[ORACLE PL/SQL] SELECT DISTINCT CLOB_COLUMN FROM TABLE;

Question

Hello, I would like to find the distinct CLOB values that can assume the column called CLOB_COLUMN (of type CLOB) contained in the table called COPIA.

I have selected a PROCEDURAL WAY to solve this problem, but I would prefer to give a simple SELECT as the following: SELECT DISTINCT CLOB_COLUMN FROM TABLE avoiding the error "ORA-00932: inconsistent datatypes: expected - got CLOB"

How can I achieve this?

Thank you in advance for your kind cooperation. This is the procedural way I've thought:

-- Find the distinct CLOB values that can assume the column called CLOB_COLUMN (of type CLOB)
-- contained in the table called COPIA
-- Before the execution of the following PL/SQL script, the CLOB values (including duplicates) 
-- are contained in the source table, called S1
-- At the end of the excecution of the PL/SQL script, the distinct values of the column called CLOB_COLUMN
-- can be find in the target table called S2

BEGIN
   EXECUTE IMMEDIATE 'TRUNCATE TABLE S1 DROP STORAGE';

   EXECUTE IMMEDIATE 'DROP TABLE S1 CASCADE CONSTRAINTS PURGE';
EXCEPTION
   WHEN OTHERS
   THEN
      BEGIN
         NULL;
      END;
END;

BEGIN
   EXECUTE IMMEDIATE 'TRUNCATE TABLE S2 DROP STORAGE';

   EXECUTE IMMEDIATE 'DROP TABLE S2 CASCADE CONSTRAINTS PURGE';
EXCEPTION
   WHEN OTHERS
   THEN
      BEGIN
         NULL;
      END;
END;

CREATE GLOBAL TEMPORARY TABLE S1
ON COMMIT PRESERVE ROWS
AS
   SELECT CLOB_COLUMN FROM COPIA;

CREATE GLOBAL TEMPORARY TABLE S2
ON COMMIT PRESERVE ROWS
AS
   SELECT *
     FROM S1
    WHERE 3 = 9;

BEGIN
   DECLARE
      CONTEGGIO   NUMBER;

      CURSOR C1
      IS
         SELECT CLOB_COLUMN FROM S1;

      C1_REC      C1%ROWTYPE;
   BEGIN
      FOR C1_REC IN C1
      LOOP
         -- How many records, in S2 table, are equal to c1_rec.clob_column?
         SELECT COUNT (*)
           INTO CONTEGGIO
           FROM S2 BETA
          WHERE DBMS_LOB.
                 COMPARE (BETA.CLOB_COLUMN,
                          C1_REC.CLOB_COLUMN) = 0;

         -- If it does not exist, in S2, a record equal to c1_rec.clob_column, 
         -- insert c1_rec.clob_column in the table called S2
         IF CONTEGGIO = 0
         THEN
            BEGIN
               INSERT INTO S2
                    VALUES (C1_REC.CLOB_COLUMN);

               COMMIT;
            END;
         END IF;
      END LOOP;
   END;
END;

Answer 1

Use this approach. In table profile column content is NCLOB. I added the where clause to reduce the time it takes to run which is high,

with
  r as (select rownum i, content from profile where package = 'intl'),
  s as (select distinct (select min(i) from r where dbms_lob.compare(r.content, t.content) = 0) min_i from profile t where t.package = 'intl')
select (select content from r where r.i = s.min_i) content from s
;

It is not about to win any prizes for efficiency but should work.

Answer 2

You could compare the hashes of the CLOB to determine if they are different:

SELECT your_clob
  FROM your_table
 WHERE ROWID IN (SELECT MIN(ROWID) 
                   FROM your_table
                  GROUP BY dbms_crypto.HASH(your_clob, dbms_crypto.HASH_SH1))

---

Edit:

The HASH function doesn't guarantee that there will be no collision. By design however, it is really unlikely that you will get any collision. Still, if the collision risk (<2^80?) is not acceptable, you could improve the query by comparing (with dbms_lob.compare) the subset of rows that have the same hashes.