Category Archives: sql

drop all objects

warning: the script below is destructive and not 100% safe

update: it is unsafe to drop SYS_ objects, check for instance note 579399.1

A question was posted on the french forums of developez.net about how to drop all objects of an user. The drop user toto cascade; followed by create user toto identified by tott; was suggested as an easy answer, but I commented that create user must re-grant quotas, roles, system privileges, table privileges. Create user must also set the correct security status of the account (password, case-sensitive password, lock status, expiration status, profile), and the password history and failed login history is lost. Also it must set the default and temporary tablespaces.

It is also important to note that “drop user” requires dba privileges, when dropping the own object does not require privileges

To drop all objects I tried with plsql and a dictionary loop.

select object_type, count(*) 
from user_objects 
group by object_type;

OBJECT_TYPE           COUNT(*)
------------------- ----------
INDEX                        6
TYPE BODY                    1
INDEXTYPE                    1
PROCEDURE                    1
JAVA CLASS                   2
JAVA RESOURCE                1
JAVA SOURCE                  1
FUNCTION                     1
TABLE                       10
TRIGGER                      1
TYPE                         1
MATERIALIZED VIEW            1
DATABASE LINK                1
PACKAGE BODY                 1
CLUSTER                      1
DIMENSION                    1
OPERATOR                     1
SEQUENCE                     1
PACKAGE                      1

19 rows selected.

purge recyclebin;

Purge successfully completed.

begin
for f in (
select object_type, object_name from user_objects
where object_type in (
‘MATERIALIZED VIEW’)) loop
execute immediate
‘drop materialized view “‘||f.object_name||’” preserve table’;
end loop;
for f in (
select table_name from user_tables) loop
execute immediate
‘drop table “‘||f.table_name||’” cascade constraints’;
end loop;
for f in (
select object_type, object_name from user_objects
where object_type in (
‘DIMENSION’,'CLUSTER’,'SEQUENCE’,
‘VIEW’,'FUNCTION’,'PROCEDURE’,
‘PACKAGE’,'SYNONYM’,'DATABASE LINK’,
‘INDEXTYPE’)
and object_name like ‘SYS_%$’) loop
execute immediate ‘drop ‘||
f.object_type||’ “‘||f.object_name||’”‘;
end loop
for f in (
select object_type, object_name from user_objects
where object_type in (
‘JAVA SOURCE’)) loop
execute immediate ‘drop ‘||
f.object_type||’ “‘||f.object_name||’”‘;
end loop;
for f in (
select object_type, object_name from user_objects
where object_type in (
‘JAVA RESOURCE’)) loop
execute immediate ‘drop ‘||
f.object_type||’ “‘||f.object_name||’”‘;
end loop;
for f in (
select object_type, object_name from user_objects
where object_type in (
‘JAVA CLASS’)) loop
execute immediate ‘drop ‘||
f.object_type||’ “‘||f.object_name||’”‘;
end loop;
for f in (
select object_type, object_name from user_objects
where object_type in (
‘TYPE’,'OPERATOR’)) loop
execute immediate ‘drop ‘||
f.object_type||’ “‘||
f.object_name||’” force’;
end loop;
end;
/

PL/SQL procedure successfully completed.


select * from user_objects

no rows selected.

All objects of the current schema disappeared, do not try this as sys, this script is destructive with no confirmation

select distinct collect

I answered a question on otn today about distinct.

Reprased, how to select distinct collection?


select job, collect(distinct deptno) deptnos 
from emp group by job;

JOB       DEPTNOS
--------- -------------------------------------------
ANALYST   SYSTPTJCzBffh0AjgQ59n0o3QCA==(20)
CLERK     SYSTPTJCzBffh0AjgQ59n0o3QCA==(10, 20, 30)
MANAGER   SYSTPTJCzBffh0AjgQ59n0o3QCA==(10, 20, 30)
PRESIDENT SYSTPTJCzBffh0AjgQ59n0o3QCA==(10)
SALESMAN  SYSTPTJCzBffh0AjgQ59n0o3QCA==(30)

5 rows selected.

select distinct collect(distinct deptno) deptnos 
from emp group by job;

ERROR at line 1:
ORA-22950: cannot ORDER objects without MAP or ORDER method

the message is clear, i need a MAP or ORDER method. Ok, I can do this


create type tt_n as table of number(2);
/

Type created.

