Ada.Strings.Fixed.Index unexpected results in loop - ada

I have a simple procedure which splits a string and then searches substrings inside them. I'm getting weird results but I dont quite grasp why. I suspect it might be related to Ada evaluation strategy or something like that.
with Ada.Text_IO; use Ada.Text_IO;
with Ada.Strings.Fixed; use Ada.Strings.Fixed;
with GNAT.String_Split; use GNAT;
procedure Split_Test is
Subs : String_Split.Slice_Set;
begin
String_Split.Create (Subs, "abcdSEPabcd", "SEP", String_Split.Multiple);
for Substring of Subs loop
declare
Idx : Integer := Index(Substring, "abc");
begin
Put_Line("index of abc is" & Integer'Image(Idx) & " within string " & Substring);
end;
end loop;
end;
When I run it, i get:
index of abc is 1 within string abcd
index of abc is 8 within string abcd
Clearly index of abc should be 1 on both iterations. What's the issue here?

Ada allows for strings to be indexed starting at any valid Positive value. What it appears is that the GNAT split function (Create) is simply ensuring that the substrings use the same indexes as their data had in the original combined string. Which is useful for finding the original index of the value you are looking for.
If you want the answer to always be 1 for the first index, you'll need to do the legwork of subtracting Substring'First and adding 1 to the index, but honestly there shouldn't be any need for that. Just make sure your code handling the substring always uses operations relative to Substring'First and it won't matter what the first index is.

Related

PL/SQL: Creating a Function: invalid identifier

I have an oracle 19c ee database build via their docker image on Oracles github (https://github.com/oracle/docker-images/tree/master/OracleDatabase/SingleInstance). I am trying to follow their example as to how to create a function from here.
I have copied their example exactly. Setup table and data:
CREATE TABLE orders (
customer_id number(10),
order_total NUMBER(11,2)
);
INSERT INTO orders (customer_id, order_total) VALUES (1, 200.01)
The actual function:
CREATE FUNCTION get_bal(acc_no IN NUMBER)
RETURN NUMBER
IS acc_bal NUMBER(11,2);
BEGIN
SELECT order_total
INTO acc_bal
FROM orders
WHERE customer_id = acc_no;
RETURN(acc_bal);
END;
However I keep running into this error when I try and create the function
Query 2 ERROR: ORA-06550: line 5, column 27:
PL/SQL: ORA-00904: "ACC_NO": invalid identifier
ORA-06550: line 2, column 7:
PL/SQL: SQL Statement ignored
ORA-06550: line 6, column 7:
PLS-00372: In a procedure, RETURN statement cannot contain an expression
ORA-06550: line 6, column 7:
PL/SQL: Statement ignored
What am I doing wrong?
The example works for me. You must have mistyped something. Are you sure your function is exactly the same as the one in the manual?
ORA-00904: "ACC_NO": invalid identifier
suggests the declaration acc_bal NUMBER(11,2); is missing or different.
PLS-00372: In a procedure, RETURN statement cannot contain an expression
indicates that your code is a procedure, not a function.
SQL> CREATE TABLE orders (
2 customer_id number(10),
3 order_total NUMBER(11,2)
4 );
Table created
SQL> INSERT INTO orders (customer_id, order_total) VALUES (1, 200.01);
1 row inserted
SQL> CREATE FUNCTION get_bal(acc_no IN NUMBER)
2 RETURN NUMBER
3 IS acc_bal NUMBER(11,2);
4 BEGIN
5 SELECT order_total
6 INTO acc_bal
7 FROM orders
8 WHERE customer_id = acc_no;
9 RETURN(acc_bal);
10 END;
11 /
Function created
SQL> select get_bal(1) from dual;
GET_BAL(1)
----------
200.01
As an aside, while I'm a big fan of the Oracle documentation in general, and this example does neatly illustrate how to create a PL/SQL function, I think it could be improved:
For readability, it's better to give each declaration its own line, so line 3 would be better split into two with acc_bal NUMBER(11,2); on its own line.
The IS and AS keywords are interchangeable here, but surely create ... as (similar to what you might use to create a table or a view) reads better than create ... is.
Understandably, the author didn't want to complicate the example by introducing %type before it had been explained, but a more advanced version would use acc_bal orders.order_total%type; to make acc_bal inherit its datatype from the table column rather than hard-coding it. This goes for all three values used in the function.
The parameter and variable names are OK - they are at least clear - but there is a danger when using the same naming pattern for parameters and variables as for table columns. One day you will type WHERE c.customer_id = customer_id and wonder why you're getting more rows back than you expected. Again it's understandable that the author didn't want to get into that whole discussion in the first example, but it's something to think about. You might use get_bal.acc_no within the function, or use camelCase for parameters and variables, or prefix them with p_ for 'parameter' etc.
A basic rule of layout is that opening and closing keywords such as if/else and begin/end should be left-aligned. The END at line 10 is misaligned under its opening BEGIN. I suppose indenting the entire thing after the first line is a valid personal layout choice, but to me it doesn't add anything.
It's a good idea to leave blank lines around each SQL statement, to avoid a solid wall of text. Personally, I'd prefer a blank line before the RETURN at line 9.
A RETURN clause doesn't require any brackets. The compiler is ignoring the redundant brackets at line 9. I'd lose them.
It's good practice (though optional) to include the procedure/function name in the closing END, so line 10 would become END get_bal;
The COBOL-style uppercase habit is widespread in the industry, but there is no need for it. (PL/SQL's syntax is famously based on Ada, though some also point to ALGOL and PL/1 - nobody ever wrote those in uppercase.) I would improve readability by lowercasing the whole thing.
With these changes, I get this:
create or replace function get_bal
( inAccNo in orders.customer_id%type )
return orders.order_total%type
as
accBal orders.order_total%type;
begin
select order_total into accBal
from orders
where customer_id = inAccNo;
return accBal;
end;

