Lexical Conventions

The following lexical conventions for issuing SQL statements apply specifically to Oracle's implementation of SQL, but are generally acceptable in other SQL implementations.

When you issue a SQL statement, you can include one or more tabs, carriage returns, spaces, or comments anywhere a space occurs within the definition of the statement. Thus, Oracle evaluates the following two statements in the same manner:

SELECT ENAME,SAL*12,MONTHS_BETWEEN(HIREDATE,SYSDATE) FROM EMP;

SELECT ENAME,
     SAL * 12,
          MONTHS_BETWEEN( HIREDATE, SYSDATE )
FROM EMP;

Case is insignificant in reserved words, keywords, identifiers and parameters. However, case is significant in text literals and quoted names. See the syntax description in "Text".

Tools Support

Most (but not all) Oracle tools support all features of Oracle SQL. This reference describes the complete functionality of SQL. If the Oracle tool that you are using does not support this complete functionality, you can find a discussion of the restrictions in the manual describing the tool, such as SQL*Plus User's Guide and Reference.

If you are using Trusted Oracle, see your Trusted Oracle documentation for information about SQL statements specific to that environment.