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I’m new to Oracle, and I need a database…help!
Database Stuff

I’m new to Oracle, and I need a database…help!

Taking an Oracle Database class or course? Need to get up and going on Oracle Database really fast, and really easily? Here’s my advice!

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REST APIs and TABLE INSERTs: the Definitive Guide for Oracle
ORDS

REST APIs and TABLE INSERTs: the Definitive Guide for Oracle

REST APIs and TABLE INSERTs, everything you need. Bonus: we’ll build a REST API to GET the data, with support for CLOB/JSON, links, and exception handling!

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Sell Me on Oracle SQLcl in 50 Seconds
SQL Developer

Sell Me on Oracle SQLcl in 50 Seconds

Why would I use SQLcl…

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Database Stuff
In Database Stuff

Partitioning and DBMS_REDEFINITION

3 Mins Read

Unscientific research and Twitter gossip reveals that fewer than 15% of folks out there take advantage of Oracle’s partitioning (Oracle Docs) support for tables and indexes. Folks that build their own solutions in-house are more likely to discover and use partitioning. If you use a packaged 3rd-party database solution and it uses partitioning, then I would love to hear about it! Do you use Oracle Partitioning (tables/indexes)?online surveys Disclaimer: Partitioning, like indexing, is a performance…

Database Stuff
In Database Stuff

My Oracle Twitter List

1 Min Read

Are you new to Twitter, and need people to follow to get the conversation started? If you work with Oracle, then please continue reading. Don’t forget to check out @BrentO’s Twitter Book! I harangued (definition) my colleague and close friend this morning until he relented in joining Twitter. He specializes in Oracle, so I thought I would send him a quick who-to-follow list in the Oracle Community. As I was building this list, I was…

General
In General

How Much is Too Much?

2 Mins Read

So 2010 is the year of social media. Time’s Person of the Year was the Facebook dude, so that kind of makes it official. I have so many identities spread across all of these communities. How do I manage them all? For now I am taking care of Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. I suppose those are the prime players. I say that based on the number of people using those sites. I use Facebook for…

Database Stuff
In Database Stuff

Access of Evil

2 Mins Read

A play on words – the Axis of Evil, three countries that foster or promote terrorism. This is not a history lesson or political discussion, go here for that. So what is the Access of Evil? I would propose that the following practices conspire to bring down any well-ordered collection of data: MS Access MS Excel SELECT *. So do I have anything meaningful to add to this discussion at this point, or was I…

Database Stuff
In Database Stuff

Trailing or Leading Commas?

1 Min Read

For me, it’s leading. If I have a code or syntax problem, I find it easier to see the line missing the comma if I can look at the first char position. Of course you may say that’s crazy, and any reasonable programmer would demand trailing commas. I’m guessing your IDE offers formatting options that allow you to choose what works best for you. A few minutes investing these could save you hours of searching…

Database Stuff
In Database Stuff

Is it Possible to Learn without Doing?

2 Mins Read

No. For several years now I have been an Oracle database dude who eavesdropped on the SQL community. I hoped to pick up the lingo and become savvy enough that I could say “Yes, I do SQL Server.” If I’m being honest, then I must admit I have largely failed. Yes, I understand what people are talking about, I can read the blogs and get what they are saying. But as Robert Heinlein coined in…

Database Stuff
In Database Stuff

Enterprise Doesn’t Mean What You Think It Does

3 Mins Read

Disclaimer: I wrote this before I started working at Oracle. I still believe what I wrote more than 10 years ago, how trippy is that? One of the most dangerous phrases to be uttered in an organization is ‘Oh, we have an Enterprise license.’ Once that gets out, everyone will think they can deploy/use as much as product X as they want. It does not take much of an imagination to realize where this can…

General
In General

What I’m Reading

2 Mins Read

I love books. I remember when my local school system had a partnership (evil plan) with Pizza Hut. For every six books I read, I earned a free personal pizza. I was reading upwards of 10-20 books a month when I was in elementary school. This may have been partly due to me living in a rural area with no local kids my age to play with, but I’ll pretend it was because I was…

Database Stuff
In Database Stuff

I am a Dirty Tool Pusher

4 Mins Read

A better title might be ‘Tools are Too Cool for School’ or ‘If you don’t use Tools You are Dumber Than a Caveman’ or…well, you get the idea I think. My focus of course falls squarely in the IT and RDBMS domain. It is also not a huge secret that I spend a lot of time advocating a specific database tool for a little independent software company. I want to take a step back this…

Database Stuff
In Database Stuff

Who Owns Performance in the Database?

3 Mins Read

Many moons ago, this was a pretty straightforward question. It also had a very easy answer, the DBA owned performance. By that I mean if the database or it’s applications did not perform as expected, it was the DBA who would step in and fix it. Several years ago this began to change. More and more shops started to expect the developers to have more than a passing awareness that their applications relied on a…