Re: Help with "&"

Hello rockhead,
the & is a special sign for a substitution varable. In the UPDATE statement Oracle reads &etal as a variable and expects you to input a value. (You could then e.g. input xxx. Then the row would be updated where field name equals to "blah blew xxx".)

You can define an escape character that tells Oracle that the & sign has to be read as & and not as a variable. Use "show escape" to verify if an escape character is set on your system. If you get the anser "escape off" then set one with "set escape \". Now the \ sign is the escape character and you can make the update with " ... blah blew \& etal".

If you have any handbooks close to you (e.g. SQL*Plus) look in the index for "substitution variables".

Hope I could help you.
Corinna Becker

Rockhead33 <rockhead33_at_aol.com> wrote in article <19971210173701.MAA15413_at_ladder01.news.aol.com>...
> We are trying to do a simple update in a field.
> UPDATE tablename set fileldname = "blah"
> where fieldname = "blah blew & etal"
>
> It is returning a prompt to enter in a string for etal.
> Is & a wildcard or something else in Oracle? Do I need a litoral symbol
 of
> some kind?
> I dont have much more info than that. And I do not know oracle. Sorry.
> Thanks in advance
>
Received on Mon Dec 15 1997 - 00:00:00 CST