<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Transitional//EN" "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-transitional.dtd"> <html> <head> <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=utf-8" /> <title> Oracle — SQLAlchemy 0.6.8 Documentation</title> <link rel="stylesheet" href="../_static/pygments.css" type="text/css" /> <link rel="stylesheet" href="../_static/docs.css" type="text/css" /> <script type="text/javascript"> var DOCUMENTATION_OPTIONS = { URL_ROOT: '../', VERSION: '0.6.8', COLLAPSE_MODINDEX: false, FILE_SUFFIX: '.html' }; </script> <script type="text/javascript" src="../_static/jquery.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="../_static/underscore.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="../_static/doctools.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="../_static/init.js"></script> <link rel="index" title="Index" href="../genindex.html" /> <link rel="search" title="Search" href="../search.html" /> <link rel="copyright" title="Copyright" href="../copyright.html" /> <link rel="top" title="SQLAlchemy 0.6.8 Documentation" href="../index.html" /> <link rel="up" title="Dialects" href="index.html" /> <link rel="next" title="PostgreSQL" href="postgresql.html" /> <link rel="prev" title="MySQL" href="mysql.html" /> </head> <body> <h1>SQLAlchemy 0.6.8 Documentation</h1> <div id="search"> Search: <form class="search" action="../search.html" method="get"> <input type="text" name="q" size="18" /> <input type="submit" value="Search" /> <input type="hidden" name="check_keywords" value="yes" /> <input type="hidden" name="area" value="default" /> </form> </div> <div class="versionheader"> Version: <span class="versionnum">0.6.8</span> Last Updated: 06/05/2011 13:10:26 </div> <div class="clearboth"></div> <div id="topnav"> <div id="pagecontrol"> <ul> <li>Prev: <a href="mysql.html" title="previous chapter">MySQL</a> </li> <li>Next: <a href="postgresql.html" title="next chapter">PostgreSQL</a> </li> <li> <a href="../contents.html">Table of Contents</a> | <a href="../genindex.html">Index</a> | <a href="../_sources/dialects/oracle.txt">view source </li> </ul> </div> <div id="navbanner"> <a class="totoc" href="../index.html">SQLAlchemy 0.6.8 Documentation</a> » <a href="index.html" title="Dialects">Dialects</a> » Oracle <h2> Oracle </h2> <ul> <li><a class="reference internal" href="#">Oracle</a><ul> <li><a class="reference internal" href="#connect-arguments">Connect Arguments</a></li> <li><a class="reference internal" href="#auto-increment-behavior">Auto Increment Behavior</a></li> <li><a class="reference internal" href="#identifier-casing">Identifier Casing</a></li> <li><a class="reference internal" href="#unicode">Unicode</a></li> <li><a class="reference internal" href="#limit-offset-support">LIMIT/OFFSET Support</a></li> <li><a class="reference internal" href="#on-update-cascade">ON UPDATE CASCADE</a></li> <li><a class="reference internal" href="#oracle-8-compatibility">Oracle 8 Compatibility</a></li> <li><a class="reference internal" href="#synonym-dblink-reflection">Synonym/DBLINK Reflection</a></li> <li><a class="reference internal" href="#oracle-data-types">Oracle Data Types</a></li> <li><a class="reference internal" href="#module-sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.cx_oracle">cx_Oracle Notes</a><ul> <li><a class="reference internal" href="#driver">Driver</a></li> <li><a class="reference internal" href="#connecting">Connecting</a></li> <li><a class="reference internal" href="#id1">Unicode</a></li> <li><a class="reference internal" href="#lob-objects">LOB Objects</a></li> <li><a class="reference internal" href="#two-phase-transaction-support">Two Phase Transaction Support</a></li> <li><a class="reference internal" href="#precision-numerics">Precision Numerics</a></li> </ul> </li> <li><a class="reference internal" href="#module-sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.zxjdbc">zxjdbc Notes</a><ul> <li><a class="reference internal" href="#jdbc-driver">JDBC Driver</a></li> </ul> </li> </ul> </li> </ul> </div> <div class="clearboth"></div> </div> <div class="document"> <div class="body"> <div class="section" id="module-sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.base"> <span id="oracle"></span><h1>Oracle<a class="headerlink" href="#module-sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.base" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h1> <p>Support for the Oracle database.</p> <p>Oracle version 8 through current (11g at the time of this writing) are supported.</p> <p>For information on connecting via specific drivers, see the documentation for that driver.</p> <div class="section" id="connect-arguments"> <h2>Connect Arguments<a class="headerlink" href="#connect-arguments" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h2> <p>The dialect supports several <a class="reference internal" href="../core/engines.html#sqlalchemy.create_engine" title="sqlalchemy.create_engine"><tt class="xref py py-func docutils literal"><span class="pre">create_engine()</span></tt></a> arguments which affect the behavior of the dialect regardless of driver in use.</p> <ul class="simple"> <li><em>use_ansi</em> - Use ANSI JOIN constructs (see the section on Oracle 8). Defaults to <tt class="xref docutils literal"><span class="pre">True</span></tt>. If <tt class="xref docutils literal"><span class="pre">False</span></tt>, Oracle-8 compatible constructs are used for joins.