Oracle WITH and MATERIALIZE hint acts as autonomous transaction for functions - oracle

In Oracle 12c if I call a function in a query that uses MATERIALIZE hint in a WITH..AS section, the function call acts like an autonomous transaction:
DROP TABLE my_table;
CREATE TABLE my_table (
my_column NUMBER
);
-- Returns number of records in table
CREATE OR REPLACE FUNCTION my_function
RETURN INTEGER
IS
i INTEGER;
BEGIN
SELECT COUNT(1) INTO i FROM my_table;
RETURN i;
END;
/
-- Inserts one record to table
INSERT INTO my_table (my_column) VALUES (9);
-- Returns number of records in table. This works correctly, returns 1
SELECT COUNT(1) AS "use simple select" FROM my_table;
-- Returns number of records in table. This works correctly, returns 1
WITH x AS (
SELECT /*+ MATERIALIZE */ COUNT(1) AS "use WITH, MATERIALIZE" FROM my_table
)
SELECT * FROM x;
-- Returns number of records in table. This works correctly, returns 1
SELECT my_function AS "use FUNCTION" FROM dual;
-- Returns number of records in table. This works INCORRECTLY, returns 0.
-- Function is called in autonomous transaction?
WITH x AS (
SELECT /*+ MATERIALIZE */ my_function "use WITH,MATERIALIZE,FUNCTION" FROM dual
)
SELECT * FROM x;
ROLLBACK;
Does anyone know what is the reason for this? Is it an Oracle bug or it is intended to work like this? (Why?)
Why it works like this only when WITH is combined with MATERIALIZED hint and FUNCTION call?

This looks like bug 15889476, "Wrong results with cursor-duration temp table and function running on an active transaction"; and 13253977 "Wrong results or error with cursor-duration temp table and PLSQL function running on an active transaction".
I can reproduce on 11.2.0.3 but not 11.2.0.4; and from Husqvik's comment it doesn't seem to reproduce on 12.1.0.2. That aligns with the affected version and fix-first-included-in information in the bug documents.
See MOS documents 15889476.8 and 13253977.8 for more information. You may need to contact Oracle Support to confirm this is the issue you are seeing, but it looks pretty similar.

Related

INTO error in SELECT while creating stored procedure in PL/SQL

I am trying to create stored procedure where I want to join two tables and save the result into one of the tables, but I am getting INTO clause is required error.
This is my code:
CREATE PROCEDURE DiorItemMaster
AS
SELECT *FROM pcdo_dior_item_master
INNER JOIN pcdo_itemdata on pcdo_itemdata.vpn = pcdo_dior_item_master.vpn;
GO;
ERROR:
Error(4,1): PLS-00428: an INTO clause is expected in this SELECT statement
You have a query that selects columns from a table in your pl/sql block. What do you want to do with the result of that query ? You cannot just select and not do anything with the results in pl/sql (you can in sql). Oracle expects that you to store the results of that select in variables. That can be done using the SELECT INTO clause.
Example (based on sample schema emp/dept):
DECLARE
l_emp emp%ROWTYPE;
BEGIN
SELECT e.* INTO l_emp FROM emp e WHERE e.ename = 'KING';
END;
/
Note that you can SELECT INTO individual columns and into rows. You cannot use SELECT INTO arrays.
A couple of other remarks about your code:
You perform a SELECT * from a table with a join to another table without using aliases. This will return all columns from both tables. It is a lot more readable to prefix the "*" with a table alias like in the example.
The GO; is not part of the oracle syntax - this will cause a compilation error.

