Check the value of attribute of a child node in datatype xmltype.

Question

Hello,
I have a xml stored in column having datatype as "XMLTYPE"
<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?>
<Settings>
  <Setting Name="A1" Value="N"/>
  <Setting Name="A2" Value="N"/>
  <Setting Name="A3" Value="SOMEVALUE"/>
  <Setting Name="A4" Value="N"/>
  <Setting Name="A5" Value="Y"/>
  <Setting Name="A6" Value="N"/>
</Settings>I do not want to loop into each child node. But want to find out if the value of setting A5 is Y or N? Is there a way I can find that without doing the extract of "Setting" child node and then looping each node to find the value?
Regards,

Answer 1

You didn't specify your version of Oracle so here are two options. If 10.2 or greater, use XMLTable, else use the ExtractValue option.
-- The WITH simply simulates your existing table that I do not have.
WITH fake_tab AS
(SELECT XMLTYPE('<?xml version="1.0" encoding="ISO-8859-1"?>
<Settings>
  <Setting Name="A1" Value="N"/>
  <Setting Name="A2" Value="N"/>
  <Setting Name="A3" Value="SOMEVALUE"/>
  <Setting Name="A4" Value="N"/>
  <Setting Name="A5" Value="Y"/>
  <Setting Name="A6" Value="N"/>
</Settings>
') tab_col
  FROM dual)
-- For 10.2 and higher use this SELECT
SELECT a5
  FROM fake_tab,
       XMLTABLE('/Settings'
                PASSING fake_tab.tab_col
                COLUMNS
                a5   VARCHAR2(10)  PATH 'Setting[@Name="A5"]/@Value');
-- For 10.1 and before
SELECT ExtractValue(tab_col, '/Settings/Setting[@Name="A5"]/@Value')
  FROM fake_tab;