</li> <li><em>optimize_limits</em> - defaults to <tt class="xref docutils literal"><span class="pre">False</span></tt>. see the section on LIMIT/OFFSET.</li> <li><em>use_binds_for_limits</em> - defaults to <tt class="xref docutils literal"><span class="pre">True</span></tt>. see the section on LIMIT/OFFSET.</li> </ul> </div> <div class="section" id="auto-increment-behavior"> <h2>Auto Increment Behavior<a class="headerlink" href="#auto-increment-behavior" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h2> <p>SQLAlchemy Table objects which include integer primary keys are usually assumed to have “autoincrementing” behavior, meaning they can generate their own primary key values upon INSERT. Since Oracle has no “autoincrement” feature, SQLAlchemy relies upon sequences to produce these values. With the Oracle dialect, <em>a sequence must always be explicitly specified to enable autoincrement</em>. This is divergent with the majority of documentation examples which assume the usage of an autoincrement-capable database. To specify sequences, use the sqlalchemy.schema.Sequence object which is passed to a Column construct:</p> <div class="highlight-python"><div class="highlight"><pre><span class="n">t</span> <span class="o">=</span> <span class="n">Table</span><span class="p">(</span><span class="s">'mytable'</span><span class="p">,</span> <span class="n">metadata</span><span class="p">,</span> <span class="n">Column</span><span class="p">(</span><span class="s">'id'</span><span class="p">,</span> <span class="n">Integer</span><span class="p">,</span> <span class="n">Sequence</span><span class="p">(</span><span class="s">'id_seq'</span><span class="p">),</span> <span class="n">primary_key</span><span class="o">=</span><span class="bp">True</span><span class="p">),</span> <span class="n">Column</span><span class="p">(</span><span class="o">...</span><span class="p">),</span> <span class="o">...</span> <span class="p">)</span></pre></div> </div> <p>This step is also required when using table reflection, i.e. autoload=True:</p> <div class="highlight-python"><div class="highlight"><pre><span class="n">t</span> <span class="o">=</span> <span class="n">Table</span><span class="p">(</span><span class="s">'mytable'</span><span class="p">,</span> <span class="n">metadata</span><span class="p">,</span> <span class="n">Column</span><span class="p">(</span><span class="s">'id'</span><span class="p">,</span> <span class="n">Integer</span><span class="p">,</span> <span class="n">Sequence</span><span class="p">(</span><span class="s">'id_seq'</span><span class="p">),</span> <span class="n">primary_key</span><span class="o">=</span><span class="bp">True</span><span class="p">),</span> <span class="n">autoload</span><span class="o">=</span><span class="bp">True</span> <span class="p">)</span></pre></div> </div> </div> <div class="section" id="identifier-casing"> <h2>Identifier Casing<a class="headerlink" href="#identifier-casing" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h2> <p>In Oracle, the data dictionary represents all case insensitive identifier names using UPPERCASE text. SQLAlchemy on the other hand considers an all-lower case identifier name to be case insensitive. The Oracle dialect converts all case insensitive identifiers to and from those two formats during schema level communication, such as reflection of tables and indexes. Using an UPPERCASE name on the SQLAlchemy side indicates a case sensitive identifier, and SQLAlchemy will quote the name - this will cause mismatches against data dictionary data received from Oracle, so unless identifier names have been truly created as case sensitive (i.e. using quoted names), all lowercase names should be used on the SQLAlchemy side.</p> </div> <div class="section" id="unicode"> <h2>Unicode<a class="headerlink" href="#unicode" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h2> <p>SQLAlchemy 0.6 uses the “native unicode” mode provided as of cx_oracle 5. cx_oracle 5.0.2 or greater is recommended for support of NCLOB. If not using cx_oracle 5, the NLS_LANG environment variable needs to be set in order for the oracle client library to use proper encoding, such as “AMERICAN_AMERICA.UTF8”.</p> <p>Also note that Oracle supports unicode data through the NVARCHAR and NCLOB data types. When using the SQLAlchemy Unicode and UnicodeText types, these DDL types will be used within CREATE TABLE statements. Usage of VARCHAR2 and CLOB with unicode text still requires NLS_LANG to be set.</p> </div> <div class="section" id="limit-offset-support"> <h2>LIMIT/OFFSET Support<a class="headerlink" href="#limit-offset-support" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h2> <p>Oracle has no support for the LIMIT or OFFSET keywords. SQLAlchemy uses a wrapped subquery approach in conjunction with ROWNUM. The exact methodology is taken from <a class="reference external" href="http://www.oracle.com/technology/oramag/oracle/06-sep/o56asktom.html">http://www.oracle.com/technology/oramag/oracle/06-sep/o56asktom.html</a> .</p> <p>There are two options which affect its behavior:</p> <ul class="simple"> <li>the “FIRST ROWS()” optimization keyword is not used by default. To enable the usage of this optimization directive, specify <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">optimize_limits=True</span></tt> to <a class="reference internal" href="../core/engines.html#sqlalchemy.create_engine" title="sqlalchemy.create_engine"><tt class="xref py py-func docutils literal"><span class="pre">create_engine()</span></tt></a>.