Object Query Language (OQL) is a query language standard for object-oriented databases modeled after SQL. OQL was developed by the Object Data Management Group (ODMG). Because of its overall complexity no vendor has ever fully implemented the complete OQL. OQL has influenced the design of some of the newer query languages like JDOQL and EJB QL, but they can't be considered as different flavors of OQL.
The following rules apply to OQL statements:
- All complete statements must be terminated by a semi-colon.
- A list of entries in OQL is usually separated by commas but not terminated by a comma(,).
- Strings of text are enclosed by matching quotation marks.
The following example illustrates how one might retrieve the CPU-speed of all PCs with more than 64MB of RAM from a fictional PC database:
FROM PCs pc
WHERE pc.ram > 64;
Query with grouping and aggregation
The following example illustrates how one might retrieve the average amount of RAM on a PC, grouped by manufacturer:
SELECT manufacturer, AVG(SELECT part.pc.ram FROM partition part)
FROM PCs pc
GROUP BY manufacturer: pc.manufacturer;
Note the use of the keyword
partition, as opposed to aggregation in traditional SQL.