create type tt_n_ord as object(
  c tt_n,
  order member function 
    eq (tc tt_n_ord) return integer);
/

Type created.

create type body tt_n_ord as
  order member function 
    eq (tc tt_n_ord) return integer
  is
  begin 
    if c=tc.c 
    then return 0; 
    else return 1; 
    end if;
  end;
end;
/

Type body created.

select distinct 
  tt_n_ord(cast(collect(distinct deptno) as tt_n))
from emp group by job;

TT_N_ORD(CAST(COLLECT(DISTINCTDEPTNO)ASTT_N))(C)
------------------------------------------------
TT_N_ORD(TT_N(30))
TT_N_ORD(TT_N(10))
TT_N_ORD(TT_N(10, 20, 30))
TT_N_ORD(TT_N(20))

4 rows selected.

Select bottom rows

Today I answered a question on otn regarding order by.

Let’s build a different test case.

You have a view that contain an order by. You want to retrieve the last 5 records. However you do not have access to the sort column.

SYS@LSC01> GRANT CREATE VIEW TO USER_A IDENTIFIED BY A;

Grant succeeded.

SYS@LSC01> GRANT SELECT ON SCOTT.EMP TO USER_A WITH GRANT OPTION;

Grant succeeded.

SYS@LSC01> CREATE VIEW USER_A.V AS SELECT ENAME FROM SCOTT.EMP 
ORDER BY HIREDATE;

View created.

SYS@LSC01> GRANT CREATE SESSION TO USER_B IDENTIFIED BY B;

Grant succeeded.

SYS@LSC01> GRANT SELECT ON USER_A.V TO USER_B;

Grant succeeded.

SYS@LSC01> CONNECT USER_B/B
Connected.
USER_B@LSC01> SELECT ROWNUM, ENAME FROM USER_A.V WHERE ROWNUM<4;
    ROWNUM ENAME
---------- ----------
         1 SMITH
         2 ALLEN
         3 WARD

To get top 3, that was easy 8)

USER_B@LSC01> SELECT R, ENAME FROM
  2    (SELECT ROWNUM R,ENAME
  3    FROM USER_A.V
  4    ORDER BY ROWNUM DESC)
  5  WHERE ROWNUM<4 ORDER BY R;
         R ENAME
---------- ----------
        12 MILLER
        13 SCOTT
        14 ADAMS

Here we have a sorted view. The OP had an external file. It could be an XML input, or any table or collection that is sorted but does not have a sort key

alert log in xml format

The alert log is in xml format in Oracle 11g. If you want to parse the content of the file and use the XML functions to retrieve the data, you can use this way :

SQL> create or replace directory alert as
  2    '/app/oracle/diag/rdbms/lsc01/lsc01/alert';

Directory created.

SQL> var c clob
SQL> declare
  2     b bfile := bfilename('ALERT','log.xml');
  3  begin
  4     dbms_lob.open(b,dbms_lob.file_readonly);
  5     dbms_lob.createtemporary(:c,true);
  6     dbms_lob.loadfromfile(:c,b,dbms_lob.lobmaxsize);
  7  end;
  8  /

PL/SQL procedure successfully completed.

SQL> select extractvalue(xmlparse(content :c),
  2    '/msg[@time="2008-03-30T01:01:13.704+01:00"]/txt/text()')
  3  from dual;
EXTRACTVALUE(XMLPARSE(CONTENT:C),'/MSG[@TIME="2008-03-30T01:01:1
----------------------------------------------------------------

Starting ORACLE instance (normal)

To RR or to YY ?

What is worst? To use DD-MON-RR or to use DD-MON-YY? When entering the birthday of my grandfather, I will write it as 31-JUL-1912, so both formats will be fine. If I enter it 31-JUL-12, both formats will be wrong. Ok, which date will I enter now and in the future? For short-time contracts I will enter dates like 01-AUG-08 or 31-DEC-11, both formats will be fine. For long time contracts like retirement saving plan I will enter 31-MAR-36, which is still fine, because I am old enough :mrgreen: Juniors in my company will enter dates like 30-JUN-52, which will be fine with YY and wrong with RR or RRRR.

