How to show string value with spaces in seperate columns

Question

Hi all, I'm using Oracle 10g.
create table
create table sample_test (
  Name    VARCHAR2(20 BYTE))insert table
insert into sample_test values ('JOAN   SCT')
     insert into sample_test values ('MELIA FILCK')
      insert into sample_test values ('SSAN LIER-LILEY')
       insert into sample_test values ('C.M. DANY WES')
           insert into sample_test values ('A L SCOTT')select * from sample_test;
Name
JOAN   SCT
MELIA FILCK
SSAN LIER-LILEY
C.M. DANY WES
A L SCOTTi would like the output as follows
NAME1        NAME2      NAME3
JOAN          SCT              
MELIA        FILCK              
SSAN       LIER-LILEY
C.M.          DANY       WES
A             L          SCOTTwhen ever there is a space in the name the value next to that should be shown in an other column. please note the first name joan sct has two spaces. but it needs to be treated as single space.
also is it possible to get something like this
NAME1        NAME2    
JOAN          SCT              
MELIA        FILCK              
SSAN       LIER-LILEY
C.M.DANY       WES
A L          SCOTTthe value before first space on the right should be in name2 everything else in name1 field.
Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

Hi,
Since you have Oracle 10, you can use regular expressions:
For the 3-column output:
SELECT        REGEXP_SUBSTR (name, '[^ ]+', 1, 1)     AS name1
,        REGEXP_SUBSTR (name, '[^ ]+', 1, 2)     AS name2
,        REGEXP_SUBSTR (name, '[^ ]+', 1, 3)     AS name3
FROM        sample_test;     [^xyz]     means "any character except x, y or z".
+     means "1 or more of the preceding"
The 4th argument to REGEXP_SUBSTR tells which occurrence of the pattern we want.
For the 2-column output:
SELECT        REGEXP_REPLACE (name, ' *[^ ]+$')     AS before_last_space
,        REGEXP_SUBSTR  (name,   '[^ ]+$')     AS after_last_space
FROM        sample_test;$     here means "the end of the string".
In Oracle 10, you often have to use REGEXP_REPLACE to get substrings.
Thanks for posting the CREATE TABLE and INSERT statements; that's very helpful!
Edited by: Frank Kulash on Sep 7, 2011 3:21 PM