Oracle Data Dictionary Pocket Reference

Rating:
Summary: Superfluous book, better read ORACLE docs (reference guide)
Review: "ORACLE Data Dictionary Pocket Reference" describes (most of) the ORACLE data dictionary views. This book sorts the DD views according to subjects e.g. "Replication". Normally for each view you will find a sentence about the contents of the view and the columns with datatype and not null constraints (if present). For some views you will see a little longer explanation.

I am a big fan on O'Reilly books and I own at lot (50+) O'Reilly books. From my point of view this book is superfluous and it should not have been printed. This book does not provide any detailed information about the columns of the views. The semantics of the data in the views is not explained at all. There is no information how to join the DD views to get the result you need. At one place the book states that you can join V$PROCESS and V$SESSION to find some more information about a session but it does not say how to join those view (V$SESSION.paddr = V$PROCESS.addr).

This book does not add any information that can not be found in the ORACLE "Reference" manual. It actually provides less information. Most of the information can be extracted from ORACLE itself (DICT table and SQL*PLUS describe on the view). The ORACLE documentation can be read online and is more detailed.

I did not find any big error in this book. The form, printing and index are of the normal O'Reilly high quality. This is worth 3 stars from me. However I will probably not look into this book again.

Rating:
Summary: OK for quick reference
Review: It lists about everything. It gives the table or view name and the column name and type. For the most part, it gives a one sentence description for the table/view. That's the extent of the details.

Rating:
Summary: OK for quick reference
Review: It lists about everything. It gives the table or view name and the column name and type. For the most part, it gives a one sentence description for the table/view. That's the extent of the details.