Case INSENSITIVE Columns on Oracle

Question

Hello Friends,
Good Monday for everyone....
I would like to ask you guys if there is a way to create a case INSENSITIVE Columns on Oracle. I used on Sqlserver before the COLLATE sintax, and I was able to make a columns (just that one) INSENSITIVE.
I'm using oracle 10gr2 on Windows plataform and herte is my nls_parameters. My ideia is to search on this column without the need of performing a function UPPER and LOWER and etc...
NLS_LANGUAGE BRAZILIAN PORTUGUESE
NLS_TERRITORY BRAZIL
NLS_CURRENCY Cr$
NLS_ISO_CURRENCY BRAZIL
NLS_NUMERIC_CHARACTERS ,.
NLS_CALENDAR GREGORIAN
NLS_DATE_FORMAT DD/MM/RR
NLS_DATE_LANGUAGE BRAZILIAN PORTUGUESE
NLS_CHARACTERSET WE8MSWIN1252
NLS_SORT WEST_EUROPEAN
NLS_TIME_FORMAT HH24:MI:SSXFF
NLS_TIMESTAMP_FORMAT DD/MM/RR HH24:MI:SSXFF
NLS_TIME_TZ_FORMAT HH24:MI:SSXFF TZR
NLS_TIMESTAMP_TZ_FORMAT DD/MM/RR HH24:MI:SSXFF TZR
NLS_DUAL_CURRENCY Cr$
NLS_NCHAR_CHARACTERSET AL16UTF16
NLS_COMP BINARY
NLS_LENGTH_SEMANTICS BYTE
NLS_NCHAR_CONV_EXCP FALSE
tks a lot
Keen

