pulling my hair out with procedure behavior

Platform: Oracle 8.1.7 on NT4

I have a procedure that SELECTs from a specified table and writes the results -- via UTL_FILE.PUT_LINE -- to a comma-delimited file. One of the keys to its operation is building the SELECT .... FROM MY_TABLE statement from the results of querying ALL_TAB_COLUMNS.

The procedure belongs to the schema of a user called DSA.

When I execute the procedure in debug mode from a tool like TOAD, (while connected as SYSTEM) the procedure works flawlessly and I have my desired comma-delimited file at the end.

When I execute the procedure from a SQLPlus command line as

SQL> exec dsa.extract_user_table(parm_list)

it reports PL/SQL procedure successfully completed. but it does not create my output file.

Since it works while inside a debugging product, but not outside of it, I am unable to determine directly what the problem might be.

SELECT ideas, comments
FROM newsgroup_participants; Received on Tue Feb 11 2003 - 15:55:25 CST