title: How to select everything in a data table not equal to something?
body: <p>I have a data table with several columns. One of these columns has a certain value which I would like to use as a way to tell the program to either give me the row or tell it that I don't want the row. </p>
  
  <p>My specific case is the column is called Status, and the <em>something</em> is APPROVED. So if the value in the Status column is something other than APPROVED I want it other wise don't bother me with it.</p>
  
  <p>What I usually do in cases like this (but the opposite) is just use something like:</p>
  
  <pre><code>myDataTable.Select("Status = 'APPROVED'");
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>giving me everything that is APPROVED. But if I try with my intuition and write</p>
  
  <pre><code>myDataTable.Select("Status != 'APPROVED'");
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>I get </p>
  
  <pre><code>Exception thrown: 'System.Data.SyntaxErrorException' in System.Data.dll
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>Note: from my debugging attempts, the only thing giving me an issue is the != operator. I wrap the statement with a try / catch and the exception reads:</p>
  
  <pre><code>Cannot interpret token '!' at position 8.
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>so using that output I found <a href="https://stackoverflow.com/questions/21645666/datatable-expression-cannot-interpret-token">this link</a>. But it doesn't seem to help me much, trying as they suggested (a desperate attempt on my part):</p>
  
  <pre><code>myDataTable.Select("Status '!'= 'APPROVED'");
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>or</p>
  
  <pre><code>myDataTable.Select("Status '!=' 'APPROVED'");
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>first off doesn't make sense to me at all and more importantly doesn't work, which seems obvious to me. </p>