Returning a value¶

Types of return values¶

You can return a value of one of the following types:

• A SQL data type

• A table

  Use TABLE(...) in the RETURN statement.

  If your block is in a stored procedure, you must also specify the RETURNS TABLE(...) clause in the CREATE PROCEDURE statement.

  Note

  Currently, in the RETURNS TABLE(...) clause, you can’t specify GEOGRAPHY as a column type. This applies whether you are creating a stored or anonymous procedure.

  CREATE OR REPLACE PROCEDURE test_return_geography_table_1()
    RETURNS TABLE(g GEOGRAPHY)
    ...
  

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  WITH test_return_geography_table_1() AS PROCEDURE
    RETURNS TABLE(g GEOGRAPHY)
    ...
  CALL test_return_geography_table_1();
  

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  If you attempt to specify GEOGRAPHY as a column type, calling the stored procedure results in the error:

  Stored procedure execution error: data type of returned table does not match expected returned table type
  

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  To work around this issue, you can omit the column arguments and types in RETURNS TABLE().

  CREATE OR REPLACE PROCEDURE test_return_geography_table_1()
    RETURNS TABLE()
    ...
  

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  WITH test_return_geography_table_1() AS PROCEDURE
    RETURNS TABLE()
    ...
  CALL test_return_geography_table_1();
  

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  If you want to return the data that a RESULTSET points to, pass the RESULTSET to TABLE(...), as shown in the example below:

  CREATE PROCEDURE ...
  RETURNS TABLE(...)
  ...
  RETURN TABLE(my_result_set);
  ...
  

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  See Returning a RESULTSET as a table.

Returning the value of a variable¶

This example declares a variable named my_var for use in a Snowflake Scripting anonymous block and then returns the value of the variable:

DECLARE
  my_var VARCHAR;
BEGIN
  my_var := 'Snowflake';
  RETURN my_var;
END;

Note: If you use Snowflake CLI, SnowSQL, the Classic Console, or the execute_stream or execute_string method in Python Connector code, use this example instead (see Using Snowflake Scripting in Snowflake CLI, SnowSQL, the Classic Console, and Python Connector):

EXECUTE IMMEDIATE
$$
DECLARE
  my_var VARCHAR;
BEGIN
  my_var := 'Snowflake';
  RETURN my_var;
END;
$$;

Using the value returned from a stored procedure call¶

See Using the value returned from a stored procedure call.