How to join only one row in joined table with postgres?

Question

I have the following schema:

CREATE TABLE author (
    id   integer
  , name varchar(255)
);
CREATE TABLE book (
    id        integer
  , author_id integer
  ,          


        

Answer 1

You could add a rule into the join for specifying only one row. I had work for me.

Like this:

SELECT 
    book.id, 
    author.id, 
    author.name, 
    book.title as last_book
FROM author auth1
JOIN book book ON (book.author_id = auth1.id AND book.id = (select max(b.id) from book b where b.author_id = auth1))
GROUP BY auth1.id
ORDER BY book.id ASC

This way you get the data from the book with the higher ID. You could add "date" and make the same with the max(date).