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Release Bulletin

SQL*Plus 8.0.5 Production

April 1998

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This bulletin contains important information about this production

release of SQL*Plus. It is recommended that you familiarize yourself

with the contents of this bulletin before attempting to use this version.

Restricted Rights Legend

------------------------

This software contains proprietary information of Oracle

Corporation; it is provided under a license agreement

containing restrictions on use and disclosure and is also

protected by copyright law. Reverse engineering of software

is prohibited.

If this software/documentation is delivered to a U.S.

Government Agency of the Department of Defense, then it is

delivered with Restricted Rights and the following legend is

applicable:

RESTRICTED RIGHTS LEGEND: Use, duplication, or disclosure of

the Programs by the Government is subject to restrictions as

set forth in subparagraph (c)(1)(ii) of DFARS 252.227-7013,

Rights in Technical Data and Computer Software (October

1988).

Oracle Corporation, 500 Oracle Parkway, Redwood City, CA 94065.

If this software/documentation is delivered to a U.S.

Government Agency not within the Department of Defense, then

it is delivered with "Restricted Rights", as defined in FAR

52.227-14, Rights in Data - General, including Alternate III

(June 1987).

The information in this document is subject to change

without notice. If you find any problems in the

documentation, please report them to us in writing. Oracle

Corporation does not warrant that this document is error

free.

Oracle and SQL*Plus are registered trademarks, and Oracle7 and

Oracle8 are trademarks of Oracle Corporation.

Documentation

-------------

SQL*Plus 8.0 is a superset of SQL*Plus 3.3. The following

documentation listed by part number and title is available:

A53717-01 SQL*Plus User's Guide and Reference

A53718-01 SQL*Plus Quick Reference

New Features in SQL*Plus 8.0.5 (Production)

-------------------------------------------

The following commands or features have been modified or introduced:

CONNECT

-------

The syntax of CONNECT command is extended to support the "mode"

of connection.

The syntax is:

CONN[ECT] [username[/password][@database_specification]]

[AS {SYSDBA|SYSOPER}]

New Features in SQL*Plus 8.0.4 (Production)

-------------------------------------------

None

New Features in SQL*Plus 8.0.3 (Production)

-------------------------------------------

The following commands or features have been modified or introduced:

CREATE TYPE

DESCRIBE

PASSWORD

CONNECT

SET Commands:

MAXDATA

CLOSECURSOR

COMPATIBILITY

CONSTRAINT

NEWPAGE

LOBOFFSET

VARIABLE

SHOW ERRORS

ATTRIBUTE

EXIT

Version variable

A discussion of each command follows.

CREATE TYPE

-----------

The CREATE TYPE command is processed as a PL/SQL command.

DESCRIBE

--------

The describe command now supports the following objects:

TABLE/VIEW

PROCEDURE/FUNCTION

SYNONYM

PACKAGE

OBJECT TYPE

PASSWORD

--------

Allows password to be change without echoing the password on an input

device.

The syntax is:

PASSW[ORD] [username]

Where username specifies the user. If no username is given,

the current user is used.

To change the password of another user you must have been granted

the appropriate privilege.

CONNECT

-------

If you logon or connect as a user whose account has expired, you

will be prompted to change your password before being allowed to

connect.

If the account it locked, a message is displayed and connection

as this user is not permitted until the account is unlocked

by your DBA.

For more information on account managment refer to the documentation

on the CREATE and ALTER USER commands,and the CREATE PROFILE command

in the "Oracle8 Server SQL Reference".

SET Commands

------------

- The SET MAXDATA and CLOSECURSOR commands have been obsoleted and

have no effect in SQL*Plus 8.0.4

- The SET COMPATIBILITY command is modified for SQL*Plus 8.0.4.

The syntax is:

SET COM[PATIBILITY] { v7 | v8 | NATIVE } (default is NATIVE)

Version 6 or lower is not parsed by the SET command.

- The SQL language SET CONSTRAINT command is supported. Refer to

your SQL Language documentation for the syntax.

- The SET NEWPAGE command has the new keyword NONE.

The syntax is:

SET NEWP[AGE] { 1 | n | NONE } (default is 1)

SET NEWPAGE NONE prints no blank lines and no formfeed between

report pages. For compatibility, SET NEWPAGE 0 prints a formfeed

and no blank lines between pages.

- The SET command now has a LOBOFFSET clause.

The syntax is:

SET LOBOF[FSET] {n|1}

The LOBOFFSET clause sets the starting position from which CLOB

and NCLOB data is retrieved and displayed.

VARIABLE

--------

The VARIABLE command now supports bind variables of following

datatypes :

NCHAR

NVARCHAR2

NCLOB

CLOB

The maximum lengths of NCHAR and NVARCHAR2 bind variables is

upto 2000 and 4000 respectively. For more information on these

new datatypes please refer to the Oracle8 SQL Language documentation.

