title: Get the minimum value between several columns
body: <p>I'm using SQL Server 2008;</p>
  
  <p>Suppose I have a table 'X' with columns 'Date1', 'Date2', 'Dateblah', all of type DateTime.</p>
  
  <p>I want to select the min value between the three columns, for example (simplified, with date mm/dd/yyyy)</p>
  
  <pre><code>ID       Date1          Date2           Dateblah
  0     09/29/2011      09/20/2011       09/01/2011 
  1     01/01/2011      01/05/2011       03/03/2010
  
  ID    MinDate
  0    09/01/2011
  1    03/03/2010
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Is there a bread and butter command to do that ? </p>
  
  <p>Thanks in advance.</p>
  
  <p>EDIT: I've seen this question <a href="https://stackoverflow.com/questions/368351/whats-the-best-way-to-select-the-minimum-value-from-multiple-columns">What&#39;s the best way to select the minimum value from several columns?</a> but unfortunately it won't suit me as I'm being obligated to do it against normalization because I'm making tfs work item reports, and the 'brute-force' case thing will end up being a pain if I have 6 ou 7 columns.</p>