Ok, what is the recommended format then?

DD-MM-FXYYYY is probably fine. FX forces you to enter 4-digits years.


SQL> select
  2    to_date('31-JUL-1912','DD-MON-YY') YY1912,
  3    to_date('31-JUL-12','DD-MON-YY') YY12,
  4    to_date('31-JUL-12','DD-MON-RR') RR12
  5  from dual;

YY1912     YY12       RR12
---------- ---------- ----------
1912-07-31 2012-07-31 2012-07-31

SQL> select
  2    to_date('31-MAR-2036','DD-MON-YY') YY2036,
  3    to_date('31-MAR-36','DD-MON-YY') YY36,
  4    to_date('31-MAR-36','DD-MON-RR') RR36
  5  from dual;

YY2036     YY36       RR36
---------- ---------- ----------
2036-03-31 2036-03-31 2036-03-31

SQL> select
  2    to_date('30-JUN-2052','DD-MON-YY') YY2052,
  3    to_date('30-JUN-52','DD-MON-YY') YY52,
  4    to_date('30-JUN-52','DD-MON-RR') RR52
  5  from dual;

YY2052     YY52       RR52
---------- ---------- ----------
2052-06-30 2052-06-30 1952-06-30

SQL> select
  2    to_date('8/4/2008','DD-MM-FXYYYY') FXYYYY2008
  3  from dual;

FXYYYY2008
----------
2008-04-08

SQL> select
  2    to_date('08-04-08','DD-MM-FXYYYY') FXYYYY08
  3  from dual;
  to_date('08-04-08','DD-MM-FXYYYY') FXYYYY08
          *
ERROR at line 2:
ORA-01862: the numeric value does not match the length 
of the format item

SQL> 

Obfuscation contest

I have been challenged to participated (my script : lsc2.sql) and now challenged to explain my query by Chen
Chen Shapira

Ok, I give a try.

To make the query unreadable and unformatable I used no space, no new line, and I started by q’<'>‘ to confuses sqlinform.

Ok, I added undocumented constructs like

connect by .1 < 1.
connect by .25 > rownum/100.

with 2 connect by, the first is ignored. The second is buggy in 10gR1 and returns 25 rows in 10gR1 (but 24 rows in 9i, 10gR2, 11g).

and group by () which means only one group. Note this clause is mandatory, you cannot remove it when using an aggregate function and a scalar subquery like in
select (select 1 from dual), count(*) from dual group by ();

The utl_raw and to_char converts a number to the string Oracle Community. I will keep terse on the formula.
The scalar subquery inside TAN returns 1. The regexp removes some characters out of the extract tag. _x0032_ is the alias of the column “2″. The v$reservedwords use UNIQUE to sort the rows (UNIQUE was sorting in 10gR1 for UNIQUE/DISTINCT) and the MAX(rownum) retrieve the 316th row (FROM) and 845th row (SELECT). Remember ROWNUM is evaluated BEFORE aggregation, therefore ROWNUM 845 exists! Note the “+” is an alias and not a string!

With the SELECT and FROM keyword I build a new query that I dynamically evaluates with dbms_xmlgen.getxml. Rest of the first part is fancy calculation.

The dburi is also dynamic.

dburitype(
'/SYS/DBA_PROCEDURES/ROW[PROCEDURE_NAME=''GETKEY'']/OBJECT_NAME'
).getxml()

Well, I could have obfuscated the text a bit more but I was short of time… This simply return the name of the package that have a procedure called GETKEY. Which is DBMS_OBFUSCATION_TOOLKIT_FFI. This is not very clean as the query would fail if you have a PROC.GETKEY in your schema. Well, I wanted to add this not very well know mechanism to query the database.

Last part is in dict, I select the pattern ‘[COTTON+XE]{4,}’ in dict and return the Mode (or modal score), which is CONTEXT.

A bit formatting and I get

"NVL2"(Q'<'>',"UTL_RAW".CAST_TO_VARC
------------------------------------
Oracle Community_Obfuscation_Contest

Side effect of cursor sharing

Cursor sharing transform strings in bind variable.

So if you do SELECT * FROM EMP WHERE ENAME='SCOTT'; it will be transformed in SELECT * FROM EMP WHERE ENAME=:sys_b0;

This sometimes improved performance of application that do not use binds, for instance.

