A good reference for Oracle PL/SQL

Question

What are the best references for Oracle PL/SQL? I have an excellent knowlege of SQL-92 and of MS-SQL extensions, but now I'm working with Oracle and I'm struggling to find good references for the PL/SQL language.

I am looking for references for the following:

• Variable
• Loops
• Cursor
• Packages
• Trigger
• Stored Procedures
• Temporary Tables

Thanks so much.

Answer 1

This reference is really good.

Answer 2

As Klaus says the online documentation is pretty good. Start with the 2-Day Application Developer's Guide. If you're using 11g, you'll want to read the most recent version of the PL/SQL User's Guide.

But if you want to buy a book, then Steven Feuerstein's Oracle PL/SQL Programming is the one.

Answer 3

One additional observation. You include temporary tables in a list of PL/SQL features. This is because you are used to the T-SQL way of doing things. In Oracle things are handled differently.

In Oracle we have global temporary tables. These are permanent database objects, like regular tables, but they are defined so that the data is held temporarily - either for the duration of a transaction or a session. The data in a global temporary table is only queryable by the session which populates it.

The point being that temporary tables are discussed in the SQL Reference, not the PL/SQL manual.

Answer 4

In addition to PL/SQL documentation that others have mentioned, the Oracle Database Concepts Guide is a good reference for finding out how Oracle works, including an overview of package, triggers, tables etc. I have posted a link to the 11.2 version, but you can find the docs for older versions here.

Answer 5

I've always found Tech on the Net to be good quick reference

Answer 6

I always download my documents for Oracle using this link: http://tahiti.oracle.com/