how to use LIKE with column name

ORACLE DATABASE example:

select * 
from table1 t1, table2 t2
WHERE t1.a like ('%' || t2.b || '%')

You're close.

The LIKE operator works with strings (CHAR, NVARCHAR, etc). so you need to concattenate the '%' symbol to the string...

MS SQL Server:

SELECT * FROM table1,table2 WHERE table1.x LIKE table2.y + '%'

Use of LIKE, however, is often slower than other operations. It's useful, powerful, flexible, but has performance considerations. I'll leave those for another topic though :)

EDIT:

I don't use MySQL, but this may work...

SELECT * FROM table1,table2 WHERE table1.x LIKE CONCAT(table2.y, '%')

SQL SERVER

 WHERE ColumnName LIKE '%'+ColumnName+'%'