Re: Basic Questions

Rhino wrote:
> "Sybrand Bakker" <postbus_at_sybrandb.demon.nl> wrote in message
> news:8pkq62153844po87rlfjf2ijue76t269mi_at_4ax.com...
> > On Thu, 18 May 2006 19:49:56 -0400, "Rhino"
> > <no.offline.contact.please_at_nospam.com> wrote:
> >
> >>I would like to get a little bit of hands on experience with PL/SQL,
> >>Developer 6.0, and Report Writer on Oracle in the next few days.
> >>
> >>I'm very fluent with DB2 and many of its tools and techniques and pretty
> >>functional with MySQL but have never used Oracle so I'm not sure what all
> >>the different components of Oracle are. I'd like to install a basic
> >>environment on my PC so that I can use the tools I mentioned but I don't
> >>want to get bogged down in installing/configuring a bunch of stuff that
> >>isn't relevant.
> >>
> >>Can anyone tell me what I need to install and where I can download trial
> >>versions of the components I need?
> >
> > Developer 6.0 has entered the museum many years ago.
> > If you want current software download Oracle 10g XE from
> > http://otn.oracle.com (150 Mb dowload).
> > There is still a thing called Internet Developer Suite, but in your
> > suite that is probably overkill.
> > XE comes with various new developer tools, Oracle is going to move to
> > anyway.
> >
> While I wouldn't normally want to look at obsolete tools, this situation is
> a bit unusual.

More usual than one would like <sigh>

>
> I have applied for a job as a "Data and Information Specialist" and the
> description calls for "Advanced technical skills, especially PL/SQL,
> Developer 6.0 - Report Writer and Oracle database preferred". I cited my DB2
> skills when I applied for the job and said that I was confident I could
> learn the Oracle tools quickly. I have been granted an interview for late
> next week but I'd like to really impress the employer by acquiring some
> basic familiarity with the tools they use before the interview.

You might consider getting a book or 3:
http://www.oracle.com/technology/tech/pl_sql/index.html

There are also a number of PL/SQL tutorials on the internet, you should be able to find with some googling. There used to be Developer tutorials floating about, too, but maybe not anymore, I really wouldn't know.

I'm having a bit of trouble reconciling a description of "Advanced technical skills, especially PL/SQL, " with "but have never used Oracle." I suppose everyone has to start somewhere, and obsolete places may be desperate, clueless, or even honestly willing to put up with someone learning on the job, but this seems a bit of a reach. If you can do it, more power to you. There are some things Oracle does differently than other db's (especially having to do with locking and read consistency), and to do a _good_ job you need to understand these things - it is entirely possible the stuff already at the obsolete place is _baaaaad_. See the books suggested at asktom.oracle.com to learn how to do things right.

Normally I would suggest starting with the concepts manual at tahiti.oracle.com (free registration required, all docs are there), but you don't really have enough time for that, and if the situation is really that bad where they are willing to accept people that have no actual experience, it wouldn't matter anyways.

>
> Even if they are using obsolete tools, it would probably not be diplomatic
> for me to point that out at the interview - I can try to persuade them to
> modernize their tools if I get the job! - and I may not get any "brownie
> points" for having a working knowledge of a much newer tool set than they
> are using.

How can you persuade about that which you know nothing?

>
> Therefore, two followup questions:
>
> 1. Are the tools they are using still available for download somewhere? If
> so, where? And what are all the different things I need to download? I know
> nothing about the bundling of Oracle so I don't know if I need to download
> the database engine and each of the main tools as separate entities or
> whether the whole kit and kaboodle is all bundled together.

9i db is here: http://www.oracle.com/technology/software/index.html There are some 6i download thingies under the the 9iAS downloads, but I don't know what they are, having decided that 9iAS is so fragile it bursts into flames of death if you look at it wrong. On the other hand, if you are being interviewed by someone who actually does know something about this stuff, if you can show that you've gotten 9iAS and forms 6i actually working yourself with no prior knowledge, that could be a plus. Oracle support has a thing called "metalink" where the patches and some real world descriptions of how to do things are kept. Some people think usenet is better, though (I think both are useful in their own ways).

Hope I haven't scared you off by giving you a glimpse of what may be in store for you. "Oracle" describes a lot of things, most of which you haven't heard of. XE is designed for people used to the MS way of installing and kickstarting things, older stuff invariably assumes you've been educated in the Oracle basics.

>
> 2. If I were to download the 10g XE package you recommend and get basic
> familiarity with the tools there, how hard would it be to use the older
> tools that this employer has? Are the current versions of the tools just
> incrementally improved or are they profoundly different?

Profound difference. But the newer tools are less iconoclastic than the old.

>
> Oh, by the way, I want to install Oracle on a standalone Windows XP
> Professional workstation; I assume that has some bearing on what I should
> download.
>
> Basically, I just want to install Oracle on my Windows box and use the
> Sample database (assuming there is one, otherwise I'll create one) to
> generate a few procedures and reports so that I can get familiar with the
> Oracle dialect of PL/SQL and with your reporting tools.

Depends on version, look for scripts to load schema Scott on older ones (something like %ORACLE_HOME%\rdbms\admin\utlsampl.sql), HR on the newer ones
http://download-west.oracle.com/docs/cd/B25329_01/doc/appdev.102/b25310/frm_tabular.htm#CHDEDICH (you need the free registration for that link).

I just got some amazpam about a pl/sql for dummies, don't know anything about it though. Oh wait, not released for another couple of weeks.

jg

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