Order by is not working

Question

Hello,
I'm using FORM 6i and writing the data to Excel Report
I'm passing the string to the Order By clause. But the data is not sorted.
Code is as follows:
procedure test (pi_order IN VARCHAR2)
is
type t_data IS REF CURSOR;
c_data t_data;
l_order_by VARCHAR2(200);
type data_rec IS RECORD (col1 NUMBER(2),
col2 VARCHAR2(100));
r_data data_rec;
BEGIN
IF (pi_order_by IS NULL) THEN
l_order_by := NULL;
ELSE
l_order_by := pi_order_by;
END IF;
OPEN c_data for SELECT COL1, COL2 , pkg1.p2(x, y) col3
FROM table_name
WHERE col1 = 1
ORDER BY l_order_by;
LOOP
FETCH c_data INTO r_data;
EXIT WHEN c_data%NOTFOUND;
---- OTHER CODE HERE--
EXCEPTION
END;
So, basically i'm using the REF CURSOR, and passing the order by string dynamically from the Oracle Form. The above procedure is part of PLL.
I have verified running the script at SQL*PLUS, to test if there is any dependency on Forms. But data is not sorted in SQL*PLUS environment also.
And also i'm using a packaged procedure as one column in the cursor query. So I can't use EXEC_SQL, which will parse the total statement once . To me known we can use EXEC_SQL, when we don't have any input parameters to the SQL statement.
Any suggestion on passing Dynamic Order by cluase in any appraoch?
Cheers
Ram

Answer 1

Hi
I researched some and found this.
It looks like you are using 'REF CURSOR WITH STATIC SQL'.
You need REF CURSOR with DYNAMIC SQL ( put it in single quotes ).
Read this article here:
http://www.oracle.com/technology/oramag/oracle/04-may/o34asktom.html
Goto this section and read ---
Cursor or Ref Cursor
At an interview for an Oracle PL/SQL developer job, I was asked to describe the difference between cursor and ref cursor and when you would appropriately use each of these. Could you please tell me the answer?
Well, technically, under the covers, at the most basic level, they are the same. A typical PL/SQL cursor is static by definition. Ref cursors, on the other hand, can be dynamically opened (the query is not known until runtime) or opened by use of a set of static SQL statements, the choice of which is based on logic (an IF/THEN/ELSE block will open one or the other query). For example, the following block of code demonstrates a typical static PL/SQL cursor, cursor C. Also, it shows how you can use a ref cursor (L_CURSOR in this example) to open a query by using dynamic SQL or static SQL:
Declare
type rc is ref cursor;
cursor c is select * from dual;
l_cursor rc;
begin
if (to_char(sysdate,'dd') = 30)
then
-- ref cursor with dynamic sql
open l_cursor for
'select * from emp';
elsif (to_char(sysdate,'dd') = 29)
then
-- ref cursor with static sql
open l_cursor for
select * from dept;
else
-- with ref cursor with static sql
open l_cursor for
select * from dual;
end if;
-- the "normal" static cursor
open c;
end;
Message was edited by:
brian952