Oracle access varray elements in SQL

I'm playing around with array support in Oracle and hit a roadblock regarding array access within a SQL query. I'm using the following schema:
create type smallintarray as varray(10) of number(3,0);
create table tbl (
id number(19,0) not null,
the_array smallintarray,
primary key (id)
);
What I would like to do is get the id and the first element i.e. at index 1 of the array. In PostgreSQL I could write select id, the_array[1] from tbl t but I don't see how I could do that with Oracle. I read that array access by index is only possible in PL/SQL, which would be fine if I could return a "decorated cursor" to achieve the same result through JDBC, but I don't know if that's possible.
DECLARE
c1 SYS_REFCURSOR;
varr smallintarray2;
BEGIN
OPEN c1 FOR SELECT t.id, t.THE_ARRAY from tbl t;
-- SELECT t.THE_ARRAY INTO varr FROM table_with_enum_arrays2 t;
-- return a "decorated cursor" with varr(1) at select item position 1
dbms_sql.return_result(c1);
END;
You can do this in plain SQL; it's not pretty, but it does work. You would prefer that Oracle had syntax to hide this from the programmer (and perhaps it does, at least in the most recent versions; I am still stuck at 12.2).
select t.id, q.array_element
from tbl t cross apply
( select column_value as array_element,
rownum as ord
from table(the_array)
) q
where ord = 1
;
EDIT If order of generating the elements through the table operator is a concern, you could do something like this (in Oracle 12.1 and higher; otherwise the function can't be part of the query itself, but it can be defined on its own):
with
function select_element(arr smallintarray, i integer)
return number
as
begin
return arr(i);
end;
select id, select_element(the_array, 1) as the_array_1
from tbl
/
First of all, please don't do that on production. Use tables instead of storing arrays within a table.
Answer to your question is to use column as a table source
SELECT t.id, ta.*
from tbl t,
table(t.THE_ARRAY) ta
order by column_value
-- offset 1 row -- in case if sometime you'll need to skip a row
fetch first 1 row only;
UPD: as for ordering the array I can only say playing with 2asc/desc" parameters provided me with results I've expected - it has been ordered ascending or descending.
UPD2: found a cool link to description of performance issues might happen

Oracle CLOB column and LAG

I'm facing a problem when I try to use LAG function on CLOB column.
So let's assume we have a table
create table test (
id number primary key,
not_clob varchar2(255),
this_is_clob clob
);
insert into test values (1, 'test1', to_clob('clob1'));
insert into test values (2, 'test2', to_clob('clob2'));
DECLARE
x CLOB := 'C';
BEGIN
FOR i in 1..32767
LOOP
x := x||'C';
END LOOP;
INSERT INTO test(id,not_clob,this_is_clob) values(3,'test3',x);
END;
/
commit;
Now let's do a select using non-clob columns
select id, lag(not_clob) over (order by id) from test;
It works fine as expected, but when I try the same with clob column
select id, lag(this_is_clob) over (order by id) from test;
I get
ORA-00932: inconsistent datatypes: expected - got CLOB
00932. 00000 - "inconsistent datatypes: expected %s got %s"
*Cause:
*Action:
Error at Line: 1 Column: 16
Can you tell me what's the solution of this problem as I couldn't find anything on that.
The documentation says the argument for any analytic function can be any datatype but it seems unrestricted CLOB is not supported.
However, there is a workaround:
select id, lag(dbms_lob.substr(this_is_clob, 4000, 1)) over (order by id)
from test;
This is not the whole CLOB but 4k should be good enough in many cases.
I'm still wondering what is the proper way to overcome the problem
Is upgrading to 12c an option? The problem is nothing to do with CLOB as such, it's the fact that Oracle has a hard limit for strings in SQL of 4000 characters. In 12c we have the option to use extended data types (providing we can persuade our DBAs to turn it on!). Find out more.
Some of the features may not work properly in SQL when using CLOBs(like DISTINCT , ORDER BY GROUP BY etc. Looks like LAG is also one of them but, I couldn't find anywhere in docs.
If your values in the CLOB columns are always less than 4000 characters, you may use TO_CHAR
select id, lag( TO_CHAR(this_is_clob)) over (order by id) from test;
OR
convert it into an equivalent SELF JOIN ( may not be as efficient as LAG )
SELECT a.id,
b.this_is_clob AS lagging
FROM test a
LEFT JOIN test b ON b.id < a.id;
Demo
I know this is an old question, but I think I found an answer which eliminates the need to restrict the CLOB length and wanted to share it. Utilizing CTE and recursive subqueries, we can replicate the lag functionality with CLOB columns.
First, let's take a look at my "original" query:
WITH TEST_TABLE AS
(
SELECT LEVEL ORDER_BY_COL,
TO_CLOB(LEVEL) AS CLOB_COL
FROM DUAL
CONNECT BY LEVEL <= 10
)
SELECT tt.order_by_col,
tt.clob_col,
LAG(tt.clob_col) OVER (ORDER BY tt.order_by_col)
FROM test_table tt;
As expected, I get the following error:
ORA-00932: inconsistent datatypes: expected - got CLOB
Now, lets look at the modified query:
WITH TEST_TABLE AS
(
SELECT LEVEL ORDER_BY_COL,
TO_CLOB(LEVEL) AS CLOB_COL
FROM DUAL
CONNECT BY LEVEL <= 10
),
initial_pull AS
(
SELECT tt.order_by_col,
LAG(tt.order_by_col) OVER (ORDER BY tt.order_by_col) AS PREV_ROW,
tt.clob_col
FROM test_table tt
),
recursive_subquery (order_by_col, prev_row, clob_col, prev_clob_col) AS
(
SELECT ip.order_by_col, ip.prev_row, ip.clob_col, NULL
FROM initial_pull ip
WHERE ip.prev_row IS NULL
UNION ALL
SELECT ip.order_by_col, ip.prev_row, ip.clob_col, rs.clob_col
FROM initial_pull ip
INNER JOIN recursive_subquery rs ON ip.prev_row = rs.order_by_col
)
SELECT rs.order_by_col, rs.clob_col, rs.prev_clob_col
FROM recursive_subquery rs;
So here is how it works.
I create the TEST_TABLE, this really is only for the example as you should already have this table somewhere in your schema.
I create a CTE of the data I want to pull, plus a LAG function on the primary key (or a unique column) in the table partitioned and ordered in the same way I would have in my original query.
Create a recursive subquery using the initial row as the root and descending row by row joining on the lagged column. Returning both the CLOB column from the current row and the CLOB column from its parent row.

