ORA-06502: PL/SQL: numeric or value error: character string buffer too small

[ligang]

We encounter this error when an night unix executing the stored procedure and the error is catched by exception handling and logged
in the log table .

We try to re-create the envionment and re-execute , and no error.
the testing environment is build up in the same structure and same
data ( on the other words , it is a clone of live environemnt).
the code is reviewed and we didn't find any lines which looks like 'mismatched variable/column length issue' . So I was thinking whether it could be a kind of oracle internal bug ?

our db is oracle9.0.6 on solaris9.

[adonis]

Can you debug your code? I had met the same error long time ago, I remember the reason is there are some blanks before the value, You'd better trim your variable before convert it into another type.

[ligang]

We debug and review the code very carefully . And I don't see any problem with the length of variable or db column . And if the procedure is executing again , the error will disappear . ( same environment )

I found this error can be generated by [ Bug 4015165 ] which detail can be revealed in [Note:4015165.8 ] from metalink.