RE: is it possible in pl/sql?

From: Jacques Kilchoer <Jacques.Kilchoer_at_quest.com>
Date: Tue, 15 Feb 2005 10:33:07 -0800
Message-ID: <B5C5F99D765BB744B54FFDF35F60262109F87C61@irvmbxw02>

I never worked with Oracle 6, but I would be really surprised if count (*) omitted counting nulls at any point in Oracle's past. Here's what the 7.3 manual has to say:

Oracle7 Server SQL Reference Manual, Release 7.3 February 1996, Part No. A32538-1
Chapter 3: Operators, Functions, Expressions, Conditions COUNT
Syntax COUNT({* | [DISTINCT|ALL] expr})
Purpose
Returns the number of rows in the query. If you specify expr, this function returns rows where expr is not null. You can count either all rows, or only distinct values of expr. If you specify the asterisk (*), this function returns all rows, including duplicates and nulls.

-----Original Message-----

Looney, Jason

My understanding was in the past count(*) returned a count of all non-null
rows, where count(1) (or any constant) returned a count of all rows.

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http://www.freelists.org/webpage/oracle-l Received on Tue Feb 15 2005 - 13:36:37 CST