Now let’s imagine your application generates trace files. The application generates a SELECT 'LSC-11.1011.000.1110.1.0100.000.110' FROM DUAL;
. Ok, let’s look for the string in trace files :

$ cd udump
$ grep LSC-11 *.trc
$
$ grep DUAL$ *.trc
LSC01_ora_8630490.trc:SELECT :"SYS_B_0" FROM DUAL
LSC01_ora_8630490.trc:SELECT :"SYS_B_0" FROM DUAL
LSC01_ora_8839288.trc:SELECT :"SYS_B_0" FROM DUAL
LSC01_ora_8839288.trc:SELECT :"SYS_B_0" FROM DUAL
LSC01_ora_8933560.trc:SELECT :"SYS_B_0" FROM DUAL
LSC01_ora_8933560.trc:SELECT :"SYS_B_0" FROM DUAL

WTF! The tracing mechanism of the application is no longer usable :twisted:

Another side effect is the length of the column and is described there : http://asktom…P11_QUESTION_ID:3696883368520

alter user identified by values in 11g

I wrote about dba_users changes in 11g .

When spooling alter user commands in 11g, it is important to understand the mechanism. Oracle 11g supports both sensitive and insensitive passwords.

When issuing an CREATE/ALTER USER IDENTIFIED BY PASSWORD, both the insensitive and the sensitive hashes are saved.

SQL> create user u identified by u;
User created.
SQL> grant create session to u;
Grant succeeded.
SQL> connect u/U
ERROR:
ORA-01017: invalid username/password; logon denied
Warning: You are no longer connected to ORACLE.
SQL> connect u/u
Connected.

Per default only the proper case works

SQL> alter system set sec_case_sensitive_logon=false;
System altered.
SQL> connect u/U
Connected.
SQL> conn u/u
Connected.

When sec_case_sensitive_logon=false, both uppercase and lowercase passwords work (10g behavior).

When issuing a create user identified by values, you must chose if you want to have both passwords, only the case insensitive or only the case sensitive.


SQL> select password,spare4 from user$ where name='U';

PASSWORD
------------------------------
SPARE4
--------------------------------------------------------------
18FE58AECB6217DB
S:8B1765172812D9F6B62C2A2B1E5FEF203200A44B4B87F9D934DABBB809A4

The hashes are in USER$.

SQL> alter user u identified by values '18FE58AECB6217DB';
User altered.
SQL> alter system set sec_case_sensitive_logon=true;
System altered.
SQL> conn u/u
Connected.
SQL> conn u/U
Connected.

When only the 10g oracle hash is used as a value, the password is case insensitive whatever the setting of sec_case_sensitive_logon is.

SQL> alter user u identified by values 
'S:8B1765172812D9F6B62C2A2B1E5FEF203200A44B4B87F9D934-
DABBB809A4';
User altered.
SQL> alter system set sec_case_sensitive_logon=false;
System altered.
SQL> conn u/u
ERROR:
ORA-01017: invalid username/password; logon denied
Warning: You are no longer connected to ORACLE.
SQL> conn u/U
ERROR:
ORA-01017: invalid username/password; logon denied

When only the 11g oracle hash is used as a value, the password is case sensitive and if the setting of sec_case_sensitive_logon is on false, the login failed as there is no 10g string. This setting is probably the most secure setting as the 10g string is not saved in USER$.

SQL> alter user u identified by values 
'S:8B1765172812D9F6B62C2A2B1E5FEF203200A44B4B87F9D934-
DABBB809A4;18FE58AECB6217DB';
SQL> alter system set sec_case_sensitive_logon=true;
System altered.
SQL> conn u/u
Connected.
SQL> conn u/U
ERROR:
ORA-01017: invalid username/password; logon denied
Warning: You are no longer connected to ORACLE.
SQL> conn / as sysdba
Connected.
SQL> alter system set sec_case_sensitive_logon=false;
System altered.
SQL> conn u/u
Connected.
SQL> conn u/U
Connected.

When using both hashes, switching back and forth to 11g mechanism is possible.

take care of minus !

Imagine this script (10gR2) :

set echo on
select  BINARY_DOUBLE_INFINITY -
BINARY_DOUBLE_INFINITY from DUAL;

Run it and you would will get an expected result!

