Help in join of two tables

Question

Hi,
I have following 2 tables
CREATE TABLE a
sr_no INT
CREATE TABLE b
sr_no INT,
startdate DATE,
remark VARCHAR2(30)
One to many mapping relationship exists between the two tables.
for each sr_no in table a ther exists multiple/no record in table b.
If there are multiple entries in table b for a single entry in table a,
then i want remark data which is corresponding to minimum of the startdate in table b
Example data of table b
1     10/15/2009     one
1     10/29/2009     one1
2     10/28/2009     two
3     10/27/2009     three
4     10/26/2009     four
minimum date of the first 2 records is 10/15/2009.so i want remark as "one" when i join the 2 tables.
How do we achieve that ?

Answer 1

Something like this?
SELECT  SUB.SR_NO
,       SUB.STARTDATE
,       B.REMARK
FROM
        SELECT  SR_NO
        ,       MIN(STARTDATE) AS STARTDATE
        FROM   B
        GROUP BY SR_NO
)       SUB
JOIN    B       ON B.SR_NO = SUB.SR_NO AND B.STARTDATE = SUB.STARTDATEThat is one possibility. There are many, many ways to achieve this kind of result.