</li> <li>the values passed for the limit/offset are sent as bound parameters. Some users have observed that Oracle produces a poor query plan when the values are sent as binds and not rendered literally. To render the limit/offset values literally within the SQL statement, specify <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">use_binds_for_limits=False</span></tt> to <a class="reference internal" href="../core/engines.html#sqlalchemy.create_engine" title="sqlalchemy.create_engine"><tt class="xref py py-func docutils literal"><span class="pre">create_engine()</span></tt></a>.</li> </ul> <p>Some users have reported better performance when the entirely different approach of a window query is used, i.e. ROW_NUMBER() OVER (ORDER BY), to provide LIMIT/OFFSET (note that the majority of users don’t observe this). To suit this case the method used for LIMIT/OFFSET can be replaced entirely. See the recipe at <a class="reference external" href="http://www.sqlalchemy.org/trac/wiki/UsageRecipes/WindowFunctionsByDefault">http://www.sqlalchemy.org/trac/wiki/UsageRecipes/WindowFunctionsByDefault</a> which installs a select compiler that overrides the generation of limit/offset with a window function.</p> </div> <div class="section" id="on-update-cascade"> <h2>ON UPDATE CASCADE<a class="headerlink" href="#on-update-cascade" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h2> <p>Oracle doesn’t have native ON UPDATE CASCADE functionality. A trigger based solution is available at <a class="reference external" href="http://asktom.oracle.com/tkyte/update_cascade/index.html">http://asktom.oracle.com/tkyte/update_cascade/index.html</a> .</p> <p>When using the SQLAlchemy ORM, the ORM has limited ability to manually issue cascading updates - specify ForeignKey objects using the “deferrable=True, initially=’deferred’” keyword arguments, and specify “passive_updates=False” on each relationship().</p> </div> <div class="section" id="oracle-8-compatibility"> <h2>Oracle 8 Compatibility<a class="headerlink" href="#oracle-8-compatibility" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h2> <p>When Oracle 8 is detected, the dialect internally configures itself to the following behaviors:</p> <ul class="simple"> <li>the use_ansi flag is set to False. This has the effect of converting all JOIN phrases into the WHERE clause, and in the case of LEFT OUTER JOIN makes use of Oracle’s (+) operator.</li> <li>the NVARCHAR2 and NCLOB datatypes are no longer generated as DDL when the <a class="reference internal" href="../core/types.html#sqlalchemy.types.Unicode" title="sqlalchemy.types.Unicode"><tt class="xref py py-class docutils literal"><span class="pre">Unicode</span></tt></a> is used - VARCHAR2 and CLOB are issued instead. This because these types don’t seem to work correctly on Oracle 8 even though they are available. The <a class="reference internal" href="../core/types.html#sqlalchemy.types.NVARCHAR" title="sqlalchemy.types.NVARCHAR"><tt class="xref py py-class docutils literal"><span class="pre">NVARCHAR</span></tt></a> and <a class="reference internal" href="#sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.NCLOB" title="sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.NCLOB"><tt class="xref py py-class docutils literal"><span class="pre">NCLOB</span></tt></a> types will always generate NVARCHAR2 and NCLOB.</li> <li>the “native unicode” mode is disabled when using cx_oracle, i.e. SQLAlchemy encodes all Python unicode objects to “string” before passing in as bind parameters.</li> </ul> </div> <div class="section" id="synonym-dblink-reflection"> <h2>Synonym/DBLINK Reflection<a class="headerlink" href="#synonym-dblink-reflection" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h2> <p>When using reflection with Table objects, the dialect can optionally search for tables indicated by synonyms that reference DBLINK-ed tables by passing the flag oracle_resolve_synonyms=True as a keyword argument to the Table construct. If DBLINK is not in use this flag should be left off.</p> </div> <div class="section" id="oracle-data-types"> <h2>Oracle Data Types<a class="headerlink" href="#oracle-data-types" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h2> <p>As with all SQLAlchemy dialects, all UPPERCASE types that are known to be valid with Oracle are importable from the top level dialect, whether they originate from <a class="reference internal" href="../core/types.html#module-sqlalchemy.types" title="sqlalchemy.types"><tt class="xref py py-mod docutils literal"><span class="pre">sqlalchemy.types</span></tt></a> or from the local dialect:</p> <div class="highlight-python"><div class="highlight"><pre><span class="kn">from</span> <span class="nn">sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle</span> <span class="kn">import</span> \ <span class="n">BFILE</span><span class="p">,</span> <span class="n">BLOB</span><span class="p">,</span> <span class="n">CHAR</span><span class="p">,</span> <span class="n">CLOB</span><span class="p">,</span> <span class="n">DATE</span><span class="p">,</span> <span class="n">DATETIME</span><span class="p">,</span> \ <span class="n">DOUBLE_PRECISION</span><span class="p">,</span> <span class="n">FLOAT</span><span class="p">,</span> <span class="n">INTERVAL</span><span class="p">,</span> <span class="n">LONG</span><span class="p">,</span> <span class="n">NCLOB</span><span class="p">,</span> \ <span class="n">NUMBER</span><span class="p">,</span> <span class="n">NVARCHAR</span><span class="p">,</span> <span class="n">NVARCHAR2</span><span class="p">,</span> <span class="n">RAW</span><span class="p">,</span> <span class="n">TIMESTAMP</span><span class="p">,</span> <span class="n">VARCHAR</span><span class="p">,</span> \ <span class="n">VARCHAR2</span></pre></div> </div> <p>Types which are specific to Oracle, or have Oracle-specific construction arguments, are as follows:</p> <dl class="class"> <dt id="sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.BFILE"> <em class="property">class </em><tt class="descclassname">sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.