How to test a oracle stored procedure with ref cursor from SQL*PLUS or SQL Developer

Oracle stored procedure is one kind of PL/SQL program unit. Consider the following cases :
1. stored procedure with scalar type - NUMBER, VARCHAR
2. stored procedure with REF CURSOR or SYS_REFCURSOR. What is difference between REF CURSOR and SYS_REFCURSOR?

Execute/Test stored procedure with primitive type:-

Step 1:- Create a stored procedure with primitive type.Below is sample code for the same ignore this step if you already have some stored procedure created. Execute it, SQL*PLUS/SQL Develope worksheet.

create or replace procedure get_employee_total_saalry 
(
  base_salary IN NUMBER 
, bonus  IN NUMBER 
, total_sal OUT NUMBER 
) as 
begin
  total_sal :=base_salary + .12*base_salary + bonus; 
end get_employee_total_saalry;

Step 2:- Create anonymous block to execute the stored procedure.Execute following blocks and see the output as total salary.

--Stored procedure having primitive type as paraemter 
declare
type rc is ref cursor;
v_base_sal NUMBER(5) := 1000;
v_bonus NUMBER(5)  := 2300;
v_total NUMBER(10) ;
begin
--call stored procedure with two IN and one OUT type parameter
HR.get_employee_total_saalry(v_base_sal,v_bonus,v_total);
    dbms_output.put_line(' Total sal is ' ||v_total);
end;

Execute/Test stored procedure with REF_CURSOR/SYS_REFCURSOR type:-

Step 1:- Create a stored procedure  with REF CURSOR. Below is the sample code for the same, ignore this step if you already have procedure created.

create or replace procedure get_employees_name(
v_deptId_in NUMBER,
v_cur OUT SYS_REFCURSOR ) 
IS
begin
  open v_cur for select FIRST_NAME,LAST_NAME from
        employees where DEPARTMENT_ID = v_deptId_in;
end get_employees_name;

Step 2:- Now write execution block from where program unit with REF CURSOR is tested.

--using refcursor --
declare

-declare ref cursor type 
type rc is ref cursor;
v_fname   VARCHAR2(10);
v_lname   VARCHAR2(10);
v_cur rc; -declare ref cursor variable
v_deptId_in NUMBER(2) := 90;
begin
HR.get_employees_name(v_deptId_in,v_cur);
dbms_output.put_line('FIRST_NAME' || ' ' || 'LAST_NAME');
dbms_output.put_line('---------------------------------');
LOOP
    FETCH v_cur INTO v_fname, v_lname;
    EXIT WHEN v_cur%NOTFOUND;
    dbms_output.put_line(v_fname || '     ' || v_lname);
  END LOOP;
  CLOSE v_cur;
end;

Using SYS_REFCURSOR also, we can write program blocks to test same stored procedure. (Remember, SYS_REFCURSOR is just a predefined weak REF CURSOR, so we do not have to declare a cursor type like "type rc is ref cursor". Following is testing program(differences from above program has been highlighted):

declare
--type rc is ref cursor; NOT required 
v_fname   VARCHAR2(10);
v_lname   VARCHAR2(10);
v_cur SYS_REFCURSOR; --rc replaced with predefined type SYS_REFCURSOR
v_deptId_in NUMBER(2) := 90;
begin
HR.get_employees_name(v_deptId_in,v_cur);
dbms_output.put_line('FIRST_NAME' || ' ' || 'LAST_NAME');
dbms_output.put_line('---------------------------------');
LOOP
    FETCH v_cur INTO v_fname, v_lname;
    EXIT WHEN v_cur%NOTFOUND;
    
    dbms_output.put_line(v_fname || '      ' || v_lname);
  END LOOP;
  CLOSE v_cur;
end;

Alternate way execute stored procedure with REF_CURSOR/SYS_REFCURSOR type:-

Declare the cursor variable of type refcursor and run stored procedure with exec. In SQL developer/SQL*PLUS it can be executed like this :-

--cursor variable declaration 
variable v_emp_cur refcursor;
--execute procedure 
execute get_employees_name(90,:v_emp_cur);
--display result referenced by ref cursor.
print v_emp_cur;

=====End of post=======

Read : Difference between SYS_REFCURSOR and REF CURSOR.