Sams Teach Yourself SQL in 21 Days, Fourth Edition

The PROCEDURE Section

The PROCEDURE section is the only mandatory part of a PL/SQL block. This part of the block calls variables and uses cursors to manipulate data in the database. The PROCEDURE section is the main part of a block; it contains conditional statements and SQL commands.

BEGIN...END

In a block, the BEGIN statement denotes the beginning of a procedure. Similarly, the END statement marks the end of a procedure. The following example shows the basic structure of the PROCEDURE section:

BEGIN
  open a cursor;
  condition1;
    statement1;
  condition2;
    statement2;
  condition3;
    statement3;
.
.
.
  close the cursor;
END

Cursor Control Commands

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