</tt><tt class="descname">BFILE</tt><big>(</big><em>length=None</em><big>)</big><a class="headerlink" href="#sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.BFILE" title="Permalink to this definition">¶</a></dt> <dd><p>Bases: <a class="reference internal" href="../core/types.html#sqlalchemy.types.LargeBinary" title="sqlalchemy.types.LargeBinary"><tt class="xref py py-class docutils literal"><span class="pre">sqlalchemy.types.LargeBinary</span></tt></a></p> <dl class="method"> <dt id="sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.BFILE.__init__"> <tt class="descname">__init__</tt><big>(</big><em>length=None</em><big>)</big><a class="headerlink" href="#sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.BFILE.__init__" title="Permalink to this definition">¶</a></dt> <dd><p>Construct a LargeBinary type.</p> <table class="docutils field-list" frame="void" rules="none"> <col class="field-name" /> <col class="field-body" /> <tbody valign="top"> <tr class="field"><th class="field-name">Parameters:</th><td class="field-body"><strong>length</strong> – optional, a length for the column for use in DDL statements, for those BLOB types that accept a length (i.e. MySQL). It does <em>not</em> produce a small BINARY/VARBINARY type - use the BINARY/VARBINARY types specifically for those. May be safely omitted if no <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">CREATE</span> <span class="pre">TABLE</span></tt> will be issued. Certain databases may require a <em>length</em> for use in DDL, and will raise an exception when the <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">CREATE</span> <span class="pre">TABLE</span></tt> DDL is issued.</td> </tr> </tbody> </table> </dd></dl> </dd></dl> <dl class="class"> <dt id="sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.DOUBLE_PRECISION"> <em class="property">class </em><tt class="descclassname">sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.</tt><tt class="descname">DOUBLE_PRECISION</tt><big>(</big><em>precision=None</em>, <em>scale=None</em>, <em>asdecimal=None</em><big>)</big><a class="headerlink" href="#sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.DOUBLE_PRECISION" title="Permalink to this definition">¶</a></dt> <dd><p>Bases: <a class="reference internal" href="../core/types.html#sqlalchemy.types.Numeric" title="sqlalchemy.types.Numeric"><tt class="xref py py-class docutils literal"><span class="pre">sqlalchemy.types.Numeric</span></tt></a></p> <dl class="method"> <dt id="sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.DOUBLE_PRECISION.__init__"> <tt class="descname">__init__</tt><big>(</big><em>precision=None</em>, <em>scale=None</em>, <em>asdecimal=None</em><big>)</big><a class="headerlink" href="#sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.DOUBLE_PRECISION.__init__" title="Permalink to this definition">¶</a></dt> <dd></dd></dl> </dd></dl> <dl class="class"> <dt id="sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.INTERVAL"> <em class="property">class </em><tt class="descclassname">sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.</tt><tt class="descname">INTERVAL</tt><big>(</big><em>day_precision=None</em>, <em>second_precision=None</em><big>)</big><a class="headerlink" href="#sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.INTERVAL" title="Permalink to this definition">¶</a></dt> <dd><p>Bases: <a class="reference internal" href="../core/types.html#sqlalchemy.types.TypeEngine" title="sqlalchemy.types.TypeEngine"><tt class="xref py py-class docutils literal"><span class="pre">sqlalchemy.types.TypeEngine</span></tt></a></p> <dl class="method"> <dt id="sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.INTERVAL.__init__"> <tt class="descname">__init__</tt><big>(</big><em>day_precision=None</em>, <em>second_precision=None</em><big>)</big><a class="headerlink" href="#sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.INTERVAL.__init__" title="Permalink to this definition">¶</a></dt> <dd><p>Construct an INTERVAL.</p> <p>Note that only DAY TO SECOND intervals are currently supported. This is due to a lack of support for YEAR TO MONTH intervals within available DBAPIs (cx_oracle and zxjdbc).</p> <table class="docutils field-list" frame="void" rules="none"> <col class="field-name" /> <col class="field-body" /> <tbody valign="top"> <tr class="field"><th class="field-name">Parameters:</th><td class="field-body"><ul class="first last simple"> <li><strong>day_precision</strong> – the day precision value. this is the number of digits to store for the day field. Defaults to “2”</li> <li><strong>second_precision</strong> – the second precision value. this is the number of digits to store for the fractional seconds field. Defaults to “6”.</li> </ul> </td> </tr> </tbody> </table> </dd></dl> </dd></dl> <dl class="class"> <dt id="sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.NCLOB"> <em class="property">class </em><tt class="descclassname">sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.