Re: oracle8 mat. view support

> Does oracle8 support materialized views??

No. The closest you can get is a SNAPSHOT. While similar, there are differences. Chief among those differences is that Materialized Views support Query Rewrite while Snapshots do not.

> I know oracle 8i does, but I'm not sure about oracle8. I don't see why not!

Simply because the option had to get introduced at some point. Oracle 8i was the introduction of Materialized Views.  

> If mat. views aren't supported by oracle8, is it possible to just define a
> table containing the same aggregates (and then: what is the difference with
> a summary table=mat view ??)

It is possible to create your own summary tables in Oracle 8, but you'll have to code the update routines when the base tables are changed. Materialized views handle this for you.

HTH,
Brian

-- 
========================================
Brian Peasland
Raytheons Systems at
  USGS EROS Data Center
These opinions are my own and do not
necessarily reflect the opinions of my 
company!
========================================