Rank, Dense, First and Last functions with examples

 

RANK

Let's assume we want to assign a sequential order, or rank, to people within a department based on salary, we might use the RANK function like.

SELECT empno,
       deptno,
       sal,
       RANK() OVER (PARTITION BY deptno ORDER BY sal) "rank"
FROM   emp;

     EMPNO     DEPTNO        SAL       rank
---------- ---------- ---------- ----------
      7934         10       1300          1
      7782         10       2450          2
      7839         10       5000          3
      7369         20        800          1
      7876         20       1100          2
      7566         20       2975          3
      7788         20       3000          4
      7902         20       3000          4
      7900         30        950          1
      7654         30       1250          2
      7521         30       1250          2
      7844         30       1500          4
      7499         30       1600          5
      7698         30       2850          6 

What we see here is where two people have the same salary they are 
assigned the same rank. When multiple rows share the same rank the
next rank in the sequence is not consecutive.

DENSE_RANK

The DENSE_RANK function acts like the RANK function except that it assigns consecutive ranks.

SELECT empno,
       deptno,
       sal,
       DENSE_RANK() OVER (PARTITION BY deptno ORDER BY sal) "rank"
FROM   emp;

     EMPNO     DEPTNO        SAL       rank
---------- ---------- ---------- ----------
      7934         10       1300          1
      7782         10       2450          2
      7839         10       5000          3
      7369         20        800          1
      7876         20       1100          2
      7566         20       2975          3
      7788         20       3000          4
      7902         20       3000          4
      7900         30        950          1
      7654         30       1250          2
      7521         30       1250          2
      7844         30       1500          3
      7499         30       1600          4
      7698         30       2850          5

FIRST and LAST

The FIRST and LAST functions can be used to return the first or last value from an ordered sequence. Say we want to display the salary of each employee, along with the lowest and highest within their department we may use something like.

SELECT empno,
       deptno,
       sal,
       MIN(sal) KEEP (DENSE_RANK FIRST ORDER BY sal) OVER (PARTITION BY deptno) "Lowest",
       MAX(sal) KEEP (DENSE_RANK LAST ORDER BY sal) OVER (PARTITION BY deptno) "Highest"
FROM   emp
ORDER BY deptno, sal;

     EMPNO     DEPTNO        SAL     Lowest    Highest
---------- ---------- ---------- ---------- ----------
      7934         10       1300       1300       5000
      7782         10       2450       1300       5000
      7839         10       5000       1300       5000
      7369         20        800        800       3000
      7876         20       1100        800       3000
      7566         20       2975        800       3000
      7788         20       3000        800       3000
      7902         20       3000        800       3000
      7900         30        950        950       2850
      7654         30       1250        950       2850
      7521         30       1250        950       2850
      7844         30       1500        950       2850
      7499         30       1600        950       2850
      7698         30       2850        950       2850