If you are using Delphi with Oracle, you probably need to know about 
the following bug (or maybe it is an enhancement).

This problem occurs when you are writing PL/SQL code using a 
Delphi product.  This includes writing pass-through SQL and 
using the Database Explorer (which, like all of Delphi, is 
written in Delphi) to write triggers, stored procedures, 
and packages.

The problem occurs with the use of colons(:) in the code.  
Colons are used to reference variables in triggers (such as 
:new.field_name) as well as in the assignment operator (x := y).

The problem is that Delphi (or probably the BDE) strips the 
whitespace before the colon out of your text before it passes 
the code to Oracle.  

This creates all types of syntax problems.  We were experiencing 
an error regarding a bind variable, for example, although we 
were not using bind variables.  Without the colon, that was the 
syntax error Oracle generated.

The solution is very simple, yet undocumented.  Use two colons.  
So, you code needs to look like ::new.field_name or x ::= y.

This solved the problem completely.  Please e-mail questions 
or comments to jay@RPLtd.com