ALTER FUNCTION Statement

14.1 ALTER FUNCTION Statement

The ALTER FUNCTION statement explicitly recompiles a standalone function.

Explicit recompilation eliminates the need for implicit runtime recompilation and prevents associated runtime compilation errors and performance overhead.

Note:

This statement does not change the declaration or definition of an existing function. To redeclare or redefine a standalone function, use the "CREATE FUNCTION Statement" with the OR REPLACE clause.

Topics

Prerequisites

If the function is in the SYS schema, you must be connected as SYSDBA. Otherwise, the function must be in your schema or you must have ALTER ANY PROCEDURE system privilege.

Syntax

alter_function ::=

Description of the illustration alter_function.eps

function_compile_clause ::=

Description of the illustration function_compile_clause.eps

(compiler_parameters_clause ::=)

Semantics

alter_function

schema

Name of the schema containing the function. Default: your schema.

function_name

Name of the function to be recompiled.

{ EDITIONABLE | NONEDITIONABLE }

Specifies whether the function becomes an editioned or noneditioned object if editioning is later enabled for the schema object type FUNCTION in schema. Default: EDITIONABLE. For information about altering editioned and noneditioned objects, see Oracle Database Development Guide.

function_compile_clause

Recompiles the function, whether it is valid or invalid.

See compile_clause semantics.

See also DEFAULT COLLATION Clause compilation semantics.

Example

Example 14-1 Recompiling a Function

To explicitly recompile the function get_bal owned by the sample user oe, issue this statement:

ALTER FUNCTION oe.get_bal COMPILE;

If the database encounters no compilation errors while recompiling get_bal, then get_bal becomes valid. The database can subsequently run it without recompiling it at run time. If recompiling get_bal results in compilation errors, then the database returns an error, and get_bal remains invalid.

The database also invalidates all objects that depend upon get_bal. If you subsequently reference one of these objects without explicitly recompiling it first, then the database recompiles it implicitly at run time.