How to print unique numbers dynamically with PLSQL

I would like to display Unique numbers dynamically. I have tried below code for the same but same number is displaying all the times.
DECLARE
a NUMBER;
BEGIN
FOR i IN 1 .. 3 LOOP
DBMS_OUTPUT.PUT_LINE(&a);
END LOOP;
END;
the above code will ask me for "a" value three times, if i pass 1,2,3 as parameters then it should display 1,2,3 but this code is displaying first(1) value three time as 1,1,1.
Could you please help me to get the required output like 1,2,3
You can't really create an interactive program in just PL/SQL. When you put &a in the PL/SQL and run it in a tool like SQL Developer, it prompts you once for a value for a before it runs the code, using the value you typed instead of the substitution variable a.
You want to print i and not a. Also the ampersand in front of the a means you will be prompted to enter a value for a.

How to have a SQLite query with a variable part?

Hi I am trying to create a query for SQLite which has a variable part in it. By variable I mean that a certain part within the string can possibly contain a variable but also an empy value
I tried this but I am not sure whether this works.
SELECT * FROM table WHERE attr LIKE 'ABC% %DEF'
Adding onto my comment, check the below code to test your values.
SELECT CASE WHEN 'ABC G DEF' LIKE 'ABC%DEF'
THEN 1
ELSE 0 END as test_space,
CASE WHEN 'ABCGGGDEF' LIKE 'ABC%DEF'
THEN 1
ELSE 0 END AS test_all

I keep getting a syntax error on this code [duplicate]

