Question

Very simple question, is it possible to write an Oracle update statement like this with column names and values grouped together?

UPDATE table_name SET (column1, column2, column3) = (value1, value2, value3)

The reason I’m asking is because I’m writing a script to migrate a lot of data and for insert statements I have a string containing all the column names and a string containing all the values. I need to write an update statement for the same data and was wondering if there’s an alternative to having to write it all out again in a different format!

Answer 1

Not directly as you wrote it, but you can do it like this:

UPDATE table_name 
   SET (column1, column2, column3) = (select 1 as value1, 'foo' as value2, 'bar' as value3 from dual);

So a multi-column update is only supported when using a sub-select for the “value”.

You might also want to look into the MERGE statement:

merge into table_name 
using
( 
   select 1 as id, 
          'foo' as value1,
          'bar' as value2
   from dual
) t on (t.id = table_name.id)
when matched then update
  set value1 = t.value1,
      value2 = t.value2
when not matched then 
   insert (id, value1, value2)
   values (t.id, t.value1, t.value2);

If that row exists it will be updated, if not it will be inserted.