-15');


-- TWO earliest records in each Section

select top 1 with ties
    Id, Section, Moment 
from
    @t
order by 
    case 
        when row_number() over(partition by Section order by Moment) <= 2 
        then 0 
        else 1 
    end;


-- THREE earliest records in each Section

select top 1 with ties
    Id, Section, Moment 
from
    @t
order by 
    case 
        when row_number() over(partition by Section order by Moment) <= 3 
        then 0 
        else 1 
    end;


-- three LATEST records in each Section

select top 1 with ties
    Id, Section, Moment 
from
    @t
order by 
    case 
        when row_number() over(partition by Section order by Moment desc) <= 3 
        then 0 
        else 1 
    end;