Basics of SQL
Oracle Day 1 Afternoon Session
Objectives
To understand important SQL functions
To understand pseudo columns
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DUAL - The Dummy table
Automatically created table, which is part of the data dictionary
Contains one row and one column(varchar2(1): value = X)
Can be used to return constants once, with a SELECT statement
Belongs to SYS schema, accessible to all
eg: SELECT SYSDATE FROM DUAL
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SQL Functions - Decode
Decode
DECODE ( expr , search , result [, search , result]... [, default] )
A DECODE function compares expr to each search value one by one. If expr is
equal to a search, Oracle returns the corresponding result. If no match is found,
Oracle returns default, or, if default is omitted, returns null.
This example decodes the value warehouse_id. If warehouse_id is 1, the function
returns 'Southlake'; if warehouse_id is 2, it returns 'San Francisco'; etc. If
warehouse_id is not 1, 2, 3, or 4, the function returns 'Non-domestic'.
SELECT product_id, DECODE (warehouse_id, 1, 'Southlake', 2, 'San Francisco', 3,
'New Jersey', 4, 'Seattle', 'Non-domestic') quantity_on_hand FROM inventories;
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SQL Functions - Trim
Trim
TRIM enables you to trim leading or trailing characters (or both) from a character
string. If trim_character or trim_source is a character literal, you must enclose it in
single quotes.
SELECT TRIM (0 FROM 0009872348900) "TRIM Example" FROM DUAL;
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SQL Functions - Substr
substr
The substring functions return a portion of string, beginning at character position,
substring_length characters long. SUBSTR calculates lengths using characters as
defined by the input character set. SUBSTRB uses bytes instead of characters.
SELECT SUBSTR('ABCDEFG',3,4) "Substring" FROM DUAL;
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SQL Functions - NVL
NVL
NVL ( expr1 , expr2 )
If expr1 is null, NVL returns expr2. If expr1 is not null, NVL returns expr1.
The following example returns a list of employee names and commissions,
substituting "Not Applicable" if the employee receives no commission:
SELECT last_name, NVL(TO_CHAR(commission_pct), 'Not Applicable')
"COMMISSION" FROM employees WHERE last_name LIKE 'B%';
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SQL Functions - Translate
Translate
TRANSLATE ( 'char' , 'from_string' , 'to_string' )
TRANSLATE returns char with all occurrences of each character in from_string
replaced by its corresponding character in to_string. Characters in char that are not
in from_string are not replaced.
The following statement translates a license number. All letters 'ABC...Z' are
translated to 'X' and all digits '012 . . . 9' are translated to '9':
SELECT TRANSLATE('2KRW229',
'0123456789ABCDEFGHIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZ',
'9999999999XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX') "License" FROM DUAL;
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SQL Functions To_char
To_char
TO_CHAR ( date , fmt )
TO_CHAR converts date of DATE to a value of VARCHAR2 datatype in the format
specified by the date format fmt.
SELECT TO_CHAR(ts_col, 'DD-MON-YYYY HH24:MI:SS') FROM my_tab;
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Pseudocolumns
Behaves like a table column
Not stored in table
Cannot change value of pseudocolumn
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Pseudocolumns
CURRVAL
NEXTVAL
ROWID
ROWNUM
LEVEL(used for hierarchical queries)
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Examples
SELECT empSeq.CURRVAL from DUAL;
SELECT ROWID, ENAME FROM EMP;
SELECT ROWNUM, ENAME FROM EMP order by ename;
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Summary
To understand important SQL functions
To understand pseudo columns
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Thank You!
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