SQL> select BINARY_DOUBLE_INFINITY -
> BINARY_DOUBLE_INFINITY from DUAL;

BINARY_DOUBLE_INFINITY
----------------------
                   Inf

The issue in sqlplus is that – at the end of line means “query continues next line”. The correct answer of Inf-Inf is Nan.

SQL> select BINARY_DOUBLE_INFINITY
-BINARY_DOUBLE_INFINITY from DUAL;

BINARY_DOUBLE_INFINITY-BINARY_DOUBLE_INFINITY
---------------------------------------------
                                          Nan

add a new language to Oracle

I first thought of adding Klingon. Well, finally I added Romansh, which is the fourth official language in my country.

Ok, here we go :

$ $ORACLE_HOME/nls/lbuilder/lbuilder &

The Oracle Locale Builder tool is started.

File –> New… –> Language

You specify the language, the spelling for January, for Monday, etc… Most fields are mandatory. If you do not know about one field, like EBCDIC, just find one in the “Show existing definition…” Dialog

File –> Save as…

You save your nlt file

File –> Tools –> Generate NLB

Three NLB files are generated.

$ ls -l *.nl*
-rw-r--r-- 1 lsc users   934 2008-02-19 18:17 lx003eb.nlb
-rw-r--r-- 1 lsc users  3843 2008-02-19 18:17 lx003eb.nlt
-rw-r--r-- 1 lsc users   128 2008-02-19 18:17 lx0boot.nlb
-rw-r--r-- 1 lsc users   428 2008-02-19 18:17 lx0boot.nlt
-rw-r--r-- 1 lsc users 22528 2008-02-19 18:17 lx1boot.nlb

Copy all your the NLB files to your ORACLE_HOME/data/nls.

Restart your instance.

Let’s test it ;)


select 
  to_char(
    sysdate, 
    'fmday dd month yyyy','NLS_DATE_LANGUAGE=romansch'
  ) 
from dual;
TO_CHAR(SYSDATE,'FMDAYDDMONTHYY
-------------------------------
mardis 19 favrer 2008

What is the lowest and highest possible date in Oracle?

using trunc and round I cannot get lower than -4800 nor higher than 10001 :twisted:


SQL> select trunc(date '-4712-1-1','CC') from dual;
TRUNC(DATE'-4712-1-1','CC')
----------------------------------
Thursday 1st January 4800 B.C.

SQL> select round(date '9999-01-01','CC') from dual;
ROUND(DATE'9999-01-01','CC')
----------------------------------
Monday 1st January 10001 A.D.

Why cannot I use subquery there?

Is there any rule where you can use scalar subquery?
You can use a scalar subquery expression in most syntax that calls for an expression (expr).

Well, you cannot use it as the second argument of sys_connect_by_path

select sys_connect_by_path(ename,
   (select '/' from dual)) from emp 
   connect by prior empno=mgr;
*
ERROR at line 1:
ORA-30003: illegal parameter in SYS_CONNECT_BY_PATH 
function

You cannot use it in the ITERATE or in the RULES clause of model

SQL> select * from dual model 
dimension by (0 x) measures (0 y) 
rules iterate ( (select 1 from dual) ) (y[0]=0);
*
ERROR at line 1:
ORA-32607: invalid ITERATE value in MODEL clause
SQL> select * from dual model 
dimension by (0 x) measures (0 y) 
(y[0]=(select 1 from dual));
*
ERROR at line 1:
ORA-32620: illegal subquery within MODEL rules

Also impossible is in the DATAOBJ_TO_PARTITION function that is used in System Partitioning :

SQL> insert into t partition (
  dataobj_to_partition("T",
    (select :partition_id  from dual) )) 
values ('x') ;
*
ERROR at line 1: 
ORA-14198: rowid column must refer to table 
specified in 1st parameter 

Another documented limitation is the GROUP BY clause :


SQL> SELECT (SELECT COUNT(*) FROM EMP), 
  COUNT(*) FROM DEPT ;
*
ERROR at line 1:
ORA-00937: not a single-group group function

SQL> SELECT (SELECT COUNT(*) FROM EMP), COUNT(*) 
  FROM DEPT GROUP BY (SELECT COUNT(*) FROM EMP);
*
ERROR at line 1:
ORA-22818: subquery expressions not allowed here

