Bind Variable reuse in GROUP BY queries

Question

We have several queries that are rather large (in are opinion, that is) and they each have 10 '?' place holders for binding JDBC parameters. These queries also use bind variables in the WHERE and GROUP BY clauses. Eventhough there are 10 bind variable place holders ('?'), there are only 3 distinct values needed.
So...in TOAD or SQL*Plus, we run the queries and "reuse" the same three bind variables and the query works fine. If we use 10 different bind variables, filled with the 3 values, we get a an error, "not a GROUP BY expression."
We would like to make these calls as JDBC PreparedStatements and bind the parameters at run time, so that we could take advantage of the statement cache and increase performance. But...since JDBC parameter binding seems to be positional, we seem to be getting 10 different bind variables at runtime in the PreparedStatement call. Is there a way to "reuse" the bind variables that JDBC is binding at runtime?
Regards,

Answer 1

Yep...that is what we are doing. We have a work around that is to manually replace the ? with string data and then pass the query in complete. It will work fine for us. I was just checking the alternatives. The query is large, but the offending code is:
...( select distinct T3.ptcpt_cd,trunc(new_time(T1.start_dt_gmt, 'GMT', ?)) trade_date,
sum(decode(T1.sttl_item_num, 10, T1.sttl_item_qnty, 0)) DA_CHARGE_MW,
sum(decode(T1.sttl_item_num, 10, T1.sttl_item_amt, 0)) DA_CHARGE_AMT,
sum(decode(T1.sttl_item_num, 30, T1.sttl_item_qnty, 0)) BAL_CHARGE_MW,
sum(decode(T1.sttl_item_num, 30, T1.sttl_item_amt, 0)) BAL_CHARGE_AMT,
sum(decode(T1.sttl_item_num, 20, T1.sttl_item_qnty, 0)) DA_CREDIT_MW,
sum(decode(T1.sttl_item_num, 20, T1.sttl_item_amt, 0)) DA_CREDIT_AMT,
sum(decode(T1.sttl_item_num, 40, T1.sttl_item_qnty, 0)) BAL_CREDIT_MW,
sum(decode(T1.sttl_item_num, 40, T1.sttl_item_amt, 0)) BAL_CREDIT_AMT,
T3.source_cd Source
from nm_sttl_item_dtl T1, nm_settlement T2, nm_sttl_statement T3
where trunc(new_time(T1.start_dt_gmt, 'GMT', ?)) between to_date(?,'mm/dd/rrrr') and to_date(?,'mm/dd/rrrr')
and sttl_item_num in (10, 20, 30, 40)
and (sttl_item_qnty <> 0 and sttl_item_amt <> 0)
and T1.sttl_id = T2.sttl_id
and T2.statement_id = T3.statement_id
and T3.ptcpt_cd = 'FAC'
and T3.source_cd = AREA'
group by T3.ptcpt_cd,trunc(new_time(T1.start_dt_gmt, 'GMT', ?)), T3.source_cd)...