Using DBA_SOURCE to query package source code

Recently I had the need to find out exactly what existing PL/SQL logic was touching a certain field that seems to update by itself, wiping out important data. Below was the quick query I put together, using the DBA_SOURCE view, to hunt down the culprit.

select name as package_name, line, text
from dba_source
where owner='MY_SCHEMA'
and type='PACKAGE BODY'
and (
  upper(text) like '%MY_TABLE_NAME%FIELD_NAME%'
  or
  upper(text) like '%FIELD_NAME%MY_TABLE_NAME%'
)
order by name, line;

Note that I could have searched for “and upper(text) like ‘%UPDATE%MY_TABLE_NAME%FIELD_NAME%'” rather than having two conditions, but I wanted to err on the side of caution, thus my wish to pull more data out to be safe.