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Oracle® OLAP DML Reference 10g Release 2 (10.2) Part Number B14346-01 |
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# REMCOLS

The REMCOLS function removes specified columns from every line of a multiline TEXT value. The function returns a multiline text value that includes only the remaining columns.

Columns refer to the character positions in each line of a multiline TEXT value. The first character in each line is in column one, the second is in column two, and so on.

Return Value

TEXT or NTEXT

REMCOLS always returns a TEXT value that has the same number of lines as text-expression, though some of the lines may be empty.

Syntax

REMCOLS(text-expression start [length])

Arguments

text-expression

  The text expression from which the specified columns should be removed. When text-expression is a multiline TEXT value, the characters in the specified columns are removed from each one of its lines.

  When you specify a TEXT expression, the return value is TEXT. When you specify an NTEXT expression, the return value is NTEXT.

start

  An `INTEGER`, between 1 and 4,000, representing the column position at which to begin removing columns. The column position of the first character in each line of text-expression is `1`. When you specify a starting column that is to the right of the last character in a given line in text expression, the corresponding line in the return value will be identical to the given line.

length

  An `INTEGER` representing the number of columns to be removed. When you do not specify length, REMCOLS removes only the starting column. When you specify a length that exceeds the number of characters that follow the starting position in a given line in text expression, the corresponding line in the return value will include only the characters that precede the starting column.

Examples

Example 20-19 Removing Text Columns

In the following example, four columns are removed from each line of CITYLIST, starting from the second column.

    DEFINE citylist VARIABLE TEXT
    CITYLIST = 'Boston\nHouston\nChicago\nDenver'

The statement

    SHOW citylist

produces the following output.

    Boston
    Houston
    Chicago
    Denver

The statement

    SHOW REMCOLS(citylist 2 4)

produces the following output.

    Bn
    Hon
    Cgo
    Dr