The maximum lengths of CHAR and VARCHAR2 bind variables have

been increased to 2000 and 4000 respectively.

SHOW ERRORS

-----------

The syntax is:

SHOW ERRORS [{ FUNCTION | PROCEDURE | PACKAGE |

PACKAGE BODY | TRIGGER | VIEW | TYPE | TYPE BODY } [schema.]name]

ATTRIBUTE

---------

The ATTRIBUTE command has been introduced. It can be used to format

the attribute of an object when that object is selected. The format

of an attribute will not be affected when selected as object.attribute,

however, the COLUMN command can be used in this case.

The syntax is:

ATTRIBUTE [type_name.attribute_name [option ... ]]

where option may be

FOR[MAT]

ON|OFF

Note that clearing columns will also clear all attributes.

EXIT

----

The EXIT command now allows numeric bind variables to be used.

The syntax is:

{ EXIT | QUIT } [ SUCCESS | FAILURE | WARNING | n |

Variable | :BindVariable ] [ COMMIT | ROLLBACK ]

Version Variable

----------------

A new define variable _PLUS_RELEASE contains a numeric form of the

SQL*Plus release number. The format is the same as the Oracle

Server release number _O_RELEASE already available.

Bugs Fixed

----------

Numbers in parentheses following the problem description refer to

bug numbers in the Oracle Bug Database.

Version 8.0.5 Production

- ORA-1400 USING THE SQL*PLUS COPY COMMAND ON COLUMNS WITH LOW VALUES(523449)

- DESCRIBE TYPE RETURNED AS UNDEFINED FOR ROWID COLUMNS(563474)

- COMMAND 'DESCRIBE' DOES NOT WORK WITH DBCS MUTIBYTE WITHIN KO16TSTSET ENV

(598260)

- CANNOT CREATE SPOOL FILE (UNABLE TO ALLOCATE DYNAMIC SPACE NEEDED)(605012)

- CONNECTING TO WRONG DATABASE AFTER INSTALLING 8.0.4 "SQLPLUS SYSTEM@PRODMI

S"(611696)

- SET COMPATIBILITY V8, AND ALTER SESSION ENDS WITH ORA-1011(633118)

- CONNECT INCORRECTLY GIVES ORA-1031 WHEN PREVIOUSLY CONNECTED TO ANOTHER DB

(634631)

- SET AUTOTRACE ON DOESN'T WORK FOR OPS$ USERS(556180)

- Internal code changes : (588251, 602485, 604932, 607223, 622509, 627147,

633621, 633633, 633722, 637212, 641480, 641481, 642039, 642800, 643676,

643741, 646053, 563079, 607239)

Version 8.0.4 Production

- OCISTMTPREPARE FAILS WITH ORA-24375 WHEN PARSING PLSQL TO FETCH

SERVEROUTPUT(555969)

- DESC COMMAND WITH CODE CONVERSION ENVIRONMENT FAIL(555918)

- NO INDEXES ON THE UNDERLYING TABLE (SYSTEM.PRODUCT_PROFILE) DOING FULL

TABLE SCANS(555626)

- DESCRIBE PACKAGE WITH INTERNAL DATATYPE DOES NOT WORK CORRECTLY(554301)

- BLANK LINE IS NOT DISPLAYED CONSISTENTLY WHEN ISSUE DESCRIBE COMMAND(554297)

- EXTRA SPACE APPEARS ON DATE FIELD IN MULTIBYTE ENVIRONMENT(549963)

- DESCRIBE SEQUENCE RETURNS SQL*PLUS INTERNAL ERROR STATE 2177(544520)

- SHADOW PROCESSES INCREASING IF FAIL CONNECTION(536398)

- WHEN EXECUTE PROCEDURE, TIME OF "SET TIMING ON" IS NOT REPORTED.(532524)

- DESCRIBE USING A SYNONYM IN SQLPLUS RETURNS ORA-4043(532396)

- SQLPLUS DUMPS CORE WHERE A TABLE HAS A REF TO A TYPE IE. NOT GRANTED TO A

USER (530884)

- SQLPLUS CORE DUMPS WHEN SELECTING CLOB COLUMN(525982)

- ORA-12154 WHEN CLIENT CHARACTER SET IS MULTIBYTE(523274)

- COPY REPLACE RETURNS ORA-955 (WRONG ERROR) WHEN FOREIGN KEY CONSTRAINT

VIOLATED(522043)

- WHILE TESTING COMPLEX OBJECT TYPES, DESCRIBE DISPLAYS JUNK ALONG WITH

RESULT(517402)

- RANDOM CHARACTERS RETURNED BY DESCRIBE -TYPE COMMAND(514538)

- GPFS DURING COPY COMMAND WITH NO ARGUMENTS(508787)

