Getting records using joins, but also getting those with nulls

ok, so here i am doing a query to get some info off a table, and i decide that i want to fill a name in using a join to the end user sees a name and not a number. now for the tricky part. there are null values in this field, or at least there can be. so naturally it only returns the records that have a number there, when i really want all of them, and just display the name if it exits. here is what i have:

select b.l_name, b.f_name, a.keyedinby, c.l_name, c.f_name, a.keyedoutby, a.datein, a.dateout, a.dateperiod from employee as b, employee as c, tracklog as a where custid = 16 and a.keyedinby = b.emp_id and a.keyedoutby = c.emp_id and a.dateperiod between 'date1' and 'date2' order by a.dateperiod desc

it works like it should without the statemensts that contain c like this

select b.l_name, b.f_name, a.keyedinby, a.keyedoutby, a.datein, a.dateout, a.dateperiod from employee as b, tracklog as a where custid = 16 and a.keyedinby = b.emp_id and a.dateperiod between 'date1' and 'date2' order by a.dateperiod desc

so any ideas? questions? oh yeah i'm using MSSQL7

Check out books online and look up the IsNull function.

-- messorian

Basically, your procedure should look like this:

Sorry, I misread, try this code:
-- messorian

thanks for the replies, but just wondering where you are reverencing the a.column name. i need that too, so whatever you can muster will be appreciated. thanks!

i got it, left outer join is the ticket!