Hi, Now I'm wanting to retrieve the top ten data from a table using sqlplus but don't know exactly how. It works fine if I use: select corp_cd, sum(delq) from rcrnsas.dataworldbkbl_rdd group by corp_cd order by sum(delq) desc; But it won't work if I add 'limit 10' or 'top 10', like the following: select top 10 corp_cd, sum(delq) from rcrnsas.dataworldbkbl_rdd group by corp_cd order by sum(delq) desc; or select corp_cd, sum(delq) from rcrnsas.dataworldbkbl_rdd group by corp_cd order by sum(delq) desc limit 10; Could anyone kindly help answer? Thanks in advance!

I think the 'top 10' part of the statement limits the number of records used in the filter as opposed to returning the top 10 records after the filter's been applied, so you'll be getting an ordered list of the first 10 records instead of the 'top 10' of the whole list. You could try using your first SQL statement to store the results in a dataset (or similar) then use the 'top 10' thing on that to return the first ten records of that dataset. Phil

SELECT somecol FROM ( SELECT somecol FROM sometab ORDER BY somecol ) WHERE ROWNUM = 10; ORDER BY within an inline view requires 8i or above. You could also look at the analytic functions e.g. RANK.