On Fri, 24 Mar 2006 21:03:25 +0100, Marten Lehmann wrote:

>> will return exactly one row of data with lets say 3 rows.
>
> Sorry, I was meaning columns.

You apparently are looking for a placeholder mechanism.

In Oracle, I believe the closest thing you will find is the 'DUAL' table,
which has one real column and one real row.

Select * from dual;

will always return one row, one column. You can then use literal to be
placeholders for the further expressions you need in development. (The
simplest expression being, of course, a simple column or literal.)

One caution - there are enough differences between Oracle and Sybase
internals that you will have some challenges in your approach. I
strongly encourage reading Tom Kyte's books (see http://www.apress.com)
before proceeding - the list of challenges IS long enough and complex
enough to fill a book.

--
Hans Forbrich
Canada-wide Oracle training and consulting
mailto: Fuzzy.GreyBeard_at_gmail.com
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