Export Oracle Query Results to an HTML File when using SQLcl

When using SQLcl with Oracle Database, you can use the SPOOL command to export your query results to a file with an .html extension, and you can set SQLFORMAT to html in order to output the actual query results in HTML format.

Example

Here’s an example to demonstrate:

SET SQLFORMAT html;
SPOOL '/Users/barney/data/regions.html';
SELECT * FROM regions;
SPOOL off;
SET SQLFORMAT ansiconsole;

Here’s what it did, line by line:

The first line sets SQLFORMAT to html. This ensures that our resulting .html file does in fact contain HTML code.
The second line uses the SPOOL command to specify where the output file will be written. Be sure to change /Users/barney/data/regions.html to a location on your system, and an appropriate file name.
On the third line, I ran the SQL query – the results for which I’m exporting. In this case, I exported the whole regions table.
Next, I turned SPOOL off.
Lastly, I set SQLFORMAT back to my original setting, which was ansiconsole. This is optional – you could leave it at json if you prefer, or change it to something else.

Here’s what the resulting file looks like:

regions.html

And here’s the source code behind that file:

<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>

<head>
  <meta charset='UTF-8'>
  
  <title>Result Data</title>
  
  <meta name="viewport" content="width=device-width, initial-scale=1.0">

  
  <style>
  * { 
    margin: 0; 
    padding: 0; 
  }
  body { 
    font: 14px/1.4 Palatino, Serif; 
  }
  
  /* 
  Generic Styling, for Desktops/Laptops 
  */
  table { 
    width: 100%; 
    border-collapse: collapse; 
  }
  /* Zebra striping */
  tr:nth-of-type(odd) { 
    background: #eee; 
  }
  th { 
    background: #333; 
    color: white; 
    font-weight: bold; 
  }
  td, th { 
    padding: 6px; 
    border: 1px solid #9B9B9B; 
    text-align: left; 
  }
  @media 
  only screen and (max-width: 760px),
  (min-device-width: 768px) and (max-device-width: 1024px)  {
    table, thead, tbody, th, td, tr { display: block; }
    thead tr { position: absolute;top: -9999px;left: -9999px;}
    tr { border: 1px solid #9B9B9B; }
    td { border: none;border-bottom: 1px solid #9B9B9B; position: relative;padding-left: 50%; }
    
    td:before { position: absolute;top: 6px;left: 6px;width: 45%; padding-right: 10px; white-space: nowrap;}
    
    /*
    Label the data
    */
td:nth-of-type(1):before { content: "REGION_ID"; }
td:nth-of-type(2):before { content: "REGION_NAME"; }
  }
  
  /* Smartphones (portrait and landscape) ----------- */
  @media only screen
  and (min-device-width : 320px)
  and (max-device-width : 480px) {
    body { 
      padding: 0; 
      margin: 0; 
      width: 320px; }
    }
  
  /* iPads (portrait and landscape) ----------- */
  @media only screen and (min-device-width: 768px) and (max-device-width: 1024px) {
    body { 
      width: 495px; 
    }
  }
  
  </style>
  <!--<![endif]-->
<script type="text/javascript">

function search(){
  
  var s = document.getElementById('search').value;

  rows = document.getElementById('data').getElementsByTagName('TR');
  for(var i=0;i<rows.length;i++){
    if ( rows[i].textContent.indexOf(s)>0  || s.length==0 ) {
	  rows[i].style.display ='';
    } else {
      rows[i].style.display ='none';
    }
  }
}


var timer;
function delayedSearch() {
	clearTimeout(timer);
	console.log('delay-ing')
    timer = setTimeout(function () {
		console.log('delay-running')
		search();
    }, 500);
  }</script>
</head>

<body>
<div><input type="text" size="30" maxlength="1000" value="" id="search" onkeyup="delayedSearch();" /><input type="button" value="Go" onclick="lsearch();"/> </div>
<table><thead><tr>	<th>REGION_ID</th>
	<th>REGION_NAME</th>
</tr></thead>
<tbody id="data">

	<tr>
<td align="right">1</td>
<td>Europe</td>
	</tr>
	<tr>
<td align="right">2</td>
<td>Americas</td>
	</tr>
	<tr>
<td align="right">3</td>
<td>Asia</td>
	</tr>
	<tr>
<td align="right">4</td>
<td>Middle East and Africa</td>
	</tr>
</tbody></table><!-- SQL:
SELECT * FROM regions--></body></html>

4 rows selected.

So it generates the whole HTML document – not just the table.

You’ll notice that some CSS has been added for styling purposes, and JavaScript has been added to create a search function.

Remove Feedback

You can remove the X rows selected with SET FEEDBACK off:

SET SQLFORMAT html;
SET FEEDBACK off;
SPOOL '/Users/barney/data/regions_feedback_off.html';
SELECT * FROM regions;
SPOOL off;
SET FEEDBACK on;
SET SQLFORMAT ansiconsole;

In this case I turned FEEDBACK back on after exporting the file.