Rating: 
Summary: The best O'Reilly Book IMO
Review: If you don't give this book 5 stars, you should pay somehow in your "reputation" as a reviewer (I guess Amazon doesn't have that tech yet). This is not only the best book on the subject, it's the best O'Reilly book I've seen in a long time, if ever. Plus, the author is very active on the Oracle developer forums. Run, don't walk, to get this one if contemplating using Oracle and XML. I haven't read the new Wrox book on the subject but would be stunned if it's anywhere near this book. 10 stars.
Rating:
Summary: The best O'Reilly Book IMO
Review: If you don't give this book 5 stars, you should pay somehow in your "reputation" as a reviewer (I guess Amazon doesn't have that tech yet). This is not only the best book on the subject, it's the best O'Reilly book I've seen in a long time, if ever. Plus, the author is very active on the Oracle developer forums. Run, don't walk, to get this one if contemplating using Oracle and XML. I haven't read the new Wrox book on the subject but would be stunned if it's anywhere near this book. 10 stars.
Rating: 
Summary: Good Book
Review: If you want to learn about using Oracle's XML packages and functions, this is a good book. It fills in for the lack of Oracle documentation.
Rating:
Summary: First review :)
Review: Interesting book - it covers a lot of information on this fledgling technology - not quite as detailed as the Oracle XML Handbook though
Rating:
Summary: Outstanding
Review: It is an amazing book on XML side of Oracle. A must read and must keep for developers who plan to build applications for Oracle8i and wish to use its XML extensions.
Rating:
Summary: Usefull book for building XML Applications
Review: It is really good book that describes development of XML/XSLT Applications and contains examples of building XML Applications using Oracle technology.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent
Review: People using just Oracle or just XML would get alot out of this, but for those using both it is essential. I found the author's asides a little jarring occasionally.
Rating:
Summary: A rich book which integrates Java, Oracle, and XML
Review: So you've made the decision to tackle your next big IT project with a powerful threesome: Java, Oracle, and XML. Then this the book for you. I echo the comments of another reader who found wading through technet.Oracle.com's assorted tutorials and scattered documentation frustrating -- this book puts it all together in one place.Though Java isn't in the book's title - it probably should be. I found chapter six, "Processing XML with Java", to be the most comprehensive and valuable chapter in the book. The author describes and builds a set of Java applications for storing XML as CLOB objects on the server, importing (via parsing and JDBC) XML documents into a relational schema, and its complement, exporting query results into XML, among other things. I also found running and working with the source code examples (downloadable at oreilly) to be a learning tool. One caveat is that this book should be used as a starting point -- not a final reference -- for using XML with Java and Oracle. The pace of development with XML means that some of the classes the author used, like those from SAX 1.0, are already deprecated. But after reading this book, and working through the examples, picking up the the new stuff shouldn't be hard.
Rating:
Summary: Nearly a Panacea
Review: Steve preaches words of wisdom and exhortation to the many would-be software development practitioners endeavoring to claim the promises of Java and XML. His book is second to none with regard to explaining Java-Oracle-XML because (1) he provides deep and wide coverage of the concepts (2) he provides meaningful example code for nearly everything discussed in the book (3) he has a command of Java, PL/SQL and XML that enables him to speak fluently in any of these languages. Consequently he becomes an ambassador from any of these camps to any of the others. The book shelves are crowded with XML, Java and Oracle books that dabble in the nexus of these technologies - applications. Where they all fall short of describing the intersection of these technologies in ways that are germane to business (Oracle XML Applications) OXA succeeds. Especially noteworthy are the many examples of using LOBs to store, manipulate and retrieve XML documents and his treatment of XSLT in chapters 7 and 9. After taking great pains to explain the use of XPath he then goes to great lengths to show how it is used in XSLT to transform XML documents into HTML, XML or other document types. Pay special attention to the explanation of the operation on page 279. Those who read his book will certainly benefit from its disclosures.
Rating:
Summary: Best technical reference I've ever read
Review: Steve's book does a simply amazing job of weaving practical business context and pinpoint technical implementation. It covers in detail everything the Oracle XDK readme's and samples miss. If you need to work with XML in an Oracle environment (either PL/SQL or Java) then you must buy this. It will save countless hours and provide the depth of knowledge that few if any books I've read have been able to convey.
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