Advanced Oracle SQL Programming: The Expert Guide to Writing Complex Queries (Oracle In-Focus series) [Paperback]

Laurent Schneider (Author), Donald Burleson (Editor)

Book Description

Series: Oracle In-Focus series | Publication Date: December 1, 2008

Providing the best solutions to Oracle customers, this comprehensive manual answers some of SQL's most exciting challenges. Covering all the elements of an Oracle query—including new features from Oracle versions 9i, 10g, and 11g—this guide will help information technology managers and programmers alike to gain new insight into complex queries, advanced aggregation, and analytics techniques. Introducing Model and XML as new ways to retrieve data out of the database, this sourcebook culminates as a perfect companion for advanced programmers and Oracle experts.

Editorial Reviews

About the Author

Laurent Schneider is an Oracle Certified Master with more than 10 years of experience with Oracle and UNIX. He has written many articles about Oracle technologies and has provided thousands of answers on online technical forums. He is currently a management system engineer at LC Systems Engineering.

Donald Burleson is one of the world’s top Oracle Database experts with more than 20 years of full-time DBA experience. He has written 30 books, including Oracle Data Mining and Oracle Shell Scripting, and serves as editor-in-chief of Rampant TechPress.

Product Details

• Paperback: 450 pages
• Publisher: Rampant Techpress (December 1, 2008)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0977671585
• ISBN-13: 978-0977671588
• Product Dimensions: 8.9 x 7 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 2.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,207,853 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Decent book on advanced SQL but much to be desired, February 21, 2009

By 

Harsha N. Hegde (NJ, USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Advanced Oracle SQL Programming: The Expert Guide to Writing Complex Queries (Oracle In-Focus series) (Paperback)

I am an ardent reader of Laurent Schneider's blog: http://laurentschneider.com/. His deep understanding of databases is unparalleled. The tips he provides are very practical and handy. That's probably what raised my expectations from his book: "Advanced Oracle SQL Programming". I have just finished reading through this book and I can clearly say that I am a bit disappointed with the book.
- It feels more like a collection of Laurent's notes on various Oracle SQL topics.
- There is a disconnect between one topic and the next one.
- Topics are very brief, often not exceeding 3-4 sentences. Much more detailed discussion/analysis of each concept would have made the book more readable.
- More tips/tricks (like the ones in boxes with an explosive symbol) would have made me go back to this book often.
- This may sound trivial, but the formatting of the code unnecessarily takes up too much space. e.g, in the first chapter itself, all the "INSERT" statements run to 8 pages! They could have easily been arranged 2 columns/page. They are not even required because it is available for download anyway at the book's website.
Nice things I found in the book:
- Exercise problems are really good, will make you think.
- Explanation on Joins, Subquery and Hierarchical queries are so far the best I have read.

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars ADavanced Oracla SQL, November 13, 2009

By 

Richard John (Vallejo, CA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Advanced Oracle SQL Programming: The Expert Guide to Writing Complex Queries (Oracle In-Focus series) (Paperback)

I found most of the book to be a rehash of other material Oracle published. Most of the SQL I would not consider advanced. I felt if a intermediate at best. I bought this book about 6 months ago and after reading I have only used it once or twice as reference. There is some stuff in one of the middle chapters, but overall I was disappointed.

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Poorly written, and confusing, April 12, 2010

By 

Joshua E. Emery (Andover, Ma) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Advanced Oracle SQL Programming: The Expert Guide to Writing Complex Queries (Oracle In-Focus series) (Paperback)

Probably the worst Technical book I have ever read. It is poorly formatted, and some paragraphs just do not make sense. Examples are weak, and not explained leaving you to toil over it to figure what the writter is trying to accomplish. I highly recommend avoiding this book. Do not make the costly mistake I did.