Oracle / PLSQL: ORA-01747 Error Message

Learn the cause and how to resolve the ORA-01747 error message in Oracle.

Description

When you encounter an ORA-01747 error, the following error message will appear:

• ORA-01747: invalid user.table.column, table.column, or columns specification

Cause

You tried to reference a column name, but the column name used is a reserved word in Oracle.

Resolution

The option(s) to resolve this Oracle error are:

Option #1

Try redefining your table so that none of your column names are reserved words.

Option #2

Try enclosing the reserved word in double quotes.

For example, if you had a supplier table with a column named number, and you tried to update this field as follows:

UPDATE suppliers
SET number = 10000;

You would receive the following error message:

You could correct this error by enclosing the column name in double quotes as follows:

UPDATE suppliers
SET "number" = 10000;