Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!uunet!fciva!dag
From: dag@fciva.FRANKLIN.COM (Daniel A. Graifer)
Newsgroups: comp.databases
Subject: Re: Comments in SQL scripts -- is there standard
Summary: Preprocess the script
Keywords: SQL UNIFY
Message-ID: <527@fciva.FRANKLIN.COM>
Date: 11 Jul 90 12:51:24 GMT
References: <216@cti1.UUCP>
Reply-To: dag@fciva.UUCP (Daniel A. Graifer)
Organization: Franklin Mortgage Capital Corp, McLean, Va.
Lines: 57

In article <216@cti1.UUCP> kmeek@cti1.UUCP (Kevin Meek) writes:
>Is there anything in the SQL standards about how comments can
>be inserted into an SQL script?  [...]
>
>If there is no standard does anyone using UNIFY 2000 know if/how
>you can insert comments into a Unify SQL script.
>[...]
>Kevin Meek
>Comprehensive Technologies Int'l Inc.
>2121 Crystal Drive   Suite #103
>Arlington,  VA  22202
>uunet!cit1!kmeek  OR cti1!kmeek@uunet.uu.net

I'm not sure about Unify 2000, but we are using Unify 4.0, which doesn't 
support comments in SQL.  

	1) Many systems which do support c-like comments also support 
	   #include, #if/#endif, etc. because they invoke the c-preprocessor.
	   The AGEN compiler for Accell does this.  You could certainly do
	   this yourself, especially if:
	2) You put your SQL queries in shell scripts as we do with most of ours.
	   This allows passing parameters to SQL.  Use the bourne shell <<
	   Input document facility:

			#shell script to produce monthly report 
			if [ $# != 2 ]
			then
				echo "Usage: $0 mm yy" >&2
				exit 1
			fi
			MM=$1
			YY=$2
			if [ $MM != 12 ]
			then
				NM=`expr $MM + 1`
				NY=$YY
			else
				NM=1
				NY=`expr $YY + 1`
			fi
			SQL<<EOF
			select ...
				where datefield >= $MM/01/$YY and datefield < $NM/01/$NY
				/
			EOF

	3) If you wanted to insert comments in the SQL part, but didn't want
	   to fool with cpp, (or you don't have the developer's toolkit which
	   I believe is where cpp is delivered) you could just pipe something
	   like the above throught grep -v '#'.

Hope this helps
Dan
-- 
Daniel A. Graifer			Franklin Mortgage Capital Corporation
uunet!dag@fmccva.franklin.com		7900 Westpark Drive, Suite A130
(703)448-3300				McLean, VA  22102