How can I get column names from a table in Oracle?

Question

You can query the USER_TAB_COLUMNS table for table column metadata.

SELECT table_name, column_name, data_type, data_length
FROM USER_TAB_COLUMNS
WHERE table_name = 'MYTABLE'

In SQL Server...

SELECT [name] AS [Column Name]
FROM syscolumns
WHERE id = (SELECT id FROM sysobjects WHERE type = 'V' AND [Name] = 'Your table name')

Type = 'V' for views Type = 'U' for tables

You can do this:

describe EVENT_LOG

or

desc EVENT_LOG

Note: only applicable if you know the table name and specifically for Oracle.

For SQL Server 2008, we can use information_schema.columns for getting column information

SELECT *
FROM   information_schema.columns
WHERE  table_name = 'Table_Name'
ORDER  BY ordinal_position  

For SQLite I believe you can use something like the following:

PRAGMA table_info(table-name);

Explanation from sqlite.org:

This pragma returns one row for each column in the named table. Columns in the result set include the column name, data type, whether or not the column can be NULL, and the default value for the column. The "pk" column in the result set is zero for columns that are not part of the primary key, and is the index of the column in the primary key for columns that are part of the primary key.

See also: Sqlite.org Pragma Table Info

That information is stored in the ALL_TAB_COLUMNS system table:

SQL> select column_name from all_tab_columns where table_name = 'DUAL';

DUMMY

Or you could DESCRIBE the table if you are using SQL*PLUS:

SQL> desc dual
Name                               Null?    Type
----------------------------------------------------- -------- ---------------------- -------------
DUMMY                               VARCHAR2(1)