Hi Pls help me understand this problem

Question

Hi,
I know its a weired doubt, i select (select empno,ename,sal,deptno from emp where ename = 'SMITH')
Result what i have is
EMPNO ENAME SAL DEPTNO
7369 SMITH 800 20
I copied the result from the sql*plus and pasted the same into the same tool,
SQL> EMPNO ENAME SAL DEPTNO
SP2-0734: unknown command beginning "EMPNO ENAM..." - rest of line ignored.
SQL> ------ ---------- ---------- ----------
SQL> 7369 SMITH 800 20
SQL>|
For first copyied line i got error message: SP2-0734: unknown command beginning "EMPNO ENAM..." - rest of line ignored. And for second line i did not get error why ? could any one help me understand this.
Thanks in advance
Mahesh Ragineni

Answer 1

Hi,
The first line from
EMPNO ENAME SAL DEPTNO
7369 SMITH 800 20
is treated as sql statement and gave the error.
the second line is treated as comment hence no error;
In the third line as the line begin with the number
and followed by text it is treated as the sql statement to be added at the given line hence no error. if the first field was not number you will receive error.
for ex:- SMITH 7369 800 20 will give u error.
try this when u get sql prompt after
7369 SMITH 600 20
press / and press enter(to execute the 7369 SMITH 600 20)
then u will receive error.
Regs
Dhananjaya