SOLUTIONS TO COMMON SQL*LOADER QUESTIONS

Document ID:
140121.1
Subject:
SOLUTIONS TO COMMON SQL*LOADER QUESTIONS
Last Modified:
11 February 1995
Author:
Unknown
_______________________________________________________________________________
SOLUTIONS TO COMMON SQL*LOADER QUESTIONS
This article describes a number of common questions on SQL*Loader, and gives
simple examples which solve these common issues.
===================================================
============================
IMPLIED DECIMAL PLACES
===================================================
============================
1. How do you load an implied decimal place into the database?
Example:
=======
Let us take an example of a bank account, the data contains a transaction
type, an account number, and a dollar amount. The last column is a
numeric value with an implied decimal place (100.73, 75.25, and 20.00):
DEPOSIT
10015 10073
DEPOSIT
10020 7525
WITHDRAWAL 10015 2000
We want to load the data into the following table:
SQL> CREATE TABLE register
2 (tx_type CHAR(15),
3 acct NUMBER,
4 amt NUMBER);
The control file would look like:
LOAD DATA
INFILE 'month.dat'
INTO TABLE register
(tx_type POSITION(1:10),
acct POSITION(13:17),
amt
POSITION(20:24) ":amt/100"
)
After we run SQL*Loader, our table data looks like:
SQL> SELECT * FROM register;
TX_TYPE
ACCT
AMT
--------------- ---------- ----------

SOLUTIONS TO COMMON SQL*LOADER QUESTIONS

DEPOSIT
DEPOSIT
WITHDRAWAL

10015
100.73
10020
75.25
10015
20

How this works:

==============
SQL*Loader simply builds an insert statement which looks like:
INSERT INTO register (tx_type,acct,amt)
VALUES (:data1, :data2, ":amt/100");
So, for every AMT loaded, we divide it by 100.
See chapter 6 of the Utilities Guide "Applying SQL Operators to Fields".
Restrictions:
============
This method cannot be used with DIRECT PATH Loader.
===================================================
============================
LOADING DATABASE SEQUENCES
===================================================
============================
2. How do you load a database sequence into a table?
Example-I:
=========
In the first example, all of the fields are located in the datafile based
on position, which makes this easier. Another example below covers data that
is comma delimited.
We want to load the data into the following table:
SQL> CREATE TABLE load_db_seq_positional
2 (seq_number NUMBER,
3 data1 NUMBER,
4 data2 CHAR(15) );
We will use the following sequence:
SQL> CREATE SEQUENCE db_seq
2 START WITH 1
3 INCREMENT BY 1;
The control file would look like:
LOAD DATA
INFILE *
INTO TABLE load_db_seq_positional

SOLUTIONS TO COMMON SQL*LOADER QUESTIONS

(seq_number "db_seq.nextval"
data1 POSITION(1:5),
data2 POSITION(6:15),
)
BEGINDATA
11111AAAAAAAAAA
22222BBBBBBBBBB
After we run SQL*Loader, our table data looks like:
SQL> SELECT * FROM load_db_seq_positional;
SEQ_NUMBER
DATA1 DATA2
---------- ---------- --------------1
11111 AAAAAAAAAA
2
22222 BBBBBBBBBB
Example-II:
==========
In this example, the data fields are comma delimited. The key here is that
since fields are delimited, SQL*Loader will expect to find values for the
field SEQ_NUMBER in the data file. Since such entries do not exist, what
we must do is to put the SEQ_NUMBER field as the last field in the control
file, and then use the TRAILING NULLCOLS clause to indicate to Loader that
on some lines (in this case all), there may be "trailing columns" which are
null, or non-existent.
Here is the similar create table statetement, we will use the same sequence:
SQL> CREATE TABLE load_db_seq_delimited
2 (seq_number NUMBER,
3 data1 NUMBER,
4 data2 CHAR(15));
The control file would look like:
LOAD DATA
INFILE *
INTO TABLE load_db_seq_delimited
FIELDS TERMINATED BY ","
TRAILING NULLCOLS
(data1,
data2,
seq_number "db_seq.nextval"
)
BEGINDATA
11111,AAAAAAAAAA
22222,BBBBBBBBBB
After we run SQL*Loader, our table data looks like:
SQL> SELECT * FROM load_db_seq_delimited;
SEQ_NUMBER

