ASCII Dump using SQL

Question

Dear All,
Could any one help me in designing the efficient sql query which should be storage effcient. I run the following query on the table:
SET NEWPAGE 0
SET SPACE 0
SET LINESIZE 319
SET TERMOUT OFF
SET PAGESIZE 0
SET ECHO OFF
SET FEEDBACK OFF
SET HEADING OFF
SET COLSEP ','
SET MARKUP HTML OFF SPOOL OFF
SPOOL FileName
alter session set nls_date_format = 'dd-mm-yyyy hh24:mi:ss';
SELECT *
FROM TABLE1
WHERE deltime > trunc(sysdate)-3
AND deltime < trunc(sysdate)-2;
SPOOL OFF
Table structrue is as follows:
Name Null? Type
DESTINATION VARCHAR2(20)
SOURCE VARCHAR2(20)
PRIORITY NUMBER(1)
PROTOCOLID VARCHAR2(20)
DCS VARCHAR2(20)
DELTIME DATE
EXPTIME DATE
MESSAGE VARCHAR2(4000)
STATUS VARCHAR2(30)
PUSHROWID VARCHAR2(50)
ID NOT NULL NUMBER(38)
MSGTYPE VARCHAR2(30)
MSISDN VARCHAR2(20)
CUST VARCHAR2(10)
What is happening a big fie size is creating by the above quey, reason is that if MESSAGE column is declared as VARCHAR2(4000) in size it is reserving the 4000 spaces in the dump file regardless the message size in the table. I want this query should ve optimised so that what ever the message size is there it should dump that in the spooled file and if there is empty coulmn it should place null in that coulmn.
Any help please?

Answer 1

maybe that helps
SCOTT@ORCL-30/08/05 >select ltrim(' test') from dual;
LTRI
test
SCOTT@ORCL-30/08/05 >select lpad('test',20,' ' ) from dual;
LPAD('TEST',20,'')
test
SCOTT@ORCL-30/08/05 >select length(' test') from dual;
LENGTH('TEST')
22
SCOTT@ORCL-30/08/05 >select ltrim(' test') from dual;
LTRI
test
SCOTT@ORCL-30/08/05 >select length( ltrim(' test')) from dual;
LENGTH(LTRIM('TEST'))
4
and use the col message to suite your demands as you like