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Databases SQL Basics Finding the Data You Want Filtering Out or Finding Missing Information

Posted by Daniel Berger
Daniel Berger
4,820 Points

When using the wildcard (%) on the LIKE function, when is it appropriate to use 1 or 2 wildcards

When using the wildcard (%) on the LIKE function, when is it appropriate to use 1 or 2 wildcards

1 Answer

Indiya Gooch
Indiya Gooch
12,075 Points

The LIKE operator is used with the WHERE clause to search for a specified pattern in a column. These patterns are created with Wildcards, whereby a Wildcard character is used to substitute one or more characters in a string.

The % Wildcard represents zero, one, or more characters.

For example:

-- find any values that start with "a" such as apple, apricot, accordion, abacus.

WHERE​ columnName ​LIKE 'a%'​;

-- find any values that end with "a" such as computerphobia, mozzarella.

WHERE​ columnName ​LIKE '%a'​;

-- find any values that have "are" in any position such as care, mozzarella, parenteral.

WHERE​ columnName ​LIKE '%are%'​;