DATA1 DATA2

SOLUTIONS TO COMMON SQL*LOADER QUESTIONS

---------- ---------- --------------3

11111 AAAAAAAAAA
4
22222 BBBBBBBBBB
How this works:
==============
SQL*Loader simply builds an insert statement which looks like:
INSERT INTO load_db_seq_delimited (data1,data2,seq_number)
VALUES (:data1, :data2, "db_seq.nextval");
See chapter 6 of the Utilities Guide "Applying SQL Operators to Fields".
Restrictions:
============
Both of these methods cannot be used with DIRECT PATH Loader.
===================================================
============================
LOADING USERNAME OF USER RUNNING SQL*LOADER
===================================================
============================
3. How do you load the username of the user running the SQL*Loader session?
Example-I:
=========
In this example, all of the fields are located in the datafile based
on position, which makes this easier. Another example below, which is
slightly more difficult, covers data that is comma delimited. Both methods
take advantage of the "USER" pseudo-variable. If you prefer to use the
Oracle User ID number, you could use "UID" instead.
We want to load the data into the following table:
SQL> CREATE TABLE load_user_positional
2 (username CHAR(30),
3 data1 NUMBER,
4 data2 CHAR(15) );
The control file would look like:
LOAD DATA
INFILE *
INTO TABLE load_user_positional
(username "USER"
data1 POSITION(1:5),
data2 POSITION(6:15),
)
BEGINDATA
11111AAAAAAAAAA
22222BBBBBBBBBB

SOLUTIONS TO COMMON SQL*LOADER QUESTIONS

If we run SQL*Loader as scott:

$ SQLLDR scott/tiger load_user_d.ctl
Our table data looks like:
SQL> SELECT * FROM load_user_positional;
USERNAME
DATA1 DATA2
-------------- ---------- --------------SCOTT
11111 AAAAAAAAAA
SCOTT
22222 BBBBBBBBBB
Example-II:
==========
In this example, the data fields are comma delimited. The key here is that
since fields are delimited, SQL*Loader will expect to find values for the
field USERNAME in the data file. Since such entries do not exist, then we
must put the USERNAME field as the last field in the control file, and then
use the TRAILING NULLCOLS clause to indicate to SQL*Loader that on some lines
(in this case all), there may be "trailing columns" which are null, or
non-existent.
Here is the similar create statetement:
SQL> CREATE TABLE load_user_delimited
2 (username CHAR(30),
3 data1 NUMBER,
4 data2 CHAR(15) );
The control file would look like:
LOAD DATA
INFILE *
INTO TABLE load_user_delimited
FIELDS TERMINATED BY ","
TRAILING NULLCOLS
(data1,
data2,
username "USER"
)
BEGINDATA
11111,AAAAAAAAAA
22222,BBBBBBBBBB
If we run SQL*Loader as jack:
$ SQLLDR jack/jack load_user_d.ctl
Our table data looks like:
SQL> SELECT * FROM load_user_delimited;

SOLUTIONS TO COMMON SQL*LOADER QUESTIONS

USERNAME
DATA1 DATA2
-------------- ---------- --------------JACK
11111 AAAAAAAAAA
JACK
22222 BBBBBBBBBB
How this works:
==============
SQL*Loader simply builds an insert statement which looks like:
INSERT INTO load_user_delimited (data1,data2,seq_number)
VALUES (:data1, :data2, "user");
See chapter 6 of the Utilities Guide "Applying SQL Operators to Fields".
Restrictions:
============
Both of these methods cannot be used with DIRECT PATH Loader.