Standards: Semicolon or Backslash

Hi all,

We're having a discussion over SQL scripting standards. We're trying to decide on best practice for ending a SQL statement.

OPTION (A) - BACKSLASH

BEGIN
         EXECUTE PL_SQL_BLOCK;
END;
/

UPDATE TABLE
SET COLUMN = VALUE
/

OPTION (B) - SEMICOLON

BEGIN
         EXECUTE PL_SQL_BLOCK;
END;
/

UPDATE TABLE
SET COLUMN = VALUE; The argument for option (A) is that since we need '/' at the end of PL/SQL blocks, it is consistent to have them for SQL too.

The argument for option (B) is that some developers have a tendency to use ';' and '/' and you end up with the update being run twice. ie.

UPDATE TABLE
SET COLUMN = VALUE;
/

I'd personally favour (B) as I think the merit of discouraging inadvertent duplicate runs of the same SQL is a better gain than the consistency of having everything end in a '/'.

Any comments, suggestions etc. on this?

Many thanks
- Bill.

-- 
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