title: In Oracle, how do I make an external table that has the exact same structure as an existing table?
body: <p>I know that you can create a table for export like this:</p>
  
  <pre><code>create table bulk_mbr organization external( 
  type ORACLE_DATAPUMP
  default directory jason_home 
  location ('mbr.dat')) 
  as SELECT * FROM mbr;
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>But I'd like to do something like this for imports so I can create an external import table with the same structure as an existing table, load data into it, and then do a simple INSERT INTO/SELECT FROM query to move the data over there.  Is there a way to do this?</p>
  
  <p>I've tried this, but it doesn't work:</p>
  
  <pre><code>create table bulk_mbr organization external( 
  type ORACLE_LOADER 
  default directory jason_home 
  location ('mbr.dat')) 
  as SELECT * FROM mbr where 1=0;
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>But got:</p>
  
  <blockquote>
    <p>ORA-30657: operation not supported on
    external organized table</p>
  </blockquote>