Hi, If you run this, you will find one funny frame with the given string ... SELECT SUBSTR('&&STR',ROWNUM,1) ||DECODE(ROWNUM,1,SUBSTR('&&STR',2,LENGTH('&&STR')),LENGTH('&&STR'),' ',LPAD(' ',LENGTH('&STR')-2,' ')) ||DECODE(ROWNUM,LENGTH('&&STR'),SUBSTR(REVERSE('&&STR'),2,LENGTH('&&STR')-2),' ') ||DECODE(ROWNUM,1,' ',SUBSTR('&&STR',-(ROWNUM),1)) FROM EMP,EMP WHERE ROWNUM