Decode does not pick up first character - sql

Question

Why does this fail for the first character in oracle sql?
select DECODE( TRANSLATE('1','123',' '), NULL, 'number','contains char') from dual
This works because 1 is the second digit
select DECODE( TRANSLATE('1','4123',' '), NULL, 'number','contains char') from dual
But this fails because 4 is the first digit
select DECODE( TRANSLATE('4','423',' '), NULL, 'number','contains char') from dual

Answer 1

First let's take a look at translate function definition:
TRANSLATE(expr, from_string, to_string): TRANSLATE returns expr with all
occurrences of each character in from_string replaced by its corresponding
character in to_string. Characters in expr that are not in from_string are not replaced.
If expr is a character string, then you must enclose it in single quotation marks.
The argument from_string can contain more characters than to_string. In this case,
the extra characters at the end of from_string have no corresponding characters
in to_string. If these extra characters appear in char, then they are removed
from the return value.
i.e. TRANSLATE(some_string,'123','abc'): 1 will be replaced by a, 2 by b, 3 by c(I will use arrow -> instead of "replaced by" further)
Now let's take a look at our examples:
TRANSLATE('1','123',' '): 1 -> " ", 2->nothing, 3->nothing.
(nothing means removed from the return value, see definition)
Result of above function is string consisted of whitespace - " "
TRANSLATE('1','4123',' '): 4 -> " ", 1->nothing, 2->nothing, 3->nothing
Result of the above function is empty string "". Oracle Database interprets the empty string as null, and if this function has a null argument, then it returns null.
TRANSLATE('4','423',' '): 4->" ", 2->nothing, 3->nothing
Result of the above function is whitespace string as in the first example.
That is why you are getting "contains char" in the first and third queries, and number in the second one