Question

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how to convert csv to table in oracle

I have a query in PL/SQL that is built to handle input in a variable as a “starts-with” filter:

WHERE product_group LIKE strProductGroup || '%'

As a new “feature”, the input variable could contain comma separated values. So, where before I would expect something like “ART”, I could now see “ART,DRM”.

I’d like to avoid building this query as a string and using EXECUTE IMMEDIATE, if possible. Can anyone think of a way to write a WHERE condition that is the equivalent of saying “starts with any of the values in a CSV list” in Oracle 10g?

Answer 1

I found another post that gave me an idea. In my specific case, the values in the input will all be 3 characters, so I can do the following:

AND SUBSTR(product_group, 0, 3) IN
    (SELECT regexp_substr(strProductGroup, '[^,]+', 1, LEVEL)
      FROM dual
      CONNECT BY LEVEL <= length(regexp_replace(strProductGroup, '[^,]+')) + 1)

I like this solution, because it does not require additional types or functions, but is pretty limited to my specific case.