- SELECT VALUE FROM OBJECT TABLE WITH NESTED TABLE OF LOB ERRORS(503587)

- DATE FORMAT IN PRINTED OBJECT TYPE IS ALWAYS DD-MON-YY(503186)

- ILLEGAL IDENTIFIER RETURNED,WHEN DESC "30BYTES TABLENAME" IN SQLPLUS(502594)

- SQLPLUS COLUMN NOT AFFECTED BY STORED PROC AMENDMENT TO NLS NUMBER FORMAT

(483589)

- MISLEADING 'ACCEPT' ERROR WHEN INVALID DATES FAIL VALIDATION(344359)

Version 8.0.3 Production

- NEED TO SUPPORT SELECT USING THE CURSOR OPERATOR (454945)

- PROCEDURE/FUNCTION CANNOT PASS IN SUBSTITUTION VARIABLES (468070)

- SQL*PLUS INTERNAL ERROR STATE 2250 WHEN SELECT DEREF OF OBJECT

WITH NESTED TBL (489555)

- SELECT VALUE FROM TYPED TABLE WITH NESTED TABLE CRASHES (494673)

- RAW(255) COLUMN TRUNCATED ON FETCH WHEN COLUMN IS FULL (497006)

- INSERT INTO AN OBJECT VIEW CAUSES SQLPLUS TO HANG (424913)

- SELECTING A LONG COLUMN CAUSES ORA-3106 (429546)

- ERROR LOCATOR DOESN'T CONSISTENTLY POINT TO CAUSE OF ERROR (441249)

- SQLPLUS NOT SHOWING THE COMPLETE ERROR MESSAGE (477234)

- SQL*PLUS 4.0.2 REPORTS WRONG ERROR MESG (ORA-24324) SHOULD BE ORA-1092

(481746)

- DISPLAYING EMPTY NESTED TABLE COLUMN (484104)

- Internal code changes : (428124, 460299, 490035, 495935, 381417,

410110, 442703, 444491, 469044, 469055, 474989, 496643)

Version 4.0.2 Beta

- COREDUMP WHEN TRYING TO USE DEREF INSTEAD OF ERROR MESSAGE (405706)

- PASSWORD COMMAND PROMPTS FOR OLD PASSWORD WHEN CHANGING SOMEONE

ELSE'S PW (377905)

- INDEX (SHOULD BE CONSTRAINT) HELP_TOPIC_SEQ NEEDS SPACE DEFINITION

(385518)

- SELECT FROM OBJECT TABLE WITH ADT WHICH HAS > 1 ROW GIVES ERROR

(390476)

- ORA-6401 FIRST TIME; ORA-24325 SECOND TIME CONNECTING (407192)

- SQLPLUS COREDUMPS WHEN SELECT * ON TABLE WITH NULL REF (432222)

- Internal code changes : (389297, 393957, 394358, 397465, 397605,

400584, 401152, 409161, 379128, 383612, 404256, 30307, 387496)

Version 4.0.1 Beta

- ACCEPT command can now accept key words such as DATE, CHAR as

valid variable names. Valid variable names can be any combination

of alphanumerics and '_' (349720)

- Avoid an invalid memory access after interrupting the entry of

hidden passwords (341437)

- Handle multibyte characters correctly when pre-processing

statements for substitution variables (e.g. &var) and escape

characters (e.g. \) (339282)

- COPY command now handles very long data for LONG columns. The

maximum limit is now 2 gigabytes (329447, 338555)

- Correctly ordered options shown with SHOW ALL (347743)

- Regularized inconsistent abbreviations for SET and SHOW commands to:

BUF[FER] EMB[BEDDED] PAGES[IZE] SQLC[ASE] COM[PATIBILITY] (347396)

- A small (approximately ten bytes per execution) memory leak was

fixed (349609)

- AUTOPRINT is reset correctly after a failed PL/SQL block (371080)

- Some internal coding changes occured (57899, 73973, 161056,

346199, 346787, 352445, 352444, 349161, 357681,359738, 360143,

360075, 359989, 360038, 360890, 369651)

Known Restrictions and Workarounds in SQL*Plus 8.0.4 Production

---------------------------------------------------------------

* Non-blocking database calls are not supported by the new interface

to the Oracle8 server. This does not affect multi-tasking

operating systems.

* Querying of LONG columns requires enough memory to store the amount of

data, as specified by the value of SET LONG command, irrespective of the

value of the SET LONGCHUNKSIZE command.

* When connect to V7 server, the syntax for DESCRIBE command is

DESCRIBE {[schema.]object[.subobject|@db_link] [column]} which is the

same as Sql*Plus for V7.

* When connect to V8 server, DESCRIBE command can not be used for

describing objects on V7 server.

End of Release Bulletin.