mysql - Calculate delta(difference of current and previous row) in sql

Question

I have a table like : trans is the name of the table for example

Id | Trans_Date          | Account_Id | Amount | Delta
------------------------------------------------------
1  | 2011-02-20 00:00:00 |     2      | 1200   | NULL
------------------------------------------------------
2  | 2011-03-21 00:00:00 |     2      | 2000   | NULL
------------------------------------------------------
3  | 2011-04-22 00:00:00 |     2      | 4500   | NULL
------------------------------------------------------
4  | 2011-02-20 00:00:00 |     4      | 1000   | NULL
------------------------------------------------------
5  | 2011-03-21 00:00:00 |     4      | 2400   | NULL
------------------------------------------------------
6  | 2011-04-22 00:00:00 |     4      | 3000   | NULL
------------------------------------------------------

And I have to update Delta column. which value is the difference of current row of the same account and preceeding row of the same account assuming there is one transaction per month. Here is a dummy sql which can generate the delta value

select tt1.id, tt1.amount , tt1.AccountId,(tt1.amount-tt2.amount) as delta 
from trans tt1 left outer  JOIN trans  tt2 
on tt1.accountid = tt2.accountid
where month(tt1.date1)-month(tt2.date1)=1 ;

The result of this query is

id | amount | AccountId  | delta  |
-------------------------------------
2  | 2000   |     2      | 800    | 
-------------------------------------
3  | 4500   |     2      | 2500   |
-------------------------------------
5  | 2400   |     4      | 1400   | 
-------------------------------------
6  | 3000   |     4      | 600    | 
-------------------------------------

But the delta of the row which has not any preceeding row should be its amount such as

1  | 1200   |     2      | 1200   | 
-----------------------------------------
4  | 1000   |     4      | 1000   | 
-----------------------------------------

these are missing by the way.

Please help me in resolving this query.

Answer 1

Here's your original query modified accordingly:

select
  tt1.id,
  tt1.amount,
  tt1.AccountId,
  (tt1.amount-ifnull(tt2.amount, 0)) as delta
from trans tt1
  left outer JOIN trans tt2 on tt1.accountid = tt2.accountid
    and month(tt1.date1)-month(tt2.date1)=1;

The month comparison is moved from where to on, which makes a difference for left join, and tt2.amount is replaced with ifnull(tt2.amount, 0).

---

The UPDATE version of the script:

update tt1
set delta = (tt1.amount-ifnull(tt2.amount, 0))
from trans tt1
  left outer JOIN trans tt2 on tt1.accountid = tt2.accountid
    and month(tt1.date1)-month(tt2.date1)=1;

---

The correct MySQL syntax for the above update should actually be:

update trans tt1 
             left outer JOIN trans tt2 
             on tt1.accountid = tt2.accountid 
             and month(tt1.date1)-month(tt2.date1)=1 
set tt1.delta = (tt1.amount-ifnull(tt2.amount, 0));

(Thanks @pinkb.)