Equivalent of MSSQL TOP 1

From: Gary Johnson <gary.johnson_at_geoffreynyc.com>
Date: Mon, 13 Sep 2004 16:36:18 -0400
Message-ID: <e816$414604a9$90a00519$13074@msgid.meganewsservers.com>

I'm writing a procedure in MSSQL to import data from the Oracle HR system to an MSSQL security system. I'm trying to get the date and time from the Oracle server to use when looking for recent changes to the Oracle data. I've tried:

select sysdate from <database_name>.<table_name>

but this seems to return a date and time for each row of <table_name>. MSSQL server has the TOP n qualifier. For example, in MSSQL I could write:

select top 1 sysdate from <database_name>.<table_name>

I was hoping someone could tell be the equivalent syntax in Oracle 8i. Or, if this is not the right approach, what would be a better way of obtaining the time at the server?

Thanks in advance,
Gary Received on Mon Sep 13 2004 - 15:36:18 CDT