How to Remove Leading Zeros From Dates in Oracle

In Oracle Database, you can use the fm (fill mode) format modifier to suppress any leading zeroes that might be applied to a date. This format modifier suppresses padding, which includes leading zeros and trailing blanks.

To use the fm format modifier, include it in your format model when specifying how dates should be formatted. For example when using the TO_CHAR() function to format dates, or in NLS parameters such as the NLS_DATE_FORMAT parameter when setting the date format for your current session.

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SQL LPAD()

In SQL, LPAD()is a commonly used function that pads the left part of a string with a specified character. The function can be used on strings and numbers, although depending on the DBMS, numbers may have to be passed as a string before they can be padded.

DBMSs that have an LPAD() function include MySQL, MariaDB, PostgreSQL, and Oracle.

DBMSs that don’t have an LPAD() function include SQL Server and SQLite (although there are other ways to apply left padding in these DBMSs).

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SQL RPAD()

In SQL, RPAD()is used to pad the right part of a string with a specified character. The function can be used on strings and numbers, although depending on the DBMS, numbers may have to be passed as a string before they can be padded.

DBMSs that have an RPAD() function include MySQL, MariaDB, PostgreSQL, and Oracle.

DBMSs that don’t have an RPAD() function include SQL Server and SQLite.

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Format a Number as Currency in SQL

Some DBMSs have functions that allow us to format numbers as currency just by passing the appropriate format string. This converts the number to a string with the applicable currency symbol, group separator, and decimal point (if relevant).

Other DBMSs don’t make it that easy, and you need to do a bit of work first.

Below are examples of using SQL to format numbers as currency in some of the most popular DBMSs.

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Oracle GROUP_CONCAT() Equivalent

Some RDBMSs have a GROUP_CONCAT() function that allows you to return a query column as a delimited list (for example, a comma separated list). MySQL and MariaDB are two that have such a function.

PostgreSQL and SQL Server have similar functions called STRING_AGG().

Oracle, on the other hand, has the LISTAGG() function that does pretty much the same thing (and perhaps more).

So you could say that LISTAGG() is Oracle’s GROUP_CONCAT() equivalent.

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