I have an Oracle 11G database and sql developer 3.0.04. I have a SQL query which collects useful data for users across a system. The query prompts for two values (using the "&" trick) and then returns a number of columns and rows reflecting their choices. For example, entering "2" at the location prompt, will use the sql query to pull revelant data for that particular location only.
I can connect to the database using Excel 2003. (ODBC Connect) I want to store an excel file on the server, that my users can access to run this query - (as sql developer wouldn't be suitable for these users, too complex)
We have Excel 2003 installed. What do I need to do to let users run the sql query from excel, which will show them the result also in excel?
Thanks!
For what it's worth...
I'd recommend just turning this query into a report in SQL Developer. There's nothing complex about that for your end-users -- they just click on the report they want to run, and it runs (output looks like a table, and they can export it if/as they choose from there). Distributing the report simply requires that you store on a share drive or email it to them (then they import it) -- it's a lot easier than it sounds, and also very convenient for distributing updates / additional reports. With reports, your users won't have to see the SQL, for example (unless they really want to), and the prompts will appear to them as little dialog boxes with plain-english messages (whatever you want them to say).
Anyway, you might find this easier to support / modify / maintain, and I think your users should be happy enough with it (unless they're really grumpy types... :-)
Related
I work on a team that creates adhoc SQL queries for a large database for users that are performing research. These searches are done with Excel via ODC files with ODBC connection.
I'm looking for a program / best language suggestion to create an app for users to run the simpler queries themselves that they request. Basically a window that has a few text boxes for the variables as well as some date range boxes. Runs query and exports to a spreadsheet etc.
So far I've only found tools that run the raw SQL query code itself.
Thanks in advance. -Steve
I am trying to use Excel pull data from a large Oracle Data Warehouse via an ODBC connection. I have a query that works using the editor in Access. I've tried using Power Query and Microsoft SQL to use this query to get this data into Excel and I get errors.
Therefore:
Does SQL executed from Excel need to be in a different syntax? Shouldn't it still be Oracle?
How can I use this pre-written query to ping the data warehouse and get what I need?
Here is the SQL that I have so far. I had to change some table names...sorry if that makes it weird.
The SQL you posted uses Access-specific functions. That is NOT a valid SQL query if run directly against Oracle. If you have a bunch of linked tables in Access, that would allow this.
The ODBC datasource connection in Excel works differently. ODBC executes the query directly at the datasource. It does some validation first and supports a limited subset of SQL language supported at the destination. What's included in the subset is determined in part by the driver selected for the connection.
So what you want to do is use a tool that lets you build the query directly in an Oracle environment, like Quest Toad or Oracle SQL Developer. Once you have the query working there, it should be easier to port it to Excel.
One thing I like to do is put my query into a view on the database. Then I can just select everything from the view when creating the Excel connection.
It's also worth pointing you to the My Data Sources folder. When you first setup an ODBC connection in Excel, the connection is saved by default in Windows in a folder called "My Data Sources" located just under your user profile folder. For example: C:\Users\UserName\My Data Sources\Data Source Name.odc.
You can open these *.odc files in any text editor, and you should be able to manually edit the SQL here. Especially look for the <odc:CommandText> element. In this way you can build a simple query up front, and then improve on the SQL command in your favorite environment and easily move the updated SQL to the existing ODBC connection.
I'm a programmer (mostly C++) who has moved into a non-software workplace. However, I don't have much experience with database stuff at all.
TL;DR: If we compare Crystal Reports to just writing scripts that execute SQL queries and parse the results, is there anything that CR can do that isn't possible via SQL queries & scripts? I'm talking purely in terms of extracting data - not making pretty documents.
Detail:
At my workplace they have a process where you run a bunch of Crystal Reports, modify the date range to the current month, manually export each to excel, delete the rows and columns that aren't needed, and then cut and paste into a summary excel document that is used by management.