I'm trying to insert some information to MySQL with Pascal, but when I run the program I get the error
unknown column 'mohsen' in field list
This is my code
procedure TForm1.Button1Click(Sender: TObject);
var
aSQLText: string;
aSQLCommand: string;
namee:string;
family:string;
begin
namee:='mohsen';
family:='dolatshah';
aSQLText:= 'INSERT INTO b_tbl(Name,Family) VALUES (%s,%s)';
aSQLCommand := Format(aSQLText, [namee, family]);
SQLConnector1.ExecuteDirect(aSQLCommand);
SQLTransaction1.Commit;
end;
How can I solve this problem?
It's because your
VALUES (%s,%s)
isn't surrounding the namee and family variable contents by quotes. Therefore, your back-end Sql engine thinks your mohsen is a column name, not a value.
Instead, use, e.g.
VALUES (''%s'',''%s'')
as in
Namee := 'mohsen';
Family := 'dolatshah';
aSQLText:= 'INSERT INTO b_tbl(Name,Family) VALUES (''%s'',''%s'')';
aSQLCommand := Format(aSQLText,[namee,family]);
In the original version of my answer, I explained how to fix your problem by "doubling up" single quotes in the Sql you were trying to build, because it seemed to me that you were having difficulty seeing (literally) what was wrong with what you were doing.
An alternative (and better) way to avoid your problem (and the one I always use in real life) is to use the QuotedStr() function. The same code would then become
aSQLText := 'INSERT INTO b_tbl (Name, Family) VALUES (%s, %s)';
aSQLCommand := Format(aSQLText, [QuotedStr(namee), QuotedStr(family)]);
According to the Online Help:
Use QuotedStr to convert the string S to a quoted string. A single quote character (') >is inserted at the beginning and end of S, and each single quote character in the string is >repeated.
What it means by "repeated" is what I've referred to as "doubling up". Why that's important, and the main reason I use QuotedStr is to avoid the Sql db-engine throwing an error when the value you want to send contains a single quote character as in O'Reilly.
Try adding a row containing that name to your table using MySql Workbench and you'll see what I mean.
So, not only does using QuotedStr make constructing SQL statements as strings in Delphi code less error-prone, but it also avoid problems at the back-end, too.
Just in case this will help anybody else I had the same error when I was parsing a python variable with a sql statement and it had an if statement in i.e.
sql="select bob,steve, if(steve>50,'y','n') from table;"
try as I might it coming up with this "unknown column y" - so I tried everything and then I was about to get rid of it and give it up as a bad job until I thought I would swap the " for ' and ' for "..... Hoooraaahh it works!
This is the statement that worked
sql='select bob,steve, if(steve>50,"y","n") from table;'
Hope it helps...
To avoid this sort of problem and SQL injection you should really look into using SQL parameters for this, not the Pascal format statement.

Ada - Is there a way to traverse through each character of an unbounded string?

I basically have a unbounded string called a for example. And a is currently storing "Hello". I want to check if the letter O is in the string. This is why I want to know if there is a way where I can check each character for a match and if there is a match.
Note: I don't want to know if the entire string is equal, I just want to know if a particular character is in the string.
I would use Index:
if Ada.Strings.Unbounded.Index (A, "O") > 0 then
Note that the pattern is a String, not a Character, but searching for a one-character String is the same as searching for a Character.
The real answer, though, is that you should be familiar with Annex A of the ARM, which describes the standard library, and should reference it before asking questions like this. The ARM is available at
ARM
See Ada.Unbounded_Strings.Element (ARM A.4.5(20) and (82), and ARM A.4.4(96)):
with Ada.Strings.Unbounded; use Ada.Strings.Unbounded;
with Ada.Text_IO; use Ada.Text_IO;
procedure Ubs is
A : Unbounded_String := To_Unbounded_String ("hello");
begin
for J in 1 .. Length (A) loop
if Element (A, J) = 'o' then
Put_Line (“'o' is in A”);
exit;
end if;
end loop;
end Ubs;
Not so easy.
with Ada.Text_IO; use Ada.Text_IO;
with Ada.Strings.Unbounded; use Ada.Strings.Unbounded;
procedure str_array is
a : Unbounded_String := To_Unbounded_String("Hello");
begin
for i in 1 .. Length(a) loop
if Element(a,i) = 'A' then
null;
end if;
end loop;
end str_array;
(and Simon beat me to it).
The lesson (for me too!) is that Unbounded_String being a private type doesn't expose the inner details the same way as String does. A bit like the difference between a C string and a C++ std::string.
There are nice techniques for dealing with Fixed Strings that mostly avoid the need for Unbounded_String, so I rarely use the latter and I apologise for leading you astray.
Easier.
if Ada.Strings.Unbounded.Count((a), "A") /= 0 then
null;
end if;
This still applies : both String and Unbounded_String supply higher level tools. Use them...

Resources