Oracle9i SQL Reference Release 2 (9.2) Part Number A96540-02 |
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greatest::=
GREATEST
returns the greatest of the list of exprs
. All expr
s after the first are implicitly converted to the datatype of the first expr
before the comparison. Oracle compares the expr
s using nonpadded comparison semantics. Character comparison is based on the value of the character in the database character set. One character is greater than another if it has a higher character set value. If the value returned by this function is character data, then its datatype is always VARCHAR2
.
The following statement selects the string with the greatest value:
SELECT GREATEST ('HARRY', 'HARRIOT', 'HAROLD') "Greatest" FROM DUAL; Greatest -------- HARRY