Advanced Oracle PL/SQL Programming with Packages

Objectives of This Book

Why did I write this book? I have the following modest objectives:

• Make sure as many PL/SQL developers as possible know about packages and how to use them. Students who attend my training sessions soon come to realize after a day or two that the answer to almost any question I ask is: "Build a package." They also often stumble out of the sessions chanting the mantra: "Packages, packages, packages..." I wrote this book and the companion software because I believe that packages are the single most important element of the PL/SQL language. You can never go wrong putting your code inside a package. You will, on the other hand, almost always regret not placing your functions and procedures inside packages from the get-go.

• Get my software into the hands of as many PL/SQL developers as possible. I like to see others get the benefit of my efforts. I like the idea that my prebuilt software will free up your time. This book contains a full-use version of the PL/Vision product, PL/Vision Lite, along with extensive documentation on how to use this library.^[2]

  ^[2] Of course, I also like to be compensated for my efforts, so you can also purchase a license to PL/Vision Professional; see the RevealNet website at http://www.revealnet.com

  (Unless otherwise noted, all references in this book to PL/Vision are to PL/Vision Lite.) You might use just a little bit of PL/Vision; you might leverage every single package into your production applications. Many readers will do nothing ...