• Oracle allows facility to access records that matches specific pattern.
  • It can be helpful when we don’t know the exact form of data that we want to search.
  • Oracle uses “LIKE” predicate for pattern matching.
  • LIKE predicate uses two symbols for pattern matching.
    • _ ( Underscore)
    • % ( Percentage)
  • Underscore can be used for single character matching.
  • Percentage sign can be used for multiple character matching.

Syntax:

SELECT * FROM <table name> WHERE <expression> LIKE <pattern>;

Example:

SELECT * FROM student WHERE std_name LIKE ‘_ameer’;
SELECT * FROM student WHERE std_name LIKE ‘A%’;
  • The 1st command will return name of the student containing ameer with preceding any of the single character (i.e Sameer,Aameer etc).
  • The 2nd command will display student name starting from letter ‘A’.
  • We can use percentage sign and underscore at any place for pattern matching.
  • We can also use both symbols in combination.