For the past ten years, O'Reilly's "Oracle PL/SQL Programming" has been the bestselling book on PL/SQL, Oracle's powerful procedural language. Packed with examples and helpful recommendations, the book has helped everyone--from novices to experienced developers, and from Oracle Forms developers to database administrators--make the most of PL/SQL.
The fourth edition is a comprehensive update, adding significant new content and extending coverage to include the very latest Oracle version, Oracle Database 10"g" Release 2. It describes such new features as the PL/SQL optimizing compiler, conditional compilation, compile-time warnings, regular expressions, set operators for nested tables, nonsequential collections in FORALL, the programmer-defined quoting mechanism, the ability to backtrace an exception to a line number, a variety of new built-in packages, and support for IEEE 754 compliant floating-point numbers.
The new edition adds brand-new chapters on security (including encryption, row-level security, fine-grained auditing, and application contexts), file, email, and web I/O (including the built-in packages DBMS_OUTPUT, UTL_FILE, UTL_MAIL, UTL_SMTP, and UTL_HTTP) and globalization and localization.
Co-authored by the world's foremost PL/SQL authority, Steven Feuerstein, this classic reference provides language syntax, best practices, and extensive code, ranging from simple examples to complete applications--making it a must-have on your road to PL/SQL mastery. A companion web site contains many more examples and additional technical content for enhanced learning.
If you're doing database application development in the Oracle environment, you're going to have to know PL/SQL, the company's extended query and update language. If you want your programs to exploit the special capabilities of Oracle software, you'll need to know the language well. That's where the third edition of Oracle PL/SQL Programming comes into play. It's an absolutely comprehensive reference (as well as a rather extensive tutorial) on PL/SQL, ideally suited to answering your questions about how to perform some programming tasks and reminding you of the characteristics of functions, triggers, and other elements of the database programmer's toolkit. The new edition covers calls to Java methods from within PL/SQL programs, autonomous transactions, object type inheritance, and the new Timestamp and XMLType data types. There's also more information about server internals--the way PL/SQL programs are run--than before, better enabling readers to optimize their code for fast and safe execution.
Steven Feuerstein takes care to explain, with prose and example code, the characteristics of PL/SQL elements. In explaining number conversions, for example, he explores Oracle's different ways of formatting numbers, then details the behavior of the to_number function under different conditions (with and without a specified format model, and with National Language Support information attached). It's a helpful approach that will have readers using the index to locate places in which Feuerstein mentions language elements of interest. --David Wall
Topics covered: How to use Oracle PL/SQL in all its manifestations through Oracle9i. Fundamentals of program structure (loops, cases, exceptions, etc.) and execution get attention, as do data types, transaction management, triggers, and the object-oriented aspects of the language. There's also coverage of calls to external Java and C programs.
Customer Reviews:
Avg. Customer Rating: 4.0 / 5.0
#1 PL/SQL Book For A Reason:
This is The Ultimate PL/SQL reference. Although the book isn't written as a reference, it serves as a more useful reference than the Oracle documentation. This book will show you 99% of PL/SQL functionality, and 110% of what you need to know. Steven Feuerstein always manages to write at a level which is not dry like 99% of all tech books out there. What a refreshing perspective he has for PL/SQL. This book can be used for learning or refreshing on certain PL/SQL topics, but it isn't the best layout for... more info
Impossibly long yet incomplete:
This book is so incredibly long and verbose that it is impossible to use to actually learn PL/SQL in a self-directed manner. Each of its numerous long chapters is so focused on a small, isolated sub-topic of PL/SQL that it spends over 500 pages just to cover the basics of PL/SQL. At that point, 500 pages into the book it says, "by now you have mastered the basics of PL/SQL" and begins a series of long chapters on small, isolated advanced sub-topics. Incredibly, the book does not cover or even mention... more info
MASSIVELY informative... yet surprisingly easy to read for beginners & intermediates:
I've worked with Oracle and PL/SQL on and off for ages. I never really took a dive into the details of anything until recently. I knew the basics of PL/SQL blocks, writing procedures/functions and some of the "advanced" column/data types and interactions with them(XML with XPath, for example). Being a professional software engineer for some time now and working with Oracle regularly has lead me down a path of basic knowledge. This book took that knowledge and pushed the boundaries further than I could... more info
The PL/SQL Standard:
As with the three previous editions, all of which I own, this book sets the standard for PL/SQL texts. Crammed with information, it provides a thorough and insightful reference and always has a place on my desk.