</tt><tt class="descname">NCLOB</tt><big>(</big><em>length=None</em>, <em>convert_unicode=False</em>, <em>assert_unicode=None</em>, <em>unicode_error=None</em>, <em>_warn_on_bytestring=False</em><big>)</big><a class="headerlink" href="#sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.NCLOB" title="Permalink to this definition">¶</a></dt> <dd><p>Bases: <a class="reference internal" href="../core/types.html#sqlalchemy.types.Text" title="sqlalchemy.types.Text"><tt class="xref py py-class docutils literal"><span class="pre">sqlalchemy.types.Text</span></tt></a></p> <dl class="method"> <dt id="sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.NCLOB.__init__"> <tt class="descname">__init__</tt><big>(</big><em>length=None</em>, <em>convert_unicode=False</em>, <em>assert_unicode=None</em>, <em>unicode_error=None</em>, <em>_warn_on_bytestring=False</em><big>)</big><a class="headerlink" href="#sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.NCLOB.__init__" title="Permalink to this definition">¶</a></dt> <dd><p>Create a string-holding type.</p> <table class="docutils field-list" frame="void" rules="none"> <col class="field-name" /> <col class="field-body" /> <tbody valign="top"> <tr class="field"><th class="field-name">Parameters:</th><td class="field-body"><ul class="first last simple"> <li><strong>length</strong> – optional, a length for the column for use in DDL statements. May be safely omitted if no <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">CREATE</span> <span class="pre">TABLE</span></tt> will be issued. Certain databases may require a <em>length</em> for use in DDL, and will raise an exception when the <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">CREATE</span> <span class="pre">TABLE</span></tt> DDL is issued. Whether the value is interpreted as bytes or characters is database specific.</li> <li><strong>convert_unicode</strong> – <p>defaults to False. If True, the type will do what is necessary in order to accept Python Unicode objects as bind parameters, and to return Python Unicode objects in result rows. This may require SQLAlchemy to explicitly coerce incoming Python unicodes into an encoding, and from an encoding back to Unicode, or it may not require any interaction from SQLAlchemy at all, depending on the DBAPI in use.</p> <p>When SQLAlchemy performs the encoding/decoding, the encoding used is configured via <tt class="xref py py-attr docutils literal"><span class="pre">encoding</span></tt>, which defaults to <cite>utf-8</cite>.</p> <p>The “convert_unicode” behavior can also be turned on for all String types by setting <tt class="xref py py-attr docutils literal"><span class="pre">sqlalchemy.engine.base.Dialect.convert_unicode</span></tt> on create_engine().</p> <p>To instruct SQLAlchemy to perform Unicode encoding/decoding even on a platform that already handles Unicode natively, set convert_unicode=’force’. This will incur significant performance overhead when fetching unicode result columns.</p> </li> <li><strong>assert_unicode</strong> – Deprecated. A warning is raised in all cases when a non-Unicode object is passed when SQLAlchemy would coerce into an encoding (note: but <strong>not</strong> when the DBAPI handles unicode objects natively). To suppress or raise this warning to an error, use the Python warnings filter documented at: <a class="reference external" href="http://docs.python.org/library/warnings.html">http://docs.python.org/library/warnings.html</a></li> <li><strong>unicode_error</strong> – Optional, a method to use to handle Unicode conversion errors. Behaves like the ‘errors’ keyword argument to the standard library’s string.decode() functions. This flag requires that <cite>convert_unicode</cite> is set to <cite>“force”</cite> - otherwise, SQLAlchemy is not guaranteed to handle the task of unicode conversion. Note that this flag adds significant performance overhead to row-fetching operations for backends that already return unicode objects natively (which most DBAPIs do). This flag should only be used as an absolute last resort for reading strings from a column with varied or corrupted encodings, which only applies to databases that accept invalid encodings in the first place (i.e. MySQL. <em>not</em> PG, Sqlite, etc.)</li> </ul> </td> </tr> </tbody> </table> </dd></dl> </dd></dl> <dl class="class"> <dt id="sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.NUMBER"> <em class="property">class </em><tt class="descclassname">sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.</tt><tt class="descname">NUMBER</tt><big>(</big><em>precision=None</em>, <em>scale=None</em>, <em>asdecimal=None</em><big>)</big><a class="headerlink" href="#sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.NUMBER" title="Permalink to this definition">¶</a></dt> <dd><p>Bases: <a class="reference internal" href="../core/types.html#sqlalchemy.types.Numeric" title="sqlalchemy.types.Numeric"><tt class="xref py py-class docutils literal"><span class="pre">sqlalchemy.types.Numeric</span></tt></a>, <a class="reference internal" href="../core/types.html#sqlalchemy.types.Integer" title="sqlalchemy.types.Integer"><tt class="xref py py-class docutils literal"><span class="pre">sqlalchemy.types.Integer</span></tt></a></p> <dl class="method"> <dt id="sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.NUMBER.