SQL> SELECT (SELECT COUNT(*) FROM EMP), 
  COUNT(*) FROM DEPT GROUP BY ();

(SELECTCOUNT(*)FROMEMP)   COUNT(*)
----------------------- ----------
                     14          4

my query is not using my index

I read a user question on forums.oracle.com this morning :
As we know NOT EQUAL operations by pass indexes and cause full table scans in queries

I did not know that. Do I need to use hints?

set autotrace traceonly explain
create table t as 
select 
  sign(rownum-1) r, rpad(rownum,4000,'.') t 
from dual connect by level<10000/*00*/;
create index i on t(r);
exec dbms_stats.gather_table_stats(user,'T',cascade=>true)

select /*+ INDEX(T,I) */ r,t from t where r!=1;

Execution Plan
----------------------------------------------------------
Plan hash value: 3993571787

--------------------------------------------------------------
----------------------

| Id  | Operation                   | Name | Rows  | Bytes | C
ost (%CPU)| Time     |

--------------------------------------------------------------
----------------------

|   0 | SELECT STATEMENT            |      |     1 |  4004 |
1979   (2)| 00:00:24 |

|   1 |  TABLE ACCESS BY INDEX ROWID| T    |     1 |  4004 |
1979   (2)| 00:00:24 |

|*  2 |   INDEX FULL SCAN           | I    |     1 |       |
1979   (2)| 00:00:24 |

--------------------------------------------------------------
----------------------

Predicate Information (identified by operation id):
---------------------------------------------------

   1 - filter("R"<>1)

SQL> select r,t from t where r!=1;

Execution Plan
----------------------------------------------------------
Plan hash value: 2153619298

--------------------------------------------------------------
------------

| Id  | Operation         | Name | Rows  | Bytes | Cost (%CPU)
| Time     |

--------------------------------------------------------------
------------

|   0 | SELECT STATEMENT  |      |     1 |  4004 |   271K  (1)
| 00:54:18 |

|*  1 |  TABLE ACCESS FULL| T    |     1 |  4004 |   271K  (1)
| 00:54:18 |

--------------------------------------------------------------
------------

Predicate Information (identified by operation id):
---------------------------------------------------

   1 - filter("R"<>1)

Create edition

In 2006, I blogged about 11g new features part II. At that time 11g was in alpha or early beta stage.

One of the new feature announced at OpenWorld 2006 was multiversioning. Like you have multiple versions of your packages running at the same time.

Unfortunately, the feature has not been implemented in 11g Release 1.

As you can see, the CREATE EDITION command does not work :

SQL> create edition v1;
create edition v1
       *
ERROR at line 1:
ORA-00901: invalid CREATE command

SQL> alter session set edition=v1;
ERROR:
ORA-38802: edition does not exist

The error messages ORA-38801 to ORA-38816 refer to EDITIONS.

SQL> select * from dba_editions;
EDITION_NAME PARENT_EDITION_NAME USABLE
------------ ------------------- ------
ORA$BASE                         YES

SQL> alter session set edition=ora$base;

Session altered.


Apparently the feature is implemented, but not ready to be used. Be patient …

random statements

I read the ultimate excuse database and checked if I can use model to do generate random statements:


with t as (
  select '%E and %E are travelling to %L.' fmt 
  from dual union all
  select 'About %N employees live in %L.' 
  from dual)
select str from t
model
reference
  dept on (
    select loc,count(*) over () c,rownum r 
    from dept)
  dimension by (r) measures (loc,c)
reference
  emp on (
    select ename,count(*) over () c, rownum r 
    from emp)
  dimension by (r) measures (ename, c) 
partition by (fmt)
dimension by (1 x) 
measures (cast(fmt as varchar2(4000)) str)
rules 
  iterate (1000) 
  until str[1] not like '%/%%' escape '/'
(str[1]=substr(str[1],1,
  decode(instr(str[1],'%'),0,4000,
    instr(str[1],'%')-1))||
  decode(substr(str[1],nullif(
    instr(str[1],'%'),0)+1,1),
    'N',to_char(trunc(
      dbms_random.value(0,1+emp.c[1]))),
    'E',initcap(emp.ename[trunc(
      dbms_random.value(1,1+emp.c[1]))]),
    'L',initcap(dept.loc[trunc(
      dbms_random.value(1,1+dept.c[1]))]))||
    substr(str[1],nullif(
      instr(str[1],'%'),0)+2))
/
STR
----------------------------------------
James and Ward are travelling to Dallas.
About 1 employees live in Chicago.
/
STR
--------------------------------------------
King and Blake are travelling to New York.
About 3 employees live in Dallas.

