What is Open SQL?

Open SQL is a set of ABAP statements that performs operations like reads, modifies or deletes data in the SAP database. Open SQL is independent of the database system, so the syntax of the open SQL is uniform for all the databases supported by SAP.

All open SQL statements are passed to the database interface. The DB interface converts the open SQL to native SQL and passes it on to the database.

List of Open SQL statements

OPEN SQL	DESCRIPTION
SELECT	Reads data from database
INSERT	Inserts lines to database
UPDATE	Changes the contents of lines in database
MODIFY	Inserts lines into database or changes the contents of existing lines
DELETE	Deletes lines from database

All Open SQL statements fill the following two system fields:

• SY-SUBRC – After every Open SQL statement, the system field SY-SUBRC contains the value 0 if the operation was successful, a value other than 0 if not.
• SY-DBCNT – After an open SQL statement, the system field SY-DBCNT contains the number of database lines processed.