MySQL: The Multi-part Identifier "u.id" Could Not Be Bound

Posted December 18, 2008 at 9:19 AM

Tags: SQL

I had never seen this error before, so I thought I would just take a second to post it in case anyone tries to Google it. Luckily, my query was extremely small and so the error was obvious from a quick review of the SQL; but, in a large query this might not be readily apparent. Here's the kind of query I was running in MySQL:

 Launch code in new window » Download code as text file »

  • UPDATE
  • [user]
  • SET
  • is_active = 1
  • WHERE
  • u.id = 4

Can you see what the problem is? My WHERE clause uses an aliased table name, but my UPDATE clause did not alias the table. I am so used to using aliased tables that when I saw the error, it didn't even occur to me that the aliasing itself was causing the issue. Once I removed the alias "u.", the query worked fine.

Again, a really minor note, but I thought it might help someone.

Download Code Snippet ZIP File

Post Comment  |  Ask Ben  |  Permalink  |  Other Searches  |  Print Page



Learning ColdFusion 9 - ColdFusion 9 tutorials, samples, examples, demos

Reader Comments

Dec 23, 2008 at 9:35 AM // reply »
7 Comments

I've done this quite a few times. Its why I've trained myself to always use the alias, even when working with a single table.


Dec 23, 2008 at 9:40 AM // reply »
6,516 Comments

@Jon,

Agreed; I try to use the alias all the time. I just like it for some reason - I think it adds readability to the query (although that may just be a purely emotional response).


Post Comment  |  Ask Ben

Recent Blog Comments
Nov 20, 2009 at 11:32 PM
Five Months Without Hungarian Notation And I'm Loving It
I've used headless camel case for years for not only ColdFusion variables, but also SQL tables and fields... pretty much everything involving code. I also subscribe to the "don't abbreviate and clea ... read »
Nov 20, 2009 at 11:00 PM
Five Months Without Hungarian Notation And I'm Loving It
@Marcel, Yeah, I always err on the side of longer but more readable variable names. As for the camel casing of CF methods and the headless camel casing of custom items, I get around this by always ... read »
Nov 20, 2009 at 10:56 PM
Five Months Without Hungarian Notation And I'm Loving It
I use the following and love it: my.namespace.MyComponents.functionMethodsOrUDF() CONSTANT_VALUES_OR_PROPERTIES One thing I always try is to CamelCaseBuiltInColdFusionFunctions() so others can tell ... read »
Nov 20, 2009 at 5:38 PM
Learning ColdFusion 8: CFImage Part I - Reading And Writing Images
Hi Ben, Great article. I've been looking around to see if ColdFusion image engine can programatically create the following "wrap around" effect: http://www.creativepro.com/article/photoshop-s-she ... read »
Nov 20, 2009 at 5:35 PM
Maintaining ColdFusion Sessions Across SMS Text Message Requests Without Cookies
@Dave: I talked to Gert he suggested: <cfhttp method="get" url="http://{some cf website}" result="stuff" addtoken="yes" /> Note the addition of cfhttp attribute addtoken. That should persist y ... read »
Nov 20, 2009 at 5:23 PM
Maintaining ColdFusion Sessions Across SMS Text Message Requests Without Cookies
@Todd, Ahh, gotcha, yeah that makes sense. ... read »
Nov 20, 2009 at 5:17 PM
Maintaining ColdFusion Sessions Across SMS Text Message Requests Without Cookies
Ben, sorry if I didn't make this clear. You can make it work like that if you want, just put <cfset session.foo = 1> (and <cfset application.foo = 1>) in your OnRequestStart() and it reve ... read »