Function results column names to be used in select statement

I have function which returns column names and i am trying to use the column name as part of my select statement, but my results are coming as column name instead of values
FUNCTION returning column name:
get_col_name(input1, input2)
Can И use this query to the results of the column from table -
SELECT GET_COL_NAME(input1,input2) FROM TABLE;
There are a few ways to run dynamic SQL directly inside a SQL statement. These techniques should be avoided since they are usually complicated, slow, and buggy. Before you do this try to find another way to solve the problem.
The below solution uses DBMS_XMLGEN.GETXML to produce XML from a dynamically created SQL statement, and then uses XML table processing to extract the value.
This is the simplest way to run dynamic SQL in SQL, and it only requires built-in packages. The main limitation is that the number and type of columns is still fixed. If you need a function that returns an unknown number of columns you'll need something more powerful, like the open source program Method4. But that level of dynamic code gets even more difficult and should only be used after careful consideration.
Sample schema
--drop table table1;
create table table1(a number, b number);
insert into table1 values(1, 2);
commit;
Function that returns column name
create or replace function get_col_name(input1 number, input2 number) return varchar2 is
begin
if input1 = 0 then
return 'a';
else
return 'b';
end if;
end;
/
Sample query and result
select dynamic_column
from
(
select xmltype(dbms_xmlgen.getxml('
select '||get_col_name(0,0)||' dynamic_column from table1'
)) xml_results
from dual
)
cross join
xmltable
(
'/ROWSET/ROW'
passing xml_results
columns dynamic_column varchar2(4000) path 'DYNAMIC_COLUMN'
);
DYNAMIC_COLUMN
--------------
1
If you change the inputs to the function the new value is 2 from column B. Use this SQL Fiddle to test the code.

PL/SQL procedure - too many values

I'm sure this is something simple, but I'm really new to PL/SQL and this has me stuck.
I've written a simple stored procedure to return a few values about a customer. Right off the bat, the %rowtype's are not coming up as reserved keywords but the compiler isn't flagging those as errors.
It is, however, ignoring the entire SQL statement flagging the line FROM demo_customers as too many values. Even if I try reducing it to only select one column it still gives me the same error.
create or replace
PROCEDURE GETCUSTOMER
(
arg_customerID demo_customers.customer_id%type,
returnRec OUT demo_customers%rowtype
)
AS
BEGIN
SELECT customer_id, cust_first_name, cust_last_name, cust_email
INTO returnRec
FROM demo_customers
WHERE customer_id = arg_customerID ;
END GETCUSTOMER;
If you want to select into a %ROWTYPE record, you'll want to do a SELECT * rather than selecting individual columns
create or replace
PROCEDURE GETCUSTOMER
(
arg_customerID demo_customers.customer_id%type,
returnRec OUT demo_customers%rowtype
)
AS
BEGIN
SELECT *
INTO returnRec
FROM demo_customers
WHERE customer_id = arg_customerID ;
END GETCUSTOMER;
If you select 4 columns explicitly, Oracle expects you to have 4 variables to select those values into.

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