Reusing large SQL queries in stored procedures - plsql

Question

I have a number of long SQL select queries( 150 lines+) that I want to use in a PL/SQL package. The package has procedures to execute the SQL queries and insert the results into a separate table, compare the SQL results to another table, delete rows etc
Its fairly easy to store the SQL results with:
INSERT into TABLE1
SELECT .... (150 line ugly select query goes here)
Problem is, I want to store the select SQL in a cursor/function/view/whatever-works so I don't have to paste the 150 lines query into each procedure where the SQL is used.
I can store the SQL as a cursor then loop through the cursor within a package procedure, fetching each row and eg inserting into my table. But this seems very inefficient considering my only motivation for using a cursor is reducing the amount of lines my package.
Is there a better way to call the SQL select query in different procedures without copying & pasting all 150 lines? If this was a script, I would store the SQL in a text file then just read the text file into a variable and pass the variable to sqlplus when needed. But I'm not very familiar with PL/SQL.
Code:
CREATE OR REPLACE PACKAGE BODY MyPackage
as
Cursor my_cursor
select (150+ lines goes here)
PROCEDURE PopulateTable
is
TYPE fetch_array IS TABLE OF my_cursor%ROWTYPE;
s_array fetch_array;
BEGIN
open my_cursor;
LOOP
FETCH tran_cursor BULK COLLECT INTO s_array;
FORALL counter in 1..s_array.COUNT
INSERT INTO my_table VALUES s_array(counter);
EXIT when s_array%NOTFOUND;
END LOOP;
close my_cursor;
COMMIT;
END PopulateTable;
END MyPackage;

Answer 1

I am not sure if this would be the best way to do, but what came to my mind, is a variable cursor. You could do that using SYS_REFCURSOR. You can build a function that contains your query, and returns ref curosr. In all your procedures, you can just call that function. This will save you writing 150+ lines query in every procedure. More important, it will limit your program to one copy of the query, and therefore easy to maintain.
The function that returns the ref cursor, could be something like this:
CREATE OR REPLACE FUNCTION my_ugly_query()
RETURN SYS_REFCURSOR
AS
my_cursor_ref SYS_REFCURSOR;
BEGIN
OPEN my_cursor_ref FOR
SELECT -- 150+ lines of query;
RETURN my_cursor_ref;
END;
This is how to use it:
CREATE OR REPLACE PACKAGE BODY MyPackage
as
PROCEDURE PopulateTable
IS
l_cur_refcur SYS_REFCURSOR;
s_array fetch_array;
BEGIN
l_cur_refcur := my_ugly_query();
LOOP
FETCH tran_cursor BULK COLLECT INTO s_array;
EXIT when s_array%NOTFOUND;
FORALL counter in 1..s_array.COUNT
INSERT INTO my_table VALUES s_array(counter);
END LOOP;
CLOSE my_cursor;
COMMIT;
END PopulateTable;
END MyPackage;

Answer 2

Create your cursor in the package specification rather than the package body. You may then refer to it from any package procedure/function using package_name.cursor_name