Auto number similar data

Question

I have a request to create a query that will number items that have similar data in fields.
For instance data like this
OwnerName Location Item
John NY CAR
John NY Truck
John NY VAN
Bill Ca Truck
Bill CA Car
Bill CA VAN
Joe IL Bike
Joe IL RV
Joe IL Truck
They want this data to be spit out like the below example appending the location with a number for each group like this
OwnerName Location Item
John NY -001 CAR
John NY -002 Truck
John NY -003 VAN
Bill Ca -001 Truck
Bill CA -002 Car
Bill CA -003 VAN
Joe IL -001 Bike
Joe IL -002 RV
Joe IL -003 Truck
I am at a loss out exactly how to do this, Using Oracle 10g. I thought maybe a temp table or something but not real sure.
I am more of a MS Sql Server guy.
Any ideas much appreciated thanks!!!

Answer 1

Hi,
This sounds like a job for the analytic ROW_NUMBER function:
SELECT     ownername
,     location || '-'
           || TO_CHAR ( ROW_NUMBER () OVER ( PARTITION BY  ownername, UPPER (location)
                                 ORDER BY      item
                   , 'FM000'
                   )     AS location_plus
,     item
FROM     table_x
gtjr wrote:I have a request to create a query that will number items that have similar data in fields. Which fields? It's unlcear whether you want a separate set of numbers (1, 2, 3, ...) for each ownername, or each loaction, or each distinct comination of ownername and location. I assumed that it was for each combination of ownername and location (case insenitive, so 'Ca' and 'CA' in your sample data are considered the same), so that if you added a row with onwername='Joe' and location='NY', it would be numbered 1, not 4. If I guessed wrong, just change the analytic PARTITION BY clause.
John NY -001 CAR
John NY -002 Truck
John NY -003 VAN
Bill Ca -001 Truck
Bill CA -002 Car
Bill CA -003 VAN ...It's also unclear in what order you want the numbers assigned. I don';t understand why you want the 'CAR' in 'NY' to be number 1, and the 'Truck' to be 2, but just the opposite in 'CA'. The query above will assign them in order by item: a 'Car' will always be numbered lower than a 'Truck', and a 'Truck' will alwyas be lower than a 'Van' for the same ownername and location. Whatever order you want, change the analytic ORDER BY clause accordingly. You must have an analytic ORDER BY clause, however, even if it's only ORDER BY NULL.
I am at a loss out exactly how to do this, Using Oracle 10g. I thought maybe a temp table or something but not real sure.
I am more of a MS Sql Server guy. In Oracle, temporary tables are almost never the right way to do anything.
I hope this answers your question.
If not, post a little sample data (CREATE TABLE and INSERT statements, relevant columns only), and the results you want from that data.
Explain how you get those results from that data.