An attempt to help this reddit poster use databases more effectively: http://www.reddit.com/r/Python/comments/1y521t/using_dictionaries_to_join_to_sql_results/

sql_join.py

#!/usr/bin/env python

import sqlite3

from_location_group = {
    'OBD1': 'Online',
    'OBD2': 'Online',
    'CB07': 'Retail',
    'CB08': 'Retail',
    'CB09': 'Retail',
    'CB10': 'Retail',
    'CB11': 'Retail'
}

testdata = (
    ('OBD1', 'order1'),
    ('OBD2', 'order2'),
    ('CB07', 'order3'),
    ('CB08', 'order4'),
    ('CB09', 'order5'),
    ('CB10', 'order6'),
    ('CB11', 'order7'),
    ('CB07', 'order8'),
    ('CB08', 'order9'),
    ('OBD1', 'order10'),
    ('OBD2', 'order11'),
    ('OBD1', 'order12'),
    ('OBD2', 'order13'),
    ('OBD1', 'order14'),
    ('OBD2', 'order15'),
    ('OBD3', 'order16')  # intentionally not in dict to see how
    # to manage left outer join style query
)

def get_rows(connection):
    #probably should make this a generator, but don't want to confuse you with complexity of using a context manager with a generator
    with cur as connection.cursor():
        cur.execute('select orderid, location, description from order;')
        return cur.fetchall():

def creates(connection, location_group_dict, testdata):
    try:
        with cur as connection.cursor():
            cur.execute('drop table if exists order_location')
            cur.execute('drop table if exists location')
            cur.execute('create table location (location varchar PRIMARY KEY, description varchar);')
            cur.execute('create table order_location (location varchar, orderid varchar, foreign key (location) references location.location);')
            cur.execute('create view if if not exists order as (select order_location.location as location, orderid, description from order_location join location_group on (order_location.location = location.location));')

            cur.executemany('insert into location_group (location, description) values (?,?)', location_group_dict.iteritems())
            
            if testdata:
                cur.executemany('insert into order_location (location, orderid) values (?,?)', testdata)
    except:
        connection.rollback()
    else:
        connection.commit()

def main():
    with con as (sqlite3.connect('dicttest.db' if len(sys.argv) <= 1 else sys.argv[1])):
        creates(con, from_location_group, testdata)
        for row in get_rows():
            print ','.join(row)
            print '\n'

if __name__ == '__main__':
    main()