Alternatives to USING in a JOIN for SQL Server for avoiding duplicated columns in joined table

Question

SQL Server does not offer the keyword USING in the context of a JOIN,
nor it provides a NATURAL JOIN.

Besides explicitly (manually) listing all the columns (link

Answer 1

The only alternative is to avoid SELECTing *:

TableA

foo | bar
---------

TableB

foo | baz
---------

When selecting * from both tables, you'll end up with 2 columns named foo, which is not allowed in a single table.

Name the selected columns using unique names, and this will work.

SELECT INTO #TableTemp t1.foo foo1, t1.bar, t2.foo foo2, t2.baz
FROM tableA t1
INNER JOIN tableB t2 ON t1.foo = t2.foo

But while you're at it, no need to insert the common column twice (as t1.foo = t2.foo). Select just one of them:

SELECT INTO #TableTemp t1.foo, t1.bar, t2.baz
FROM tableA t1
INNER JOIN tableB t2 ON t1.foo = t2.foo

EDIT: As stated by Philip Kelley, this problem only occurs when you try to save the resultset into a table. As long as you only select data, everything works fine with duplicate column names.