MySQL Cookbook

Specifying Which Columns to Display

Problem

You want to display some or all of the columns from a table.

Solution

Use * as a shortcut that selects all columns. Or name the columns you want to see explicitly.

Discussion

To indicate what kind of information you want to see from a table, name a column or a list of columns and the table to use. The easiest way to select output columns is to use the * specifier, which is a shortcut for naming all the columns in a table:

mysql> SELECT * FROM mail;
+---------------------+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+
| t                   | srcuser | srchost | dstuser | dsthost | size    |
+---------------------+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+
| 2001-05-11 10:15:08 | barb    | saturn  | tricia  | mars    |   58274 |
| 2001-05-12 12:48:13 | tricia  | mars    | gene    | venus   |  194925 |
| 2001-05-12 15:02:49 | phil    | mars    | phil    | saturn  |    1048 |
| 2001-05-13 13:59:18 | barb    | saturn  | tricia  | venus   |     271 |
...

Alternatively, you can list the columns explicitly:

mysql> SELECT t, srcuser, srchost, dstuser, dsthost, size  FROM mail; +---------------------+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+ | t | srcuser | srchost | dstuser | dsthost | size | +---------------------+---------+---------+---------+---------+---------+ | 2001-05-11 10:15:08 | barb | saturn | tricia | mars | 58274 | | 2001-05-12 12:48:13 | tricia | mars | gene | venus | 194925 | | 2001-05-12 15:02:49 | phil | mars | phil | saturn | 1048 | | 2001-05-13 13:59:18 | barb | saturn | tricia ...