| March, 2002 |
|
|||||||||||||
|
All articles have been reprinted with the written consent of their respective authors.
| |||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||
|
Code Search Utility I figured that after using code samples from so many others from resources like this, it was time to give back a bit. So, here is my small contribution to the community. As a roving developer, I am regularly diving into new applications that have been documented poorly, if at all. The first thing I usually need to figure out is "What sets this value". Sure, you can check dba_dependencies, but that doesn't get you to the column level of granularity, or the the procedure level within a package. And, if the original developer used "%type" specifications, there could be a whole lot of dependencies. You can quickly search all_source, but what if the value is set in a trigger? Besides, printing out the one line from all_source rarely is as informative as what you want and you wind up manually opening each stored procedure, searching for line 657, and seeing if that was the hit you wanted. This does the legwork for you. It checks all_source, trigger bodies, and view bodies for a case-insensitive match in either a single schema, or all of the schemas. When it finds a hit, it prints out enough of the surrounding code to give you a good sense of what it is being used for in this instance, and if the hit is in a package body it tries to figure out the subprogram name as well. Click Here for the Code Search Utility. SYSOP Response: (Brian Peasland)
"I got a chance to run this utility today. It's really
nice! I like it. I really like two things about it. The
search string is highlighted with '==>' at the start of the line.
This is a nice touch. I also like the way each proc/fn/etc is
separated by the '---End of Match---' string." |
|||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||
|
Myths and Folklore About Oracle 8i Performance
Tuning It is hard to believe that the Oracle RDBMS has been in existence for 25 years...a fascinating but true fact. In this period of time, it has undergone significant change. Over the years, with core functionality transformed, it has become imperative that we keep up with change. Every major release of Oracle makes some of us feel as though we have to re-learn the concepts all over again. Personally, with the advent of every major release of Oracle, I feel like a brand-new DBA. In a world that requires us to support well-designed and great performing 24x7xforever commercial applications, there is a dire need for us to keep up with time. Failure to do so results in us propagating old and potentially irrelevant technical information to others. And that is how myths and folklore are conceived and that also drives us to arrive at inappropriate technical decisions. The myths and folklore discussed in this paper are all performance-related. Although the list is not comprehensive, it encompasses some of the common ones that are out there within the context of Oracle and performance tuning. So what is your take on the legend of Loch Ness? Does Nessie (as she is affectionately referred to) really exist? Click Here for the article.
|
|||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||
|
DB2 Index Design: Analyze How Data is Used To
understand the cost vs. benefits of using indexes, you must analyze how the data
is used to determine which columns should be indexed. Identify columns
that are frequently searched or joined, and estimate the percentage of rows
processed by frequently executed SQL statements. Consider creating the
clustering index on the column most frequently searched or joined in
sequence. Consider non-clustering indexes on searched or joined columns in
which less than 5 to 10 percent of the rows are to be selected, updated,
deleted, and joined. Read on for more! |
|||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||
|
Oracle 8i PL/SQL FTP Protocol Implementation This paper shows basic ideas of how to work with FTP protocol from an Oracle database, presenting a PL/SQL package example, which allows you to download text files right inside your Oracle database. The task of building an Oracle package even with minimal ftp functionality is very complex and challenging, but feasible. In this paper, the author shows the basic approach to the process. Click Here for the paper. Data Modeling, Part 2: It's Really All About
the Relationships In this paper, the second in the data modeling series, we'll examine the intricate complexities of relationships and their corresponding foreign keys. Experience has shown that while many people can readily define entities and their unique identifiers, a relatively small percentage are really any good at modeling the relationships between those entities. This usually occurs as the chosen data modelers are:
In other words, DBAs and programmers quite often make the worst data modelers! The motto has to be effective first, then efficient. It doesn't matter if it runs fast if the results are wrong. Likewise, it doesn't matter that in the old system it was done a certain way. Let the business requirements dictate the model - and don't fight it. Click Here for the paper. A Brute Force Approach to Debugging Forms You're sitting at your desk and your manager
comes over to you, hands you an issue that needs to be fixed - the client
is complaining because something is not working, let it be a forms crash,
triggers acting improperly, or anything else. This is the kind of thing
that the Oracle documentation and the books do not discuss. You have no
idea what is going on. You scan Metalink and OTN to see if anyone else has
had this issue and find nothing. The Oracle representative responds to
your post saying that they were unable to recreate the error. You're under
time pressure. The client and your management want this fixed. What
do you do? Click Here for the answer. |
|||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||
|
XML Support in Transact-SQL The Internet has changed our lives once and for good; most times for the better and sometimes for worse. But the bottom line is that we would never want to go back to living without email, on-line shopping and the ability to do research right from our desktop. Microsoft SQL Server has supported web related functionality since version 6.5, which allowed you to create somewhat crude and non-interactive HTML pages. These HTML pages display contents of your tables or queries. In the later releases the web functionality has been enhanced with web tasks and wizards that automatically create web pages according to the settings you specify. More importantly, SQL Server 2000 is one of the first relational database engines that offers native XML support. Click Here for the article. Product Update: The new Knowledge Xpert for SQL Server v1.1 fully integrates with Microsoft's Visual Studio suite, including Visual Basic, Visual C++, and Visual InterDev. Click Here for the announcement. |
|||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||
|
TOAD User Groups in 20 Cities -
Sign Up Today!
Free e-Seminars with Steven Feuerstein
e-Seminar "en Francais"
|
|||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||
|
"The TAO of Programming" The wise programmer is told about Tao and follows it. The average programmer is told about Tao and searches for it. The foolish programmer is told about Tao and laughs at it. If it were not for laughter, there would be no Tao. The highest sounds are hardest to
hear. Click Here for more of this month's humor! New Feature!!
|
|||||||||||||
|
|||||||||||||
We love getting white papers, tips, articles, and code examples/archives from our readers around the world. Send your submission to campbell.white@quest.com. If your article is published, we will mail you a FREE gift from Quest as a gesture or our appreciation. Our mission at Quest Software - RevealNet Labs is to anticipate the daily responsibilities and challenges faced by database professionals. Our products help thousands of people solve problems and implement solutions every day. This newsletter is designed to help facilitate the sharing of information among database professionals. It is currently circulated to 24,000 readers. About the Newsletter This newsletter is distributed to Quest Software - RevealNet Labs customers, prospects and friends who have subscribed to it from our website. If you would like to unsubscribe, please send a note to info@quest-pipelines.com and we will make every effort to remove you from our list. Subscribe a Friend! Do you know someone who would like to receive the Pipeline Newsletter? If so, please enter their email address in the box below and click SUBMIT.
Past Issues of the Pipeline Newsletter
|
|||||||||||||
