PS Query & SQL

One of my favorite things to have in the expressions. Start your expression with an explanation of what you are attempting to do - a real time saver when you have multiple equations that look like the same thing. 

Comments in Expressions

Thanks for this Steph.  I was trying to do this the other day using the "--" as you would use in SQL and of course it didn't work.  PSQuery is very peculiar at times.

Strictly speaking, a block comment in SQL doesn't include the plus sign, e.g.   

select something
/* my block comment */
from somewhere ;

The plus sign comes in when passing a "hint" to the DBMS, when you think you have a better way to optimize the query than the automatic optimizer.  That's a whole other topic!  See Oracle's documentation "Influencing the Optimizer with Hints."

PS Query allows hints but not block comments.  Here's what happens when I try a block comment in an expression, without using the plus sign:

Fortunately, Oracle database ignores unrecognized hints, thus we can trick PS Query into treating a bad hint like a good comment.

Welcome to the world of workarounds!  :-D

Haha.  Thanks for that explanation on why it works, Ray.  I am a nerd about the whys of things not just the hows.

select something/* my block comment */from somewhere ;