Possible Use of a Cursor

I have a complex query that I hope I can explain it well enough for
everyone to understand.

I have a table that contains information for work instructions.
Contained in the table are "MACHINE_PROC" these are groupings of
machining processes (milling,drilling etc). Contained also in the table
are "INSTRUCTION" that are a grouping of machining processes in a
particular order. In order to organize the order "MACHINE_PROC" are
made they become a "POSITION_NR".

"INSTRUCTION" can have any number of "POSITION_NR" and
"MACHINE_PROC". "POSITION_NR" are always acending meaning that the
smallest number is at the begining of a instruction and the larger a
number towards the end.

The problem that I have is that I want to look for a given set of
machining processes (MACHINE_PROC) from groups 3500, 3400 and 3430 in
the first position of a given INSTRUCTION. The problem is that the
first step of a INSTRUCTION doesn't always have the same number.

Normally the first "POSITION_NR" of a job is "10" and the second "20"
and so on... Room is left between the steps in case that a extra step
needs to be added.

If a step needs to be added before the first step it will get a
number below "10" and if a step needs to be added between the first and
second step it will be between "10" and "20" and so on...

Hopefully you understand me in what I'm trying to explain. Here's 2
examples to help along.

Remember I'm looking for the first step in an "INSTRUCTION" that has
"MACHINE_PROC" 3600, 3400 or 3430

Example 1
INSTRUCTION_NR | MACHINE_PROC | POSITION_NR
123456 | 3600 | 10
123456 | 5600 | 20
123456 | 4587 | 30

Example 2
INSTRUCTION_NR | MACHINE_PROC | POSITION_NR
456789 | 3600 | 5
456789 | 6522 | 10
456789 | 7841 | 20

Does any one know how to go about this do I need to write a cursor of
can I do this by using a couple select statements.

P.S. This is not homework. This is a real problem that I have. I took
the time to write this post, please don't respond to it saying
it's homework or that I should read the manual

Look at your SQL code. I recreated a table (just called Table1) with
those three columns and ran a query with the following SQL code:

SELECT Table1.Instruction_NR, Table1.MACHINE_PROC,
First(Table1.POSITION_NR) AS FirstOfPOSITION_NR
FROM Table1
GROUP BY Table1.Instruction_NR, Table1.MACHINE_PROC
HAVING (((Table1.Instruction_NR)=123456) AND ((Table1.MACHINE_PROC) In
(3600,3400,3430)))

David Hodgkins
dhodgkins RemoveThis @jstarsoftware.com