The Oracle SQLPlus Pocket Reference is a must-have for anyone working with Oracle databases, especially those looking to maximize the effectiveness of SQLPlus. As Oracle's long-standing interactive query tool, SQLPlus is available at every Oracle site, from the largest data warehouse to the smallest single-user system. Despite its wide use, however, SQLPlus is still often not completely understood or fully utilized.Database administrators and developers alike will therefore find the Oracle SQLPlus Pocket Reference to be extremely beneficial. In addition to summarizing all of the SQLPlus syntax and format options, including new Oracle Database 10g features, this handy, on-the-job guide specifically shows readers how to:
- Differentiate between SQL and SQLPlus
- Interact with SQLPlus from both the command line and the web browser
- Select, insert, update, and delete data
- Format both text and HTML reports with SQLPlus
- Specify SQLPlus commands and format elements
- Tune SQL queries
The new third edition of this book has been updated for Oracle Database 10
g to include information on both SQL
Plus and SQL. New SQL information includes the SELECT statement's new MODEL clause, flashback queries, partition outer joins, and DBMS_XPLAN.With its quick-reference format and compact size, the Oracle SQLPlus Pocket Reference follows in the long line of successful "pocket references" offered by O'Reilly. It also serves as the ideal companion to O'Reilly's larger, more comprehensive book on SQL
Plus, the bestselling Oracle SQLPlus: The Definitive Guide.Author Jonathan Gennick is an editor for O'Reilly specializing in database and programming titles, having amassed some 17 years of programming and database management experience.
This small slim volume is a concise guide to using Oracle's SQL*Plus tool which acts as a front-end to the SQL querying language.
Oracle SQL*Plus Pocket Reference does not attempt to teach you how to use the language but provides a quick reference to the commands available and the ways in which they can be pressed into service.
It's terse but informative, as befits a pocket guide, and so small that the usually entertaining O'Reilly colophon is omitted--which is a shame. The first half covers basic interactions such as string handling and naming variables, moving on to deal with selecting data, formatting reports and tuning SQL statements plus a section on formatting elements that let you do almost anything with number and date displays, including showing dates with a BC or AD indicator. In the tuning section there is brief coverage of execution plans for SQL statements and of how to tune the Oracle optimiser that puts those plans into operation. The second half forms the SQL command reference section, everything from ACCEPT to WHENEVER.
This eminently pocketable reference book would be invaluable for jogging the memory in those odd moments of blankness-- and it's almost palmable if you're shy about admitting fallibility. --Mark Whitehorn
