Comments on: How to turn rows into columns

By: Eddie Awad

Eddie Awad — Wed, 12 Apr 2006 02:09:41 +0000

Deepak, you mean if the number of rows that we want to convert into columns is unknown or dynamic? In that case, We can dynamically construct the query that contains the CASE expressions, then execute the query (string) as dynamic SQL (using execute immediate). I have not tried it but theoretically it should work.

More info at

http://asktom.oracle.com/pls/ask/f?p=4950:8:::::F4950_P8_DISPLAYID:766825833740

Does the select list have a maximum number of columns?

By: deepak

deepak — Tue, 11 Apr 2006 13:37:10 +0000

What if you do not know the value of the columns in advance?

By: Karl Reitschuster

Karl Reitschuster — Thu, 06 Apr 2006 17:10:22 +0000

Hi,
the simple case expression was released in 8.1
http://download-west.oracle.com/docs/cd/B10501_01/server.920/a96540/wnsql.htm#970400
Greetings
Karl

By: Balqees

Balqees — Sun, 02 Apr 2006 08:06:50 +0000

This was the error, and not the previous one:

select sum(case when job = ‘ANALYST’ then 1 else 0 end) as ANALYST,
*
ERROR at line 1:
ORA-00907: missing right parenthesis

By: Balqees

Balqees — Sun, 02 Apr 2006 08:04:33 +0000

I tried the previous code to change rows into columns , but it did not work, I think it may work with later versions of sql.
Im using sql 8.0.

the code was:

SQL> select job, count(*) from emp
2 group by job;

JOB COUNT(*)
——— ———
ANALYST 2
CLERK 4
MANAGER 3
PRESIDENT 1
SALESMAN 4

SQL> select sum(case when job = ‘ANALYST’ then 1 else 0 end) as ANALYST,
2 sum(case when job = ‘CLERK’ then 1 else 0 end) as CLERK,
3 sum(case when job = ‘MANAGER’ then 1 else 0 end) as MANAGER,
4 sum(case when job = ‘PRESIDENT’ then 1 else 0 end) as PRESIDENT,
5 sum(case when job = ‘SALESMAN’ then 1 else 0 end) as SALESMAN
6 from (
7 select job
8 from emp
9 where job in (’ANALYST’, ‘CLERK’, ‘MANAGER’, ‘PRESIDENT’, ‘SALESMAN’))
10 /

But the ERROR was

select sum(case)when job = ‘ANALYST’ then 1 else 0 end) as ANLYST,
*
ERROR at line 1:
ORA-00923: FROM keyword not found where expected

I don’t know what is the problem..