What is ROWNUM=1 ?

Is rownum=1 the first row returned? well, it depends :


select rownum, ename 
from emp 
order by ename;
    ROWNUM ENAME
---------- ----------
        11 ADAMS
         2 ALLEN
         6 BLAKE
         7 CLARK
        13 FORD
        12 JAMES
         4 JONES
         9 KING
         5 MARTIN
        14 MILLER
         8 SCOTT
         1 SMITH
        10 TURNER
         3 WARD

The ROWNUM is evaluated before the order by

select rownum 
from emp 
group by rownum 
having rownum between 3 and 6;
    ROWNUM
----------
         6
         5
         3
         4

the rownum is selected before the GROUP BY and before the HAVING.

select 
   rownum, 
   sal, 
   median(sal) over () 
from emp;
    ROWNUM        SAL MEDIAN(SAL)OVER()
---------- ---------- -----------------
         1        800              1550
        12        950              1550
        11       1100              1550
         3       1250              1550
         5       1250              1550
        14       1300              1550
        10       1500              1550
         2       1600              1550
         7       2450              1550
         6       2850              1550
         4       2975              1550
         8       3000              1550
        13       3000              1550
         9       5000              1550

The optimiser may chose to resort the result, here as a WINDOW SORT operation for the MEDIAN analytic function

OR aggregate

you want to BIT_OR multiple rows. For example you have a table with 3 rows that you want to aggregate with BIT_OR


1010 (10)
1100 (12)
0110 (6)
=========
1110 (14)

Let’s try


with t as (
  select 10 n from dual union all 
  select 12 from dual union all 
  select 6 from dual) 
select 
  utl_raw.cast_to_binary_integer(
    sys.mvaggrawbitor(
      utl_raw.cast_from_binary_integer(
        n
      )
    )
  ) N 
from t;
  N
---
 14

It is that easy !

disclaimer: mvaggrawbitor is not documented

NOT IN and NULL

I posted about Unexpected results in June 2005. Here are more results from NOT IN and NULL

select * from dual
WHERE (1) NOT IN (SELECT NULL FROM DUAL);
no rows selected

select * from dual
WHERE (1,1) NOT IN (SELECT NULL,1 FROM DUAL);
no rows selected

However, and this surprised me,
select * from dual
WHERE (1,1) NOT IN (SELECT NULL,2 FROM DUAL);

D
-
X

:roll:

Probably the expression
where (a,b) not in (select c,d from t)
is translated into
where (a!=c or b!=d) — first row of t
and (a!=c or b!=d) — second row of t
– and …

MIN(DISTINCT X)

What is doing the MIN(DISTINCT X) call? Basically, every distinct value of X is passed to the MIN function. Well, it is probably of very little interest as the MIN function is very fast and processing less rows than MIN(X) should not boost the performance because of the overhead of sorting distinct values.

However, if you write your own aggregate, distinct may be interesting!

create type myudag_type as object
(
  myudag INTEGER,
  static function ODCIAggregateInitialize(
    sctx IN OUT myudag_type)
    return number,
  member function ODCIAggregateIterate(
    self IN OUT myudag_type,
    value IN INTEGER)
    return number,
  member function ODCIAggregateTerminate(
    self IN myudag_type,
    returnValue OUT INTEGER,
    flags IN number)
    return number,
  member function ODCIAggregateMerge(
    self IN OUT myudag_type,
    ctx2 IN myudag_type)
    return number
);
/

create or replace type body myudag_type is
static function ODCIAggregateInitialize(
  sctx IN OUT myudag_type)
  return number is
begin
  sctx := myudag_type(0);
  return ODCIConst.Success;
end;
member function ODCIAggregateIterate(
  self IN OUT myudag_type,
  value IN INTEGER)
  return number is
begin
  -- doing nothing will cost you a lot !!!
  for i in 1..1000000 loop null; end loop; 
  return ODCIConst.Success;
end;
member function ODCIAggregateTerminate(
  self IN myudag_type,
  returnValue OUT INTEGER,
  flags IN number) return number is
begin
  returnValue := self.myudag;
  return ODCIConst.Success;
end;
member function ODCIAggregateMerge(
  self IN OUT myudag_type,
  ctx2 IN myudag_type)
  return number is
begin
  return ODCIConst.Success;
end;
end;
/

