Run Unix command from PLSQL

Question

I am trying to execute simple Unix command such as (/UItools/touch test.txt or /UItools/cp t1.txt t2.txt ) from PL/SQL. Could somebody pls help?

Answer 1

Hi,
you can use DBMS_PIPE to achieve this
CREATE OR REPLACE FUNCTION exec_host_command( lc_cmd IN VARCHAR2 )
RETURN INTEGER IS
ln_status NUMBER;
lc_errormsg VARCHAR2(80);
lc_pipe_name VARCHAR2(30);
BEGIN
lc_pipe_name := ‘HOST_PIPE’;
dbms_pipe.pack_message( lc_cmd );
ln_status := dbms_pipe.send_message(lc_pipe_name);
RETURN ln_status;
END;
Alternatively you can write a java stored procedure to do the same
CREATE OR REPLACE AND COMPILE JAVA SOURCE NAMED "Cmd" AS
--==========================================================--
-- Class Cmd
--==========================================================--
import java.io.BufferedReader;
import java.io.InputStreamReader;
public class Cmd {
*Static method to invoke host system commands
*input variable String Command
*Returns int. 0 for success and any other number
*for failure of the command
public static int executeCommand(String s_command) {
try {
/*Get the runtime shell and execute the system command
*Wait till the command is executed
final Process pr = Runtime.getRuntime().exec(s_command);
pr.waitFor();
return pr.exitValue();
catch (Exception ex) {
System.out.println(ex.getLocalizedMessage());
return -1;
}/*End of function executeCommand*/
SHOW ERRORS
EXIT;
Grant the permissions
--Grant Host File permissions to the APPS schema
DBMS_JAVA.grant_permission ('<USER>', 'java.io.FilePermission',
'<<ALL FILES>>', 'read ,write, execute, delete');
--Grant Runtime Write permissions to the APPS schema
DBMS_JAVA.grant_permission ('<USER>', 'SYS:java.lang.RuntimePermission',
'writeFileDescriptor', '');
--Grant Runtime Read permissions to the APPS schema
DBMS_JAVA.grant_permission ('<USER>', 'SYS:java.lang.RuntimePermission',
'readFileDescriptor', '');
and create a wrapper plsql call
FUNCTION Cmd (p_command IN VARCHAR2)
RETURN NUMBER
AS LANGUAGE JAVA
NAME 'Cmd.executeCommand (java.lang.String) return int';
Edited by: navsriva on Apr 13, 2010 3:21 PM