grabbing first row in a mysql query only

Question

if i had a query such as

select * from tbl_foo where name = \'sarmen\'

and this table has multiple instances of name = sarmen how can i vir

Answer 1

You didn't specify how the order is determined, but this will give you a rank value in MySQL:

SELECT t.*,
       @rownum := @rownum +1 AS rank
  FROM TBL_FOO t
  JOIN (SELECT @rownum := 0) r
 WHERE t.name = 'sarmen'

Then you can pick out what rows you want, based on the rank value.