To me, this is pretty crazy and stupid. I'd like to automate/script most of it.
So I have two options:
Learn Crystal Reports and try to modify the existing reports to be more automated.
Dump CR and just learn SQL and do the whole thing programmatically with scripts working with CSV files or something.
I'd much rather learn SQL since it's more general and useful. But I need to be assured that I can get the data output that I need (without writing a million lines of code to reproduce CR myself.)
So yeah, I'm looking for an answer like, "The two are equivalent. Anything you can do in CR you can do easily via scripts and SQL," or "If you need to group records into categories based on a parameter and then sum their one of their fields, then CR will do it much more easily than raw code," to push me in one direction or another.
Edit:
Some additional detail. At the moment my crystal reports run a database query, and then crystal does things like, "don't display the records that are returned, instead group the records by Field A and then display the count of how many records in each group."
Is functionality like this difficult to reproduce via SQL coding? I wouldnt want to have to write a python (or whatever) script to parse and manipulate the data from plaintext CSV, for example.
You can't just compare SQL and CR - they have different purpose. SQL (in this context) is data source, CR is pretty output formatter. For excel you would need data, not formatted output. Excel combined with SQL can give you all CR options (dynamic crosstab reports, charts etc) what you can't get directly from SQL data.
BTW, creating SQL views or procedures is often needed to overcome CR limitations; from this standpoint SQL has lot of more options than CR.
I personally would go with SQL+Excel route. In our company we're using simply SQL+CR without postprocessing, sometimes SQL+Excel. Our customers are using different approaches.
But like said by other people, choice of tools depends on more things. Who has to redesign reports? Who will maintain these reports? How often requirements change? Are there more uses for CR reports besides sourcing Excel tables? Who will be waked up at night, if reports do not work?
Management perpective:
In many I will say mostly cases management does not know SQL. So if a manager for E.g.HR wants to know staus about something then how he will get that status?? This is where Crystal reports come into picture, Using crystal reports they do not have to worry about SQL; they will just enter required fields and get their data.
Programmer perspective:
Simple data outputs can be achieved through SQL but consider a scenario where you need to pull details as well as summary. I agree it can be done via SQL but consider the overhead of time and proficiency required to develop such output using sql. I bet it wont be that easy to develop such output using sql as compared to crystal. So I will say learn both SQL and crystal, you will get to choose the tool to apply for your requirement.
You can write SQL and drop it into the Crystal Report. Best of both worlds, and possibly faster performance than the drag-and-drop Crystal functionality.
You will see some response time lag when the report runs.
There are actually a few things that Crystal Reports can do that are very tricky using plain SQL Queries as Crystal Reports can access the entire dataset in a single formula and can do things at runtime.
However unless you have some really crazy complex Crystal Reports I would recommend building a tool in Excel that can one click the info straight into a new sheet.
I did this and it got me a promotion, not kidding :P
I have a custom Excel Addin I can give you code to that basically does this:
On open, connects to the database and downloads a list of menu options connected to views and procedures
Adds these menu options into a new Ribbon tab within Excel
When one is clicked, runs the view and dumps the entire dataset (properly formatted) into a new sheet
Advantage of this is you can update the main menu list and each view it references without making any changes to the file or re-issuing anything to everyone.
Crystal could be helpful if you want to create a document with a specific layout , logos etc. and show some data on it. Export to excel from Crystal repot is not easy - usually there are a lot of empty columns and rows and each report should be tweaked to avoid that.
If you need to export some data from a SQLServer database to excel your best option will be SSIS ( I guess you have a license for SQL Server). If you don't have license for SSIS or you are using for example Access database there are also some inexpensive tools, which can retrieve data from any database ( not just SQLServer) and export it to excel. I would suggest you to check this one: http://www.r-tag.com. It can run Crystal reports and SQL reports so you can start using your crystal reports immediately and start transforming them to SQL reports whenever you have time for that. Both reports could be exported to excel.
i fixed this by editing excel sql, Left(Column_maxLength, 250)
this resolved my issue
in my case if even if i read left 250 character is enough
I've just designed a large database by playing around in MS Access. Now that I'm happy with the design, I need to be able to generate this same database (tables, relationships, etc.) from code.
