Get the minimum value between several columns

Question

I\'m using SQL Server 2008;

Suppose I have a table \'X\' with columns \'Date1\', \'Date2\', \'Dateblah\', all of type DateTime.

I want to select the min valu

Answer 1

Simply lets say the table where your dates are is called sells and it has two date fields Date1 and Date2 from which you want the minimum.

SELECT ( 
   SELECT MIN([x]) 
   FROM (VALUES(Date1),(Date2)) x([x])
) as minimum
FROM sells