SQL*Loader and using nulls, truncate and sysdate.

Question

Good afternoon,
I have a control file some of which is below which I need to use to load a CSV file. What I want to know is; how do I truncate fields which are too long and if there is no date specified how do I insert the sysdate as default. For any other fields missing data I want to insert a NULL value, I think that I have the NULL bit sorted.
LOAD DATA
INFILE new_employee.csv
INTO TABLE temp_emp
FIELDS TERMINATED BY "," OPTIONALLY ENCLOSED BY '"'
TRAILING NULLCOLS
EMP_NO
LAST_NAME
FIRST_NAME
TITLE
ADD1
PCODE
HOME_TEL
DATE
)The table I am inserting too is described below
Name                                      Null?    Type
EMP_NO                                             NUMBER
LAST_NAME                                          VARCHAR2(20)
FIRST_NAME                                         VARCHAR2(20)
TITLE                                         VARCHAR2(15)
ADD1                                             VARCHAR2(35)
PCODE                                              VARCHAR2(10)
HOME_TEL                                           VARCHAR2(20)
DATE_STARTED                                       DATECan anyone show me where I put truncate etc in my file and does TRAILING NULL COLS actually insert null when no data is present?
Cheers

Answer 1

Hi,
Thanks for the info.
I have the SEQUENCE SORTED and I believe that TRAILLING NULLCOLLS works fine too but I cannot seem to seem to find away to insert SYSDATE when no date exists in the flat file. Also, I cannot work out how to trim down the information if its too long for the column I want to insert too.
My CTL file again is like this
LOAD DATA
INFILE new_employees.csv
INTO TABLE temp_emp
FIELDS TERMINATED BY ","
TRAILING NULLCOLS
EMP_NO       SEQUENCE(MAX, 1),
LAST_NAME,
FIRST_NAME,
TITLE,               
ADD1,
PCODE,               -- some pcodes are too long how can I trim them here?
HOME_TEL,
DATE_STARTED   -- What can I put here to say if NULL then use SYSDATE
)I did read the info and learned sequence easy enough but I couldn't find an answer to these last to questions.
Cheers
M