I know I can update a single record like this - but then how to I get access to the id of the record that was updated? (I\'m using MSSQL so I can\'t use Oracles RowId)
This example works really well in MSSQL 2005...
SET ANSI_NULLS ON
GO
SET QUOTED_IDENTIFIER ON
GO
DROP TABLE [dbo].[TEST_TABLE]
GO
CREATE TABLE [dbo].[TEST_TABLE](
[id] [int] IDENTITY(1,1) NOT NULL,
[name] [nvarchar](100) COLLATE SQL_Latin1_General_CP1_CI_AS NOT NULL,
CONSTRAINT [PK_TEST_TABLE] PRIMARY KEY CLUSTERED
(
[id] ASC
)WITH (PAD_INDEX = OFF, STATISTICS_NORECOMPUTE = OFF, IGNORE_DUP_KEY = OFF, ALLOW_ROW_LOCKS = ON, ALLOW_PAGE_LOCKS = ON) ON [PRIMARY]
) ON [PRIMARY]
-- An insert which will return the identity
INSERT INTO [dbo].[TEST_TABLE] ([name])
OUTPUT inserted.id
VALUES('Test 1')
-- Another insert which will return the identity
INSERT INTO [dbo].[TEST_TABLE] ([name])
OUTPUT inserted.id
VALUES('Test 2')
-- Now an update which will return the identity
UPDATE [dbo].[TEST_TABLE]
SET [name] = 'Updated Test 1'
OUTPUT inserted.id
WHERE [name] = 'Test 1'
SELECT id, [name] FROM [dbo].[TEST_TABLE]
And more specifically to your query...
update myTable
set myCol = 'foo'
output inserted.itemid
where itemId in (select top 1 itemId from myTable )