Exam Topic: Using Single-Row Functions to Customize Output – Describe various types of functions available in SQL

Single row functions return a result for every row in a result. They can be used in any part of a SQL query, such as the SELECT lists or any part that can use a conditional statement. Oracle 11g has several built-in single row functions that work on most datatypes. Functions can take zero to many parameters as an input but it only returns one value, such as UPPER(‘test’) returns ‘TEST’. The following is a closer look at numeric functions.

Numeric

Numeric functions accept numeric inputs and return numeric outputs. There are two types of numeric functions:

• Algebraic – can be expressed with addition, subtraction, multiplication and division
• Transcendental – cannot be expressed with finite algebraic operations. Includes exponentials, logarithms and trigonometry.