__init__"> <tt class="descname">__init__</tt><big>(</big><em>precision=None</em>, <em>scale=None</em>, <em>asdecimal=None</em><big>)</big><a class="headerlink" href="#sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.NUMBER.__init__" title="Permalink to this definition">¶</a></dt> <dd></dd></dl> </dd></dl> <dl class="class"> <dt id="sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.LONG"> <em class="property">class </em><tt class="descclassname">sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.</tt><tt class="descname">LONG</tt><big>(</big><em>length=None</em>, <em>convert_unicode=False</em>, <em>assert_unicode=None</em>, <em>unicode_error=None</em>, <em>_warn_on_bytestring=False</em><big>)</big><a class="headerlink" href="#sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.LONG" title="Permalink to this definition">¶</a></dt> <dd><p>Bases: <a class="reference internal" href="../core/types.html#sqlalchemy.types.Text" title="sqlalchemy.types.Text"><tt class="xref py py-class docutils literal"><span class="pre">sqlalchemy.types.Text</span></tt></a></p> <dl class="method"> <dt id="sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.LONG.__init__"> <tt class="descname">__init__</tt><big>(</big><em>length=None</em>, <em>convert_unicode=False</em>, <em>assert_unicode=None</em>, <em>unicode_error=None</em>, <em>_warn_on_bytestring=False</em><big>)</big><a class="headerlink" href="#sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.LONG.__init__" title="Permalink to this definition">¶</a></dt> <dd><p>Create a string-holding type.</p> <table class="docutils field-list" frame="void" rules="none"> <col class="field-name" /> <col class="field-body" /> <tbody valign="top"> <tr class="field"><th class="field-name">Parameters:</th><td class="field-body"><ul class="first last simple"> <li><strong>length</strong> – optional, a length for the column for use in DDL statements. May be safely omitted if no <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">CREATE</span> <span class="pre">TABLE</span></tt> will be issued. Certain databases may require a <em>length</em> for use in DDL, and will raise an exception when the <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">CREATE</span> <span class="pre">TABLE</span></tt> DDL is issued. Whether the value is interpreted as bytes or characters is database specific.</li> <li><strong>convert_unicode</strong> – <p>defaults to False. If True, the type will do what is necessary in order to accept Python Unicode objects as bind parameters, and to return Python Unicode objects in result rows. This may require SQLAlchemy to explicitly coerce incoming Python unicodes into an encoding, and from an encoding back to Unicode, or it may not require any interaction from SQLAlchemy at all, depending on the DBAPI in use.</p> <p>When SQLAlchemy performs the encoding/decoding, the encoding used is configured via <tt class="xref py py-attr docutils literal"><span class="pre">encoding</span></tt>, which defaults to <cite>utf-8</cite>.</p> <p>The “convert_unicode” behavior can also be turned on for all String types by setting <tt class="xref py py-attr docutils literal"><span class="pre">sqlalchemy.engine.base.Dialect.convert_unicode</span></tt> on create_engine().</p> <p>To instruct SQLAlchemy to perform Unicode encoding/decoding even on a platform that already handles Unicode natively, set convert_unicode=’force’. This will incur significant performance overhead when fetching unicode result columns.</p> </li> <li><strong>assert_unicode</strong> – Deprecated. A warning is raised in all cases when a non-Unicode object is passed when SQLAlchemy would coerce into an encoding (note: but <strong>not</strong> when the DBAPI handles unicode objects natively). To suppress or raise this warning to an error, use the Python warnings filter documented at: <a class="reference external" href="http://docs.python.org/library/warnings.html">http://docs.python.org/library/warnings.html</a></li> <li><strong>unicode_error</strong> – Optional, a method to use to handle Unicode conversion errors. Behaves like the ‘errors’ keyword argument to the standard library’s string.decode() functions. This flag requires that <cite>convert_unicode</cite> is set to <cite>“force”</cite> - otherwise, SQLAlchemy is not guaranteed to handle the task of unicode conversion. Note that this flag adds significant performance overhead to row-fetching operations for backends that already return unicode objects natively (which most DBAPIs do). This flag should only be used as an absolute last resort for reading strings from a column with varied or corrupted encodings, which only applies to databases that accept invalid encodings in the first place (i.e. MySQL. <em>not</em> PG, Sqlite, etc.)</li> </ul> </td> </tr> </tbody> </table> </dd></dl> </dd></dl> <dl class="class"> <dt id="sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.RAW"> <em class="property">class </em><tt class="descclassname">sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.</tt><tt class="descname">RAW</tt><big>(</big><em>length=None</em><big>)</big><a class="headerlink" href="#sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.RAW" title="Permalink to this definition">¶</a></dt> <dd><p>Bases: <a class="reference internal" href="../core/types.html#sqlalchemy.types.LargeBinary" title="sqlalchemy.types.LargeBinary"><tt class="xref py py-class docutils literal"><span class="pre">sqlalchemy.types.LargeBinary</span></tt></a></p> <dl class="method"> <dt id="sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.RAW.