CREATE FUNCTION myudag (
  input INTEGER)
  RETURN INTEGER
  AGGREGATE USING myudag_type;
/

SQL> select myudag(deptno) from emp;

MYUDAG(DEPTNO)
--------------
             0

Elapsed: 00:00:00.57
SQL> select myudag(distinct deptno) from emp;

MYUDAG(DISTINCTDEPTNO)
----------------------
                     0

Elapsed: 00:00:00.13

What is bigger than infinity?

Nan


select
  BINARY_DOUBLE_INFINITY INF, 
  BINARY_DOUBLE_NAN NAN,
  greatest(BINARY_DOUBLE_INFINITY, BINARY_DOUBLE_NAN) GRE
from t;

INF NAN GRE
--- --- ---
Inf Nan Nan

Nan means not a number. It could be square root of -1, log of -1, 0/0, acos(1000), Inf-Inf, etc…


select
  SQRT(-1d),
  LN(-1d),
  0/0d,
  acos(1000d),
  BINARY_DOUBLE_INFINITY-BINARY_DOUBLE_INFINITY
from t;
SQR LN- 00D ACO BIN
--- --- --- --- ---
Nan Nan Nan Nan Nan

According to the doc, it is greater than any value, inclusive positive infinity.

To check if a value is nan, it could be compared to BINARY_DOUBLE_NAN.
where :z = BINARY_DOUBLE_NAN
There is a function NANVL(:z, :y) which evaluates to :y when :z is equal Nan. if :z is not equal to Nan and :y is not null, then it evaluates to :z. NANVL evaluates to NULL when :z or :y is null.


select NANVL(1,null) from dual;
NANVL
------
[null]

Display a blob

I have a table with a blob


create table t(b blob);
insert into t values ('585858');

In 11g sql*plus, I can display raw data

select b from t;
B
------
585858

Ok, but if I want to display XXX (the character content)


select utl_raw.cast_to_varchar2(b) from t;
UTL
--- 
XXX

However, in sql, a raw cannot be more than 2000 bytes long.

Another way to print your blob content is to use DBMS_LOB.CONVERTTOCLOB


var c clob
set autoprint on
declare
  b blob;
  dest_offset integer := 1 ;
  src_offset  integer := 1 ;
  lang_context integer:= 1 ;
  warning integer;
begin
  select b into b from t for update;
  dbms_lob.createtemporary(:c,true);
  dbms_lob.converttoclob(
    :c, b, DBMS_LOB.LOBMAXSIZE,
    dest_offset, src_offset,
    1, lang_context, warning);
end;
/
C
---
XXX

On associativity, transitivity and reflexivity

Addition is supposed to be associative.
a+(b+c)=(a+b)+c

This may be wrong in Oracle when dealing with months and days


with t as (select
 interval '1' month a,
 date '2007-09-26' b,
 interval '7' day c
from dual)
select a+(b+c),(a+b)+c 
from t;

A+(B+C)     (A+B)+C
----------- -----------
03-NOV-2007 02-NOV-2007

The equality is supposed to be transitive
if (a=b and b=c) then (a=c)
However, in Oracle the comparison operator equal may imply some transformation


with t as (select '.0' a, 0 b, '0.' c from dual) 
select 
  case when a=b then 'YES' else 'NO ' end "A=B",
  case when b=c then 'YES' else 'NO ' end "B=C",
  case when a=c then 'YES' else 'NO ' end "A=C"
from t;
A=B B=C A=C
--- --- ---
YES YES NO

The equality operator is also supposed to be reflexive
a=a

This is unfortunately wrong with null

with t as (select null a from dual) 
select case when a=a then 'YES' else 'NO ' end "A=A" 
from t;
A=A
---
NO

:mrgreen: