Help with job scheduling; decode error

Question

Hi
Iam trying to change a job that runs my procedure using dbms_job.. Here is the output I got.
Can someone help me why this is giving me errors.
<code>
SQL> exec dbms_job.next_date(395,decode(sign(substr(to_char(sysdate,'dd/mm/yy hh24:mi'),10,2)-17),-1,'trunc(sysdate) +18.5/24',1,'trunc(sysdate)+1+6.5/24'));
BEGIN dbms_job.next_date(395,decode(sign(substr(to_char(sysdate,'dd/mm/yy hh24:mi'),10,2)-17),-1,'trunc(sysdate) +18.5/24',1,'trunc(sysdate)+1+6.5/24')); END;
ERROR at line 1:
ORA-06550: line 1, column 30:
PLS-00204: function or pseudo-column 'DECODE' may be used inside a SQL
statement only
ORA-06550: line 1, column 7:
PL/SQL: Statement ignored
</code>
Thanks in advance

Answer 1

I'm not sure what you're trying to achieve.
Is this a one time action or do you want to run this statement on a regular basis?
How about this:
begin
  if ( to_number(to_char(sysdate,'hh24')) <= 17 ) then
    dbms_job.next_date(395, 'trunc(sysdate)+18.5/24');
  else
    dbms_job.next_date(395, 'trunc(sysdate)+1+6.5/24');
  end if;
end;