__init__"> <tt class="descname">__init__</tt><big>(</big><em>length=None</em><big>)</big><a class="headerlink" href="#sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.RAW.__init__" title="Permalink to this definition">¶</a></dt> <dd><p>Construct a LargeBinary type.</p> <table class="docutils field-list" frame="void" rules="none"> <col class="field-name" /> <col class="field-body" /> <tbody valign="top"> <tr class="field"><th class="field-name">Parameters:</th><td class="field-body"><strong>length</strong> – optional, a length for the column for use in DDL statements, for those BLOB types that accept a length (i.e. MySQL). It does <em>not</em> produce a small BINARY/VARBINARY type - use the BINARY/VARBINARY types specifically for those. May be safely omitted if no <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">CREATE</span> <span class="pre">TABLE</span></tt> will be issued. Certain databases may require a <em>length</em> for use in DDL, and will raise an exception when the <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">CREATE</span> <span class="pre">TABLE</span></tt> DDL is issued.</td> </tr> </tbody> </table> </dd></dl> </dd></dl> </div> <div class="section" id="module-sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.cx_oracle"> <span id="cx-oracle-notes"></span><h2>cx_Oracle Notes<a class="headerlink" href="#module-sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.cx_oracle" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h2> <p>Support for the Oracle database via the cx_oracle driver.</p> <div class="section" id="driver"> <h3>Driver<a class="headerlink" href="#driver" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h3> <p>The Oracle dialect uses the cx_oracle driver, available at <a class="reference external" href="http://cx-oracle.sourceforge.net/">http://cx-oracle.sourceforge.net/</a> . The dialect has several behaviors which are specifically tailored towards compatibility with this module. Version 5.0 or greater is <strong>strongly</strong> recommended, as SQLAlchemy makes extensive use of the cx_oracle output converters for numeric and string conversions.</p> </div> <div class="section" id="connecting"> <h3>Connecting<a class="headerlink" href="#connecting" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h3> <p>Connecting with create_engine() uses the standard URL approach of <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">oracle://user:pass@host:port/dbname[?key=value&key=value...]</span></tt>. If dbname is present, the host, port, and dbname tokens are converted to a TNS name using the cx_oracle <tt class="xref py py-func docutils literal"><span class="pre">makedsn()</span></tt> function. Otherwise, the host token is taken directly as a TNS name.</p> <p>Additional arguments which may be specified either as query string arguments on the URL, or as keyword arguments to <a class="reference internal" href="../core/engines.html#sqlalchemy.create_engine" title="sqlalchemy.create_engine"><tt class="xref py py-func docutils literal"><span class="pre">create_engine()</span></tt></a> are:</p> <ul class="simple"> <li><em>allow_twophase</em> - enable two-phase transactions. Defaults to <tt class="xref docutils literal"><span class="pre">True</span></tt>.</li> <li><em>arraysize</em> - set the cx_oracle.arraysize value on cursors, in SQLAlchemy it defaults to 50. See the section on “LOB Objects” below.</li> <li><em>auto_convert_lobs</em> - defaults to True, see the section on LOB objects.</li> <li><em>auto_setinputsizes</em> - the cx_oracle.setinputsizes() call is issued for all bind parameters. This is required for LOB datatypes but can be disabled to reduce overhead. Defaults to <tt class="xref docutils literal"><span class="pre">True</span></tt>.</li> <li><em>mode</em> - This is given the string value of SYSDBA or SYSOPER, or alternatively an integer value. This value is only available as a URL query string argument.</li> <li><em>threaded</em> - enable multithreaded access to cx_oracle connections. Defaults to <tt class="xref docutils literal"><span class="pre">True</span></tt>. Note that this is the opposite default of cx_oracle itself.</li> </ul> </div> <div class="section" id="id1"> <h3>Unicode<a class="headerlink" href="#id1" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h3> <p>cx_oracle 5 fully supports Python unicode objects. SQLAlchemy will pass all unicode strings directly to cx_oracle, and additionally uses an output handler so that all string based result values are returned as unicode as well.</p> <p>Note that this behavior is disabled when Oracle 8 is detected, as it has been observed that issues remain when passing Python unicodes to cx_oracle with Oracle 8.</p> </div> <div class="section" id="lob-objects"> <h3>LOB Objects<a class="headerlink" href="#lob-objects" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h3> <p>cx_oracle returns oracle LOBs using the cx_oracle.LOB object. SQLAlchemy converts these to strings so that the interface of the Binary type is consistent with that of other backends, and so that the linkage to a live cursor is not needed in scenarios like result.fetchmany() and result.fetchall(). This means that by default, LOB objects are fully fetched unconditionally by SQLAlchemy, and the linkage to a live cursor is broken.</p> <p>To disable this processing, pass <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">auto_convert_lobs=False</span></tt> to <tt class="xref py py-func docutils literal"><span class="pre">create_engine()</span></tt>.