Oracle PL/SQL 101

Rating:
Summary: A so-so book on PL SQL but mostly on Oracle.
Review: I realize that most of the people reading this review are Oracle people. I also realize most of the people here aren't interested in non-oracle products.

However, some of us use open source databases. I personally use PostgreSQL. Postgres has pl/sql functionality, and I was looking to implement some stored procedures to optimize the functioning of several programs I have that iterate over a few hundred thousand rows. I talked to a couple Oracle admins about the problem, and they suggested pl/sql.

Bear in mind, I am a perl programmer, and generally I am not interested in programming sql. However, when it comes to performance you really need to offload the brunt of the processing to the database.

So I looked for a book on PL/SQL and found that there really werent any that were "beginner" books. Furthermore, I found that all of them were Oracle books. So, I crossed my fingers, and bought the beginner oracle pl/sql book.

The first 80% of the book was entirely review, covering the barest basics of SQL, and moving into some other less basic but still not intermediate SQL.

By the time the book began to cover pl/sql it had become a heavily windows- and oracle- centric discussion with little attention paid to other databases and other operating systems. The author does not even entertain that people create SQL queries with tools other than SQL*Plus.

So perhaps the word on this book would be thus.

If youre an oracle admin and windows user, you'll love it. It provides the basics of SQL, and gives a modest tutorial on pl/sql.

If youre a programmer and or unix user, you may find yourself disgusted by how pedantic and shallow the book is. If you dont mind spending the $25 for the book, go ahead. Otherwise, there is probably an Oracle DBA around who has a copy of the book, who loved it, and would be happy to let you borrow it.

Rating:
Summary: Title is misleading - It's an introduction to SQL and .....
Review: PL/SQL. If you're beginner, you may learn something out of this book, but you should consider other options (there is no practice excersies). If you're experienced SQL programmer you should not even waste time and money in this book.
PL/SQL is covered only in the last two chapters and just scratches the surface of PL/SQL. It should've been called introduction to SQL 101.

Rating:
Summary: Great book on beginning PL/SQL
Review: This is by far the best book that I have seen on beginning PL/SQL. The chapters are well laid out and each chapter builds on the previous on. The book is very complete and doesn't assume any prior knowledge and it also looks at topics indepth. I have also found it to be a good technical reference when I forget the syntax for a command. I would highly recommend this book to anyone wanting to begin or learn more on PL/SQL.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent place to start for PL/SQL
Review: This is one of the best books that I've bought recently. I've been a programmer for 4 years, but I just recently started working with relational databases, specifically Oracle. This book is clear, concise, and very accessible. The writing style is very engaging, too. The author manages to present the material in a way that keeps your interest without sacraficing quality. Consequently, the book is fast to read, but of great value.

The chapter on using SQL*Plus is of great value. It helped me to more effective look at what is in our databases to get a feel for the results from the programs that I was testing.

After reading this book I felt like the author gave a solid overview of the PL/SQL language without being overly rigorous. If you are looking for an academic treatment with lots of theory, this is not the place. Those books are very import to broaden your understanding, but this book bridges the gap to make the advance texts accessible.

This is the place for Oracle beginners to get their hands dirty. There are plenty of examples that run throughout the book to demonstrate the concepts. As you work with PL/SQL and SQL*Plus, you will find yourself referring back to this book often as you come up to speed. It is definitely worth the money and the time.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent investement if you are new to SQL
Review: This is an excellent investment if you do not know SQL and want to learn PL/SQL. I actually took an instructor led course on this to get me ready for the first Oracle test and found this book to be much better at explaining the concepts then my instructor. Blasted! =-> Highly recommend this book.

Rating:
Summary: ORACLE PL/SQL 101
Review: The book is a masterpiece to every novice in the field of database administration. The author really planned the work and after reading it I bet you your confidence will soar and the advance books in the field would be a joy to read.Go for it you will get your moneys worth and with other advance books you can face the IZO-001 exams and the rest with confidence.
Well done Chris.

Rating:
Summary: Oracle PL/SQL 101 (Osborne ORACLE Press Series)
Review: This book has been very helpful so far with my database class @ DeVry. The author has broken the information down into bits that are easy to understand and I really appreciate all of the exercises included throughout the chapters for practice.

Rating:
Summary: Excellent for beginners
Review: Although the book does not go into great detail about PL/SQL, it does give you a great understanding of SQL with quizzes at the end of each chapter. I would recommend this to everyone just starting to learn SQL.

Rating:
Summary: The ultimate starting point!
Review: I bought this book after buying several other books that assume the reader has a basic knowledge of SQL and Oracle, which wasn't me. Christopher starts the reader at the beginning and walks them through the basic fundamentals with patience and even some humor. I think this book is a great starting point for anyone who is database ignorant and doesn't want to stay that way.

Rating:
Summary: Best jump-starts to Oracle PL/SQL
Review: This book is one of the jump-starts into Oracle PL/SQL and covers all basic functionalities and a little bit of intermediary-advance features. Also, simplify the difficulties of Oracle PL/SQL advance features. Using this book alone, even a beginner can create a full function PL/SQL program. However, for advance programmers, this book offers little to no benefits. Well, this is match with its content. This is one of the must have, for every PL/SQL programmers specially the beginners.