Oracle Data Dictionary Pocket Reference

Chapter 1. Introduction

The Oracle Data Dictionary Pocket Reference is a quick reference guide to the Oracle data dictionary. This guide pulls together information on the tables and views most commonly used by Oracle database administrators and developers, along with column specification listings and usage and performance tips. Given the small size of this pocket reference, this book obviously cannot serve as a complete reference to the use of the Oracle data dictionary. For more detailed information, refer to the Oracle documentation for your release. This book reflects the data dictionary contents as of Oracle9i Release 2.

Acknowledgments

Many thanks to those who helped in the preparation of this book. In particular, thanks to Jonathan Gennick who provided a technical review of the draft. I also appreciate all the good work of the O’Reilly crew in editing and producing this book. And, of course, thanks to Debby Russell for keeping this book on the fast track.

Conventions

UPPERCASE

Indicates a SQL keyword when used in a query.

lowercase

Indicates a table, view, or column name in a query. (In query results, Oracle displays columns in uppercase.)

Italic

Indicates user-defined items such as filenames.

Constant width

Indicates code examples and output.

#

When used in a column listing, indicates that the column has a NOT NULL constraint (which means the column cannot contain a NULL value). Because of space constraints (many column names are very long), we have omitted the NOT NULL display from the ...