Rather than hand-writing the SQL CREATE statements (which will be long, tedious, and error-prone process), I was wondering whether there was a shortcut. I seem to recall from my limited exposure to MySql that I was able to export an entire database as an SQL statement that can then be run in order to regenerate that database.
Do you know of a way to do this in MS Access, either through the GUI, or programmatically?
I just found and tried out this tool: jet-tool. It seems to work well for Access 2010.
For free for 30 days (then $30) you can give DBWScript a go, looks like its what you are asking for, although not in native Access GUI or programmatically
The quick and dirty, easy, perfectly legitimate way to do this is just copy the .mdb file. Empty out the data if you need to - usually there are static tables that are handy to leave populated, however.
I use a free utility called MDB Viewer Plus (http://www.alexnolan.net/software/mdb_viewer_plus.htm).
Launch it, open your db, then select your table.
On top menu, select "Table > Generate SQL - CREATE".
I don't know what tools you have on your development machine, so this may or may not be helpful.
You can easily transfer your Access database to Microsoft SQL Server using the Upsizing Wizard.
The express edition of SQL Server is available for free > here.
You will also want to get the free Management Studio Express.
Using these free graphical-based tools you can easily generate the SQL statements to re-create the database. You will have the Create statements you are looking for and they will be placed in a text file.
The Bullzip is very good to this. Very simple. See bullzip Access to MySQL for example
It is possible export any tables to SQL or migrate automatically.
Access to MySQL is a small program that will convert Microsoft Access Databases to MySQL.
Wizard interface.
Transfer data directly from one server to another.
Create a dump file.
Select tables to transfer.
Select fields to transfer.
Transfer password protected databases.
Supports both shared security and user-level security.
Optional transfer of indexes.
Optional transfer of records.
Optional transfer of default values in field definitions.
Identifies and transfers auto number field types.
Command line interface.
Easy install, uninstall and upgrade.
The thing that you're mentioning in MySQL is sql dumping. Very useful feature. If you want to migrate the database to mysql, here's a helpful article.
http://www.kitebird.com/articles/access-migrate.html#TOC_4
I have been using for years a tool called database.net from https://fishcodelib.com/Database.htm
I generally use it on client's site as a portable version of SSMS (drop and run), but it can handle a multitude of RDBMSes, including Access.
Connect to your mdb/accdb, right click any table, choose SCRIPT AS, Create, and you're done.
If you right click Tables header, you can select multiple tables to generate, but I think it's a feature of the paid version.
I have no acquaintance with them, just a happy client.
I found an easy way to go:
Export-> ODBC Database
and then retrieve the SQL form there (e.g via pgadmin on postgres)
Compare'Em
http://home.gci.net/~mike-noel/CompareEM-LITE/CompareEM.htm
The free version creates VBA while the $10 pro version gives you DDL statements.
I have inherited an Excel spreadsheet which contains an external data query. I can edit the query, which provides a list of the columns returned, but it does provide the table that this data comes from. Is there any way to retrieve the actual SQL behind the query?
I think this may depend on the version of office you're using and the type of external data you're connecting to.
I believe if you're using Office 2003, and you're seeing columns like you say, there may be a SQL icon in the toolbar.
Click that to view the SQL used to return the data.
If you're using Office 2007, Go to the Data tab, click connections, then properties, then the definition tab, and change the command text.
However I believe you're using the first method.
This is from what I can remember, so I hope it's correct.
It could also be somewhat obsfuscated by using an ODBC link or something. Another way to get it is to run SQL Profiler on the SQL Server to see the exact SQL being executed. Of course, this won't help you edit it but you'll know what it is doing.