Answer 1

APC wrote:
No, they mean a setting which makes "APC" or "apc" match "Apc".
There is nothing to be done on 10g, other than building a function based index on the column in question, so that any UPPER() searches are optimized.
Well, as Kamran Agayev already noted CI is available in 10g too. It also worth mentioning FBI creates a hidden column. Also, your statement
In 11g we have the option to set the NLS_SORT parameter so that any searches are case-insensitive (or indeed accent insensitive). Find out more.
is incomplete. NLS_SORT affects nothing but sort:
SQL> connect scott
Enter password: *****
Connected.
SQL> select * from v$version
  2  /
BANNER
Oracle Database 10g Enterprise Edition Release 10.2.0.4.0 - Prod
PL/SQL Release 10.2.0.4.0 - Production
CORE    10.2.0.4.0      Production
TNS for 32-bit Windows: Version 10.2.0.4.0 - Production
NLSRTL Version 10.2.0.4.0 - Production
SQL> with t as (
  2             select 'Max' name from dual union all
  3             select 'sam' name from dual union all
  4             select 'Joe' name from dual union all
  5             select 'max' name from dual union all
  6             select 'joe' name from dual union all
  7             select 'Sam' name from dual
  8            )
  9  select  name
10    from  t
11    order by name
12  /
NAM
Joe
Max
Sam
joe
max
sam
6 rows selected.
SQL> with t as (
  2             select 'Max' name from dual union all
  3             select 'sam' name from dual union all
  4             select 'Joe' name from dual union all
  5             select 'max' name from dual union all
  6             select 'joe' name from dual union all
  7             select 'Sam' name from dual
  8            )
  9  select  name
10    from  t
11    where name = 'max'
12  /
NAM
max
SQL> alter session set nls_sort = binary_ci
  2  /
Session altered.
SQL> with t as (
  2             select 'Max' name from dual union all
  3             select 'sam' name from dual union all
  4             select 'Joe' name from dual union all
  5             select 'max' name from dual union all
  6             select 'joe' name from dual union all
  7             select 'Sam' name from dual
  8            )
  9  select  name
10    from  t
11    order by name
12  /
NAM
Joe
joe
max
Max
Sam
sam
6 rows selected.
SQL> with t as (
  2             select 'Max' name from dual union all
  3             select 'sam' name from dual union all
  4             select 'Joe' name from dual union all
  5             select 'max' name from dual union all
  6             select 'joe' name from dual union all
  7             select 'Sam' name from dual
  8            )
  9  select  name
10    from  t
11    where name = 'max'
12  /
NAM
max
SQL> with t as (
  2             select 'Max' name from dual union all
  3             select 'sam' name from dual union all
  4             select 'Joe' name from dual union all
  5             select 'max' name from dual union all
  6             select 'joe' name from dual union all
  7             select 'Sam' name from dual
  8            )
  9  select  name
10    from  t
11    where name like 'm%'
12  /
NAM
max
SQL> select 'Max' name from dual union
  2  select 'max' name from dual
  3  /
NAM
Max
max
SQL> with t as (
  2             select 'Max' name from dual union all
  3             select 'sam' name from dual union all
  4             select 'Joe' name from dual union all
  5             select 'max' name from dual union all
  6             select 'joe' name from dual union all
  7             select 'Sam' name from dual
  8            )
  9  select  distinct name
10    from  t
11  /
NAM
sam
Joe
joe
max
Sam
Max
6 rows selected.
SQL> As you can see, NLS_SORT alone works on sort but not on "searches". We also need to set NLS_COMP, which by default is BINARY. Prior to 10g R2 (I am not 100% sure, it could be prior 10g), the only NLS_COMP choice, besides BINARY, was ANSI. However, ANSI does not work with all comparison operators (e.g. does not work for LIKE, UNION, DISTINCT):
SQL> alter session set nls_sort = binary_ci
  2  /
Session altered.
SQL> alter session set nls_comp=ansi
  2  /
Session altered.
SQL> with t as (
  2             select 'Max' name from dual union all
  3             select 'sam' name from dual union all
  4             select 'Joe' name from dual union all
  5             select 'max' name from dual union all
  6             select 'joe' name from dual union all
  7             select 'Sam' name from dual
  8            )
  9  select  name
10    from  t
11    order by name
12  /
NAM
Joe
joe
max
Max
Sam
sam
6 rows selected.
SQL> with t as (
  2             select 'Max' name from dual union all
  3             select 'sam' name from dual union all
  4             select 'Joe' name from dual union all
  5             select 'max' name from dual union all
  6             select 'joe' name from dual union all
  7             select 'Sam' name from dual
  8            )
  9  select  name
10    from  t
11    where name = 'max'
12  /
NAM
Max
max
SQL> with t as (
  2             select 'Max' name from dual union all
  3             select 'sam' name from dual union all
  4             select 'Joe' name from dual union all
  5             select 'max' name from dual union all
  6             select 'joe' name from dual union all
  7             select 'Sam' name from dual
  8            )
  9  select  name
10    from  t
11    where name like 'm%'
12  /
NAM
max
SQL> select 'Max' name from dual union
  2  select 'max' name from dual
  3  /
NAM
Max
max
SQL> with t as (
  2             select 'Max' name from dual union all
  3             select 'sam' name from dual union all
  4             select 'Joe' name from dual union all
  5             select 'max' name from dual union all
  6             select 'joe' name from dual union all
  7             select 'Sam' name from dual
  8            )
  9  select  distinct name
10    from  t
11  /
NAM
sam
Joe
joe
max
Sam
Max
6 rows selected.
SQL> Starting 10g R2 NLS_COMP can be set to LINGUISTIC, which will also work for LIKE and UNION but not for DISTINCT:
SQL> alter session set nls_sort = binary_ci
  2  /
Session altered.
SQL> alter session set nls_comp=linguistic
  2  /
Session altered.
SQL> with t as (
  2             select 'Max' name from dual union all
  3             select 'sam' name from dual union all
  4             select 'Joe' name from dual union all
  5             select 'max' name from dual union all
  6             select 'joe' name from dual union all
  7             select 'Sam' name from dual
  8            )
  9  select  name
10    from  t
11    order by name
12  /
NAM
Joe
joe
max
Max
Sam
sam
6 rows selected.
SQL> with t as (
  2             select 'Max' name from dual union all
  3             select 'sam' name from dual union all
  4             select 'Joe' name from dual union all
  5             select 'max' name from dual union all
  6             select 'joe' name from dual union all
  7             select 'Sam' name from dual
  8            )
  9  select  name
10    from  t
11    where name = 'max'
12  /
NAM
Max
max
SQL> with t as (
  2             select 'Max' name from dual union all
  3             select 'sam' name from dual union all
  4             select 'Joe' name from dual union all
  5             select 'max' name from dual union all
  6             select 'joe' name from dual union all
  7             select 'Sam' name from dual
  8            )
  9  select  name
10    from  t
11    where name like 'm%'
12  /
NAM
Max
max
SQL> select 'Max' name from dual union
  2  select 'max' name from dual
  3  /
NAM
Max
SQL> with t as (
  2             select 'Max' name from dual union all
  3             select 'sam' name from dual union all
  4             select 'Joe' name from dual union all
  5             select 'max' name from dual union all
  6             select 'joe' name from dual union all
  7             select 'Sam' name from dual
  8            )
  9  select  distinct name
10    from  t
11  /
NAM
sam
Joe
joe
max
Sam
Max
6 rows selected.
SQL> However even LINGUISTIC does not work with:
• CLOB or NCLOB data types
• Object data types
• Table partitions
• Index-organized tables
SY.