Cleaning data containing characters &

Question

Hi
One of the Columns in the table contained characters like &amp which is not recognised by XMLpublisher as such user is not getting an output. How can I identify the records containing such characters so that it could be fixed manually.
Thanks in advance
Regards
anna
create table publication
(Publication_id number
,Title varchar2(100)
,Year varchar2(5));
insert into publication values
(100, 'Research on Flu & Vacine', 2008)
insert into publication values
(200, 'Human < Computer &amp Interaction', 2010)

Answer 1

Hi, Anna,
If you're not using substitution variables elsewhere in the same statement, it's easiest to turn off that feature using SET DEFINE OFF; then SQL*Plus will treat & as a normal character.
SET DEFINE OFF
insert into publication (id, title, year) values
(100, 'Research on Flu &amp; Vacine', 2008)
insert into publication (id, title, year) values
(200, 'Human < Computer &amp Interaction', 2010)
-- If you need to use substitution variables later, turn the feature on again:
SET DEFINE ONOther options (in order of likelihood) include:
(1) Escape the special character
(2) Change the character that marks substitution variables (e.g. "SET DEFINE ~")
(3) Use CHR (38) instead of '&'