Re: Do you use PL/SQL

zigzagdna_at_yahoo.com wrote:

> In practice, you cannot make your application as database independent
> by writing lots of stored procedures in PL/SQL. That's the reason
> people avoid PL/SQL because it is a proprietary Language of Oracle.

Sorry but that's nonsense. You can do it and the better companies with the better products do do it. Generic code will not perform well. Generic code will not scale well. Generic code will not leverage the differences in architecture and concepts. What you get is vanilla. And if you want to be known as the company that sells Chevrolets and Yugos that is your privilege. But most people aspire to own a Benz or Ferrari.

> If you are a software vendor and develop a product for many databases,
> you want to use as little one data specific code, I am sure Frank, Dan
> and other Oracle gurus will say otherwise, but that is reality.

You are correct. I will say otherwise and as you surmised ... I would expect most guru's ... people that know from experience ... will also say that too.

Not because we make more money pushing "best of breed" solutions. Actually I make much of my money cleaning up after generic rubbish. I say it because it is reality. Is the up-front cost a bit more to do a good job? Yes. Does it require having subject matter experts on staff? Yes. Does it save money over the long run by being able to use fewer CPUs, less expensive hardware, and spend less time tuning and tweaking? YES!

> Look
> at vendors like SAP, EMC Documentum, they do not use any PL/SQL. They
> have abstracted a common SQL, and they stick to it.

And one might, by extension, compare the rapid expansion of Oracle's applications business as a strong indication they are doing something right.

This might help.
http://finance.yahoo.com/q/bc?t=5y&s=ORCL&l=on&z=m&q=l&c=SAP

> May be their
> applications run little slower than if they developed all their
> database code in Pl/SQL for Oracle database, but I can assure this
> slowness is in terms of mill second and not minutes.

Actually you can not give that assurance because, in truth, you don't have the metrics to support it. Please stick with facts and leave the spin doctoring to the marketers and politicians.

 > If you write
> inefficient queries, that is where you see order of magnitude slowness
> in performance. While PL/SQL is a good language for Oracle databases,
> it lacks object-orieneted classes of C++ and Java , a serious
> limitation once you get hang of object-oriented programming. I

Object orientation has nothing, nada, zero, zilch, to do with retrieving relational data. What you are writing is marketing hyperole not the results of benchmarks and not the result of testing. If you feel otherwise come on over to my lab. I'd like to see you do what no one else has ever done.

-- 
Daniel A. Morgan
University of Washington
damorgan_at_x.washington.edu
(replace x with u to respond)
Puget Sound Oracle Users Group
www.psoug.org