LIKE condition

A LIKE condition tests for matching character strings.

As with the MATCHES condition, the LIKE condition is true, or satisfied, when the value of the column to the left of the LIKE keyword matches the pattern that the quoted string specifies to the right of the LIKE keyword. You can use only certain symbols as wildcards in the quoted string. For more information about LIKE, see the HCL OneDB™ Guide to SQL: Syntax.

The LIKE condition can specify only a literal match. For literal matches, the data type of the column determines whether collation considerations come into play, as follows:
  • For CHAR and VARCHAR columns, no collation considerations come into play.
  • For NCHAR and NVARCHAR columns, collation considerations might come into play because these data types use localized order, and the locale might define equivalence classes of collation. For example, the localized order might specify that a and A are an equivalent class.

The LIKE keyword does not support ranges of characters. That is, you cannot use bracketed characters to specify a range in LIKE conditions.