Re: Table names as variables?

In article <1994Oct11.005935.20908@wvus.org>, sford@wvus.org (Scott Ford) wrote: > Whadd'ya think? Will table names ever be able to be represented as > variables? Something like this could make SPL incredibly powerful for > maintenance and routine tasks. Or shall we just stick with requiring an > additional language (ESQL, 4GL, Shell script) to do such *complex* > activities such as looping through many tables in a data base? > -- > Scott F. Ford, DBA / Unix SA | sford@wvus.org > bps (Benefit Panel Services) | elroy.jpl.nasa.gov!wvus!sford > 888 South Figueroa Street, Suite 1400 | Voice: (213) 489-2694 > Los Angeles, CA. 90017 | FAX: (213) 489-7973 > > "...The bozone layer: shielding the rest of the solar > system from the earth's harmful effects...." suppose there was a data dictionary view that had columns: table_name, column_name, row_number, value i think this would let you do just about anything. the problem is that the value would have to be a particular data type. it would have to be a type that could represent all values of any type and there would need to be conversion functions from that type to any other.