Pivot table with very large number of columns

Question

Hello,
here is the situation:
One table that contains raw data; from this table I feed one with extract information (3 fields); I have to turn the content in a pivot table
Ro --- Co --- Va
A A 1
A B 1
A C 2
B A 11
Turned in
A B C...
A 1 1 2
B 11 null null
To do this I do a query like:
select r, sum(decode(c,'A',Va) COLA, sum(decode(c,'B',Va) COLB , sum(decode(c,'C',Va) COLC,.... sum(decode(c,'XYZ',Va) COLXYZ from table group by r
The statement is generated by a script (cfmx) and it works until I reach a query that try to have 672 values for c; which means 672 columns...
Oracle doesn't like that: ORA-01467: sort key too long
I like this way has it is getting the result fast.
I have tried different solution a the CFMX level with for that specific query, I got timeout (query table with loop on co within loop on ro)
Is there any work around?
I am using Oracle 9i.
Tahnk you!

Answer 1

insert into extracted_data select c, r, v, p from full_data where <specific_clause>
The values for C are from a query: select disctinct c from extracted_data
and it is the same for R
R and C are varchar2(3999)
I suppose that I can split on the first letter of the C column as:
SELECT r, low.cola, low.colb, . . ., low.colm,
high.coln, high.colo, . . ., high.colz
FROM (SELECT r, SUM(DECODE(c, 'A', va)) cola, . . .
SUM(DECODE(c, 'M', va)) colm
FROM table
WHERE c like 'A%'
GROUP BY r) Alpha_A,
(SELECT r, SUM(DECODE(c, 'N', va)) coln, . . .
SUM(DECODE(c, 'Z', va)) colz
FROM table
WHERE c like 'B%'
GROUP BY r) Alpha_B,
(SELECT r, SUM(DECODE(c, 'N', va)) coln, . . .
SUM(DECODE(c, 'Z', va)) colz
FROM table
WHERE c like 'C%'
GROUP BY r) Alpha_C
(SELECT r, SUM(DECODE(c, 'zN', va)) coln, . . .
SUM(DECODE(c, 'zZ', va)) colz
FROM table
WHERE c like 'Z%'
GROUP BY r) Alpha_Z
WHERE alpha_A.r = alpha_B.r and apha_a.r = alpha_C.r ... and alpha_a.r = alpha_z.r
I will have 27 select statement joined... I have to check if even like that I will not reach the limit within one of the statement select
"in real life"
select GRPW.r, GRPW.W0, GRPC.C0, GRPC.C1 from
(select r, sum(decode(C, 'Wall, unspecified',cases)) W0 from tmp_maqueje where upper(C) like 'W%' group by r) GRPW,
select r,
sum(decode(C, 'Ceramic tiles, indoors',cases)) C0,
sum(decode(C, 'Cement surface, outdoors (Concrete/cement block, see Structural element, A11)',cases)) C1
from tmp_maqueje where upper(C) like 'C%' group by r) GRPC
where GRPW.r = GRPC.r
order by GRPW.r, GRPW.W0, GRPC.C0, GRPC.C1
Message was edited by:
maquejp