Using DBMS_METADATA

Question

I'm trying to get to grips with DBMS_METADATA to transfer table DDL across schemas, making some modifications in the process.
Firstly, I'm not achieving table recreation using DBMS_METADATA.PUT. Example 18-7 from the Utilities manual is giving an "ORA-00942: Table does not exist" error, and my own attempt below does not result in a copy of the table being created. Can anyone point out what the problem is?
xdba@ora10gr2 > select * from v$version;
BANNER
Oracle Database 10g Enterprise Edition Release 10.2.0.1.0 - Prod
PL/SQL Release 10.2.0.1.0 - Production
CORE    10.2.0.1.0      Production
TNS for Linux: Version 10.2.0.1.0 - Production
NLSRTL Version 10.2.0.1.0 - Production
xdba@ora10gr2 > create user king identified by lion;
User created.
xdba@ora10gr2 > grant connect, resource to king;
Grant succeeded.
xdba@ora10gr2 > declare
  2
  3    src   number;
  4    destn number;
  5
  6    xml   xmltype;
  7    ddls  sys.ku$_ddls;
  8
  9    txh number;
10
11    created boolean;
12    errs    sys.ku$_SubmitResults := sys.ku$_SubmitResults();
13
14    dbms_metadata_failure exception;
15
16  begin
17
18    src := dbms_metadata.open('TABLE');
19
20    dbms_metadata.set_filter(src, 'SCHEMA', 'SCOTT');
21    dbms_metadata.set_count(src, 3);
22
23    txh := dbms_metadata.add_transform(src, 'MODIFY');
24    dbms_metadata.set_transform_param(txh, 'OBJECT_ROW', 3);
25    dbms_metadata.set_remap_param(txh, 'REMAP_SCHEMA', 'SCOTT', 'KING');
26
27    txh := dbms_metadata.add_transform(src, 'DDL');
28
29    dbms_metadata.set_transform_param(txh, 'REF_CONSTRAINTS', false);
30    dbms_metadata.set_transform_param(txh, 'CONSTRAINTS', false);
31    dbms_metadata.set_transform_param(txh, 'STORAGE', false);
32    dbms_metadata.set_transform_param(txh, 'SEGMENT_ATTRIBUTES', false);
33
34    ddls := dbms_metadata.fetch_ddl(src);
35
36    for i in ddls.first()..ddls.last()
37    loop
38      dbms_output.put_line(ddls(i).ddlText);
39    end loop;
40
41    destn := dbms_metadata.openw('TABLE');
42
43    created := dbms_metadata.put(destn, xml, 0, errs);
44
45    dbms_metadata.close(destn);
46
47    if not created
48    then
49      raise dbms_metadata_failure;
50    end if;
51
52    dbms_metadata.close(src);
53
54  exception
55
56    when dbms_metadata_failure
57    then
58      for i in errs.first..errs.last
59      loop
60        for j in errs(i).errorlines.first..errs(i).errorlines.last
61        loop
62          dbms_output.put_line(errs(i).errorlines(j).errortext);
63        end loop;
64      end loop;
65      raise;
66
67  end;
68  /
CREATE TABLE "KING"."EMP"
   (    "EMPNO" NUMBER(4,0),
        "ENAME" VARCHAR2(10),
        "JOB" VARCHAR2(9),
        "MGR" NUMBER(4,0),
        "HIREDATE"
DATE,
        "SAL" NUMBER(7,2),
        "COMM" NUMBER(7,2),
        "DEPTNO" NUMBER(2,0)
PL/SQL procedure successfully completed.
xdba@ora10gr2 > connect king/lion@ora10gr2
Connected.
king@ora10gr2 > select dbms_metadata.get_ddl('TABLE', 'EMP') from dual;
ERROR:
ORA-31603: object "EMP" of type TABLE not found in schema "KING"
ORA-06512: at "SYS.DBMS_METADATA", line 1546
ORA-06512: at "SYS.DBMS_METADATA", line 1583
ORA-06512: at "SYS.DBMS_METADATA", line 1901
ORA-06512: at "SYS.DBMS_METADATA", line 2792
ORA-06512: at "SYS.DBMS_METADATA", line 4333
ORA-06512: at line 1Secondly, does anyone have experience of performing more complex transformations with DBMS_METADATA using external XLST? Are there any examples anywhere?

Answer 1

I've now achieved table recreation in example 18-7 and my own code above. This does not work when XMLType storage is used, but does when CLOB is used. It is not clear to me from these experiments and the documentation if there is intended to be a difference between XMLType/dbms_metadata.fetch_xml() and CLOB/dbms_metadata.fetch_clob, and if so, what this is?
I have also succeeded in applying more complex transformations using XSLT (changing table names, tablespaces; adding columns). However, I'm concerned that the dbms_metadata XML format seems to be undocumented.
Has there been any advance since XML Schema for Oracle DDL statements??
Can anyone shed any light on the use of the various <SPAREn> elements for example? Valid values for <COL_LIST_ITEM>...<TYPE_NUM>?