OPEN Procedure

OPEN specifies the type of object to be retrieved, the version of its metadata, and the object model. The return value is an opaque context handle for the set of objects to be used in subsequent calls.

Syntax

FUNCTION open
( object_type  IN VARCHAR2,
    version IN VARCHAR2 DEFAULT 'COMPATIBLE',
    model IN VARCHAR2 DEFAULT 'ORACLE', 
) RETURN NUMBER;

Parameters

Table 28-2 Open() Parameters

Parameter	Description
object_type	The type of object to be retrieved. Table 28-3 lists the valid type names and their meanings. These object types will be supported for the ORACLE model of metadata (see model in this table) in Oracle9i. Future models may support a different set of object types. Most objects have names, belong to schemas, and are uniquely identified within their namespace by their schema and name. Some objects (for example, outlines) are not schema objects; these are marked with an "N" in Table 28-3. Some objects (for example, system privilege grants) do not have names; see the "Notes" column in Table 28-3. These differences are relevant when choosing object selection criteria. See "SET_FILTER Procedure" for more information.
version	The version of metadata to be extracted. Database objects or attributes that are incompatible with the version will not be extracted. Legal values for this parameter are: COMPATIBLE (default)--the version of the metadata corresponds to the database compatibility level. Note that database compatibility must be set to 9.0.0 or higher. LATEST--the version of the metadata corresponds to the database version. A specific database version, for example, 9.0.0.
model	Specifies which view to use, since the API can support multiple views on the metadata. Only the ORACLE model is supported in Oracle9i.

Table 28-3 DBMS_METADATA: Object Types

Type Name	Meaning	Schema Object	Notes
FUNCTION	stored functions
INDEX	indexes
INDEXTYPE	indextypes
OBJECT_GRANT	object grants		Not a named object.
OPERATOR	operators
OUTLINE	stored outlines	N
PACKAGE	stored packages		By default, both package specification and package body are retrieved. See "SET_FILTER Procedure".
PROCEDURE	stored procedures
SYNONYM	synonyms	See notes.	Private synonyms are schema objects. Public synonyms are not, but for the purposes of this API, their schema name is PUBLIC. The name of a synonym is considered to be the synonym itself. For example, in CREATE PUBLIC SYNONYM FOO FOR BAR, the resultant object is considered to have name FOO and schema PUBLIC.
SYSTEM_GRANT	system privilege grants	N	Not a named object.
TABLE	tables
TRIGGER	triggers
TYPE	user-defined types		By default, both type and type body are retrieved. See "SET_FILTER Procedure".
VIEW	views

Returns

An opaque handle to the class of objects. This handle is used as input to SET_FILTER, SET_COUNT, ADD_TRANSFORM, GET_QUERY, SET_PARSE_ITEM, FETCH_xxx, and CLOSE.

Exceptions

• INVALID_ARGVAL. A NULL or invalid value was supplied for an input parameter. The error message text identifies the parameter.

• INVALID_OBJECT_PARAM. The version or model parameter was not valid for the object_type.