SQL in a Nutshell

Name

FETCH

Synopsis

The FETCH command is one of four commands used in cursor processes. FETCH retrieves a specific row from a server-side cursor.

Vendor	Command
SQL Server	Supported
MySQL	Not supported
Oracle	Supported, with variations
PostgreSQL	Supported, with variations

SQL99 Syntax and Description

The FETCH command retrieves a record from the cursor_name (created by the DECLARE CURSOR statement), based on either the NEXT, PRIOR, FIRST, LAST, ABSOLUTE, or RELATIVE keyword. The values retrieved by the FETCH statement optionally may be stored in variables. The FETCH operations are:

NEXT

Tells the cursor to return the record immediately following the current row, and increments the current row to the row returned. FETCH NEXT is the default behavior for FETCH and retrieves the first record if it is performed as the first fetch against a cursor. (PostgreSQL uses the keyword FORWARD or the string FETCH RELATIVE NEXT.)

PRIOR

Tells the cursor to return the record immediately preceding the current row, and decrements the current row to the row returned. FETCH PRIOR does not retrieve a record if it is performed as the first fetch against the cursor. (PostgreSQL uses the keyword BACKWARD or the string FETCH RELATIVE PRIOR.)

FIRST

Tells the cursor to return the first record in the cursor and makes it the current row. (Not supported by PostgreSQL.)

LAST

Tells the cursor to return the last record in the cursor and makes it the current row. (Not supported by PostgreSQL.)

ABSOLUTE ...