Oracle Rdb™ SQL Reference Manual Volume 5 Release 7.2 for HP OpenVMS Industry Standard 64 for Integrity Servers and OpenVMS Alpha operating systems October 2006 ® SQL Reference Manual, Volume 5 Release 7.2 for HP OpenVMS Industry Standard 64 for Integrity Servers and OpenVMS Alpha operating systems Copyright © 1987, 2006 Oracle Corporation. All rights reserved. The Programs (which include both the software and documentation) contain proprietary information of Oracle Corporation; they are provided under a license agreement containing restrictions on use and disclosure and are also protected by copyright, patent, and other intellectual and industrial property laws. Reverse engineering, disassembly, or decompilation of the programs is prohibited. The information contained in this document is subject to change without notice. If you find any problems in the documentation, please report them to us in writing. Oracle Corporation does not warrant that this document is error free. 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Oracle is not responsible for any loss or damage of any sort that you may incur from dealing with any third party. Contents Send Us Your Comments ........................................... xi Preface ........................................................... xiii A Error Messages A.1 Types of Error Messages and Their Format ....................... A–1 A.2 Error Message Documentation ................................. A–3 A.3 Errors Generated When You Use SQL Statements . ................ A–4 A.4 Identifying Precompiler and Module Language Errors ............... A–7 B SQL Standards B.1 ANSI/ISO/IEC SQL 1999 Standard ............................. B–1 B.2 SQL:1999 Features in Rdb . ................................. B–6 B.3 Establishing SQL:1999 Semantics .............................. B–8 C The SQL Communications Area (SQLCA) and the Message Vector C.1 The SQLCA ............................................... C–2 C.2 The Message Vector ......................................... C–11 C.3 Declarations of the SQLCA and the Message Vector ................ C–12 C.4 Using SQLCA Include Files . ................................. C–19 C.5 SQLSTATE ................................................ C–19 C.5.1 Definition of the SQLSTATE Status Parameter . ................ C–20 C.5.2 Use of the SQLSTATE Status Parameter ...................... C–24 iii D The SQL Dynamic Descriptor Areas (SQLDA and SQLDA2) D.1 Purpose of the SQLDA . ...................................... D–1 D.2 How SQL and Programs Use the SQLDA . ...................... D–3 D.3 Declaring the SQLDA . ...................................... D–5 D.4 Description of Fields in the SQLDA ............................. D–9 D.5 Parameters Associated with the SQLDA: SQLSIZE and SQLDAPTR . D–14 D.6 Purpose of the SQLDA2 ...................................... D–15 D.6.1 Declaring the SQLDA2 .................................... D–16 D.6.2 Description of Fields in the SQLDA2 . ...................... D–18 E Logical Names Used by SQL F Obsolete SQL Syntax F.1 Incompatible Syntax . ...................................... F–1 F.1.1 Incompatible Syntax Containing the SCHEMA Keyword .......... F–2 F.1.1.1 CREATE SCHEMA Meaning Incompatible ................. F–2 F.1.1.2 SHOW SCHEMA Meaning Incompatible ................... F–2 F.1.1.3 DROP SCHEMA Meaning Incompatible ................... F–2 F.1.2 DROP TABLE Now Restricts by Default ...................... F–3 F.1.3 Database Handle Names Restricted to 25 Characters ............ F–3 F.1.4 Deprecated Default Semantics of the ORDER BY Clause ......... F–3 F.1.5 Change to EXTERNAL NAMES IS Clause .................... F–4 F.2 Deprecated Syntax .......................................... F–4 F.2.1 Command Line Qualifiers . .............................. F–6 F.2.2 Deprecated Interactive SQL Statements ...................... F–6 F.2.3 Constraint Conformance to the ANSI/ISO SQL Standard ......... F–7 F.2.4 Obsolete Keywords . ...................................... F–7 F.2.5 Obsolete Built-in Functions . .............................. F–8 F.3 Deprecated Logical Names .................................... F–9 F.3.1 RDB$CHARACTER_SET Logical Name ...................... F–9 F.4 Reserved Words Deprecated as Identifiers . ...................... F–9 F.4.1 ANSI/ISO 1989 SQL Standard Reserved Words ................. F–10 F.4.2 ANSI/ISO 1992 SQL Standard Reserved Words ................. F–11 F.4.3 ANSI/ISO 1999 SQL Standard Reserved Words ................. F–12 F.4.4 Words From ANSI/ISO SQL3 Draft Standard No Longer Reserved .............................................. F–14 F.5 Punctuation Changes . ...................................... F–14 F.5.1 Single Quotation Marks Required for String Literals ............ F–14 F.5.2 Double Quotation Marks Required for ANSI/ISO SQL Delimited Identifiers ............................................. F–14 iv F.5.3 Colons Required Before Host Language Variables in SQL Module Language .............................................. F–15 F.6 Suppressing Diagnostic Messages .............................. F–15 G Oracle RDBMS Compatibility G.1 Oracle RDBMS Functions . ................................. G–1 G.1.1 Optional Oracle SQL Functions ............................. G–1 G.2 Oracle Style Outer Join ...................................... G–9 G.2.1 Outer Join Examples ..................................... G–10 G.2.2 Oracle Server Predicate . ................................. G–15 H Information Tables H.1 Introduction to Information Tables ............................. H–1 H.2 Restrictions for Information Tables ............................. H–5 I System Tables I.1 Using Data Dictionary ....................................... I–1 I.2 Modifying System Tables ..................................... I–1 I.3 Updating Metadata ......................................... I–2 I.4 LIST OF BYTE VARYING Metadata . ......................... I–2 I.5 Read Only Access . ......................................... I–3 I.6 All System Tables . ......................................... I–6 I.6.1 RDB$CATALOG_SCHEMA ................................ I–8 I.6.2 RDB$COLLATIONS ...................................... I–8 I.6.3 RDB$CONSTRAINTS . ................................. I–9 I.6.4 RDB$CONSTRAINT_RELATIONS . ......................... I–10 I.6.5 RDB$DATABASE ........................................ I–11 I.6.6 RDB$FIELD_VERSIONS . ................................. I–15 I.6.7 RDB$PARAMETER_SUB_TYPE . ......................... I–18 I.6.8 RDB$FIELD_SUB_TYPE . ................................. I–18 I.6.9 RDB$FIELDS . ......................................... I–20 I.6.10 RDB$GRANTED_PROFILES ............................... I–24 I.6.11 RDB$INDEX_SEGMENTS ................................ I–24 I.6.12 RDB$INDICES ......................................... I–25 I.6.13 RDB$INTERRELATIONS ................................. I–28 I.6.14 RDB$MODULES ........................................ I–30 I.6.15 RDB$OBJECT_SYNONYMS ............................... I–31 I.6.16 RDB$PARAMETERS