</p> </div> <div class="section" id="two-phase-transaction-support"> <h3>Two Phase Transaction Support<a class="headerlink" href="#two-phase-transaction-support" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h3> <p>Two Phase transactions are implemented using XA transactions. Success has been reported with this feature but it should be regarded as experimental.</p> </div> <div class="section" id="precision-numerics"> <h3>Precision Numerics<a class="headerlink" href="#precision-numerics" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h3> <p>The SQLAlchemy dialect goes thorugh a lot of steps to ensure that decimal numbers are sent and received with full accuracy. An “outputtypehandler” callable is associated with each cx_oracle connection object which detects numeric types and receives them as string values, instead of receiving a Python <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">float</span></tt> directly, which is then passed to the Python <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">Decimal</span></tt> constructor. The <a class="reference internal" href="../core/types.html#sqlalchemy.types.Numeric" title="sqlalchemy.types.Numeric"><tt class="xref py py-class docutils literal"><span class="pre">Numeric</span></tt></a> and <a class="reference internal" href="../core/types.html#sqlalchemy.types.Float" title="sqlalchemy.types.Float"><tt class="xref py py-class docutils literal"><span class="pre">Float</span></tt></a> types under the cx_oracle dialect are aware of this behavior, and will coerce the <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">Decimal</span></tt> to <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">float</span></tt> if the <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">asdecimal</span></tt> flag is <tt class="xref docutils literal"><span class="pre">False</span></tt> (default on <a class="reference internal" href="../core/types.html#sqlalchemy.types.Float" title="sqlalchemy.types.Float"><tt class="xref py py-class docutils literal"><span class="pre">Float</span></tt></a>, optional on <a class="reference internal" href="../core/types.html#sqlalchemy.types.Numeric" title="sqlalchemy.types.Numeric"><tt class="xref py py-class docutils literal"><span class="pre">Numeric</span></tt></a>).</p> <p>The handler attempts to use the “precision” and “scale” attributes of the result set column to best determine if subsequent incoming values should be received as <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">Decimal</span></tt> as opposed to int (in which case no processing is added). There are several scenarios where <a class="reference external" href="http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/database/features/oci/index.html">OCI</a> does not provide unambiguous data as to the numeric type, including some situations where individual rows may return a combination of floating point and integer values. Certain values for “precision” and “scale” have been observed to determine this scenario. When it occurs, the outputtypehandler receives as string and then passes off to a processing function which detects, for each returned value, if a decimal point is present, and if so converts to <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">Decimal</span></tt>, otherwise to int. The intention is that simple int-based statements like “SELECT my_seq.nextval() FROM DUAL” continue to return ints and not <tt class="docutils literal"><span class="pre">Decimal</span></tt> objects, and that any kind of floating point value is received as a string so that there is no floating point loss of precision.</p> <p>The “decimal point is present” logic itself is also sensitive to locale. Under <a class="reference external" href="http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/database/features/oci/index.html">OCI</a>, this is controlled by the NLS_LANG environment variable. Upon first connection, the dialect runs a test to determine the current “decimal” character, which can be a comma ”,” for european locales. From that point forward the outputtypehandler uses that character to represent a decimal point (this behavior is new in version 0.6.6). Note that cx_oracle 5.0.3 or greater is required when dealing with numerics with locale settings that don’t use a period ”.” as the decimal character.</p> </div> </div> <div class="section" id="module-sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.zxjdbc"> <span id="zxjdbc-notes"></span><h2>zxjdbc Notes<a class="headerlink" href="#module-sqlalchemy.dialects.oracle.zxjdbc" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h2> <p>Support for the Oracle database via the zxjdbc JDBC connector.</p> <div class="section" id="jdbc-driver"> <h3>JDBC Driver<a class="headerlink" href="#jdbc-driver" title="Permalink to this headline">¶</a></h3> <p>The official Oracle JDBC driver is at <a class="reference external" href="http://www.oracle.com/technology/software/tech/java/sqlj_jdbc/index.html">http://www.oracle.com/technology/software/tech/java/sqlj_jdbc/index.html</a>.</p> </div> </div> </div> </div> </div> <div class="bottomnav"> Previous: <a href="mysql.html" title="previous chapter">MySQL</a> Next: <a href="postgresql.html" title="next chapter">PostgreSQL</a> <div class="doc_copyright"> © <a href="../copyright.html">Copyright</a> 2007-2011, the SQLAlchemy authors and contributors. 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