Question

I’ve found a good question at https://dba.stackexchange.com/questions/3587/oracle-automate-export-unload-of-data. Is it valid to use such a construction:

FOR r IN (SELECT * FROM table) LOOP
   UTL_FILE.PUT_LINE(lfFilelog, r.row);
END LOOP;

I’m trying to use something like this:

CREATE OR REPLACE PROCEDURE p_name(DESTFOLDER in varchar2, FILENAME in varchar2)
IS
    V_FILEHANDLE UTL_FILE.FILE_TYPE;
    CURSOR dataset IS 
        SELECT 
            field1, 
            field2, 
            fieldN 
        FROM 
            table1, 
            table2, 
            (SELECT field3 from table3);
        -- WHERE CLAUSE ... and so on..
BEGIN
    V_FILEHANDLE := UTL_FILE.FOPEN(DESTFOLDER, FILENAME, 'w');
    FOR R IN dataset LOOP
        UTL_FILE.PUT_LINE(V_FILEHANDLE, R.ROW);
    END LOOP;
END;
/

and getting pls-00302 error which states that I should have defined ROW component. So as far as I undrestand this field should already exist in the query. Am I right?

Can I simply write a row from the cursor?

Answer 1

The answer mentionned is not complete, I think it was given as an example (pseudo-code) that lacks implementation details.

As it is:

• your SELECT clause is invalid, you aren’t selecting anything. What do you want to select?
• the construct XX.row where xx is a cursor doesn’t exist
• furthermore, the UTL_FILE.get_line procedure accepts a VARCHAR2 as its second argument, not any kind of rowtype
• you can’t name a table table (although you could name it "table").

Given a table mytable(col1, col2, ... , colN) you could write:

CREATE OR REPLACE PROCEDURE p_name()
IS
    V_FILEHANDLE UTL_FILE.FILE_TYPE;
    CURSOR dataset IS SELECT col1, col2, /*...*/ coln FROM mytable;
BEGIN
    /*utl_file.fopen maybe?*/
    FOR R IN dataset LOOP
        UTL_FILE.PUT_LINE(V_FILEHANDLE, R.col1 ||';'|| r.col2 /*...*/ || r.coln);
    END LOOP;
END;