Shell Programming and Scripting

I'm trying to connect to oracle with the following code in the script:

checksqlerror{
if [$1 eq 0]
echo $1
exit
fi
}
$SQLPLUS username/password@schemaname
checksqlerror "failed to connect to oracle"

If I'm passing wrong schema name,instead of executing checksqlerror it stops and expects user to enter some characters..cause oracle has the facility to allow three attempts if wrong credentials have been passed..
But I want to ignore this & want to execute next statement..what should i do?

I have checked in google and i changed the statement to

$SQLPLUS username/password@schemaname <<EOF.

Now my execution stops but not able to execute next statement.

Can anyone please explain me in detail,what does <<EOF mean??
or
Whats the solution of my problem.

Thanks

It is a here document - acts like you typed stuff inot the sqlplus program:

Code:

$SQLPLUS username/password@schemaname <<EOF
select sysdate from dual;
exit
EOF

You need a second "EOF" (it can be anything I once used PLPL, it just has to match top and bottom ) that lives on the leftmost margin in the script. Most people use EOF.

Thanks Jim for your reply.I understood now.