Doubt in Overloading Concept in Packages

Question

Hi,
I have two Stored Procedures are inside a package
sp_mem(mCursor REFCURSOR Datatype,MemberId INTEGER);
sp_mem(mCursor REFCURSOR Datatype, mEmailId INTEGER);
In the Above Procedures if the second Parameter is Member Id then the first SP will be executed.
In the Above Procedures if the Second Parameter is MemEmailId then the Second SP will be Executed.
This is the normal OverLoading Concept inside the package. But for me, i am returning the Recordset using a RefCursor.
I just want to know it is possible for returning the recordset using ref cursor with the overloading concept for both the SP.
Thanks,
Murali.V

Answer 1

Hello
You need to be careful with this type of overloading. Overloading is generally based around the position and data types of the parameters being supplied which are used to identify the "signature" of the particular procedure to call i.e.
sp_myproc(ref cursor, integer)
sp_myproc(ref cursor, date)
sp_myproc(ref cursor, varchar2)
sp_myproc(ref cursor, varchar2, integer)
etc etc
When you have 2 procedures that have the same signature, unless you specify the name of the parameter, there is no way to determine which procedure to call:
tylerd@DEV2> CREATE OR REPLACE PACKAGE pkg_test_overload
  2  IS
  3
  4     PROCEDURE sp_mem(mCursor sys_refcursor,MemberId INTEGER);
  5     PROCEDURE sp_mem(mCursor sys_refcursor, mEmailId INTEGER);
  6
  7  END;
  8  /
Package created.
tylerd@DEV2>
tylerd@DEV2> CREATE OR REPLACE PACKAGE BODY pkg_test_overload
  2  IS
  3
  4     PROCEDURE sp_mem(mCursor sys_refcursor,MemberId INTEGER)
  5     IS
  6
  7     BEGIN
  8
  9             NULL;
10
11     END;
12
13     PROCEDURE sp_mem(mCursor sys_refcursor, mEmailId INTEGER)
14     IS
15
16     BEGIN
17
18             NULL;
19
20     END;
21
22  END;
23  /
Package body created.
Package body created.
tylerd@DEV2> var mycursor refcursor
tylerd@DEV2> var memberid number
tylerd@DEV2> exec pkg_test_overload.sp_mem(:mycursor,:memberid)
BEGIN pkg_test_overload.sp_mem(:mycursor,:memberid); END;
ERROR at line 1:
ORA-06550: line 1, column 7:
PLS-00307: too many declarations of 'SP_MEM' match this call
ORA-06550: line 1, column 7:
PL/SQL: Statement ignored
tylerd@DEV2> exec pkg_test_overload.sp_mem(:mycursor,MemberId=>:memberid)
PL/SQL procedure successfully completed.
tylerd@DEV2> exec pkg_test_overload.sp_mem(:mycursor,mEmailId=>:memberid)
PL/SQL procedure successfully completed.To me, using named notation with overloading kind of defeats part of the objective...I'm not saying it's completely wrong, as sometimes I guess it's unavoidable, but I'd review the design carefully :-)
HTH
David
Message was edited by:
David Tyler
Oops, copied the wrong bit of the output! :-)