Oracle PL/SQL Best Practices

Structure of This Book

Oracle PL /SQL Best Practices is composed of nine chapters and one appendix. Each chapter contains a set of best practices for a particular area of functionality in the PL/SQL language. For each best practice, I’ve provided as many of the following elements as are applicable:

Title

A single sentence that describes the best practice and provides an identifier for it in the form XXX-nn (where XXX is the type of best practice—for example, EXC for exception handling—and nn is the sequential number within this set of best practices); see Section P.4 for how to use this identifier online. I have, whenever possible, sought to make this title stand on its own. In other words, you should be able to glance at it and understand its impact on how you write code. This way, after you’ve read the entire best practice, you can use Appendix A to instantly remind you of best practices as you write your code.

Description

A lengthier explanation of the best practice. It’s simply not possible to cover all the nuances in a single sentence!

Example

We learn best from examples, so just about every best practice illustrates, through code and/or anecdote, the value of the best practice. Whenever it makes sense, I put the example code in a file that you can use (or learn from) in your own programming environment. You’ll find these files on the O’Reilly web site (see Section P.4 later in this Preface).

Benefits

Why should you bother with this best practice? How crucial is it for you to ...