SELECT * FROM images WHERE id > ? ORDER BY id LIMIT 1
[download]

Meh. If your requirement is a single query, then you need to implement a linked list in the database. This isn't that hard, but it requires that all inserts and deletes update 3 rows vs. just selects doing three queries. This probably is ok.

CREATE TABLE images (
    id INT
   ,prev_id INT
   ,next_id INT
   ,other_columns_here
);
[download]

Then, to get everything in a single query, you do:

SELECT * FROM images WHERE ( (id=?) OR (next_id=?) OR (prev_id=?) );
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Not that hard. :-)

---

My criteria for good software:

1. Does it work?
2. Can someone else come in, make a change, and be reasonably certain no bugs were introduced?

Only if this could work ...

-- changed "union" to "union all"
select id from table where id > ? order by id asc  limit 1
UNION ALL
select id from table where id < ? order by id desc limit 1
[download]

... does not work in Sybase for (a) "order by" clause does not go with "union all" or in derived table creation; (b) there is no "limit" clause, just "rowcount" option per SQL session/transaction.

You can do it in a little more convoluted way not using UNION at all:

SELECT * 
FROM table 
WHERE id=(SELECT id FROM table WHERE id>? ORDER BY id ASC LIMIT 1) 
  OR id=(SELECT id FROM table WHERE id<? ORDER BY id DESC LIMIT 1)
[download]

Careful with that hash Eugene.