Lesson 1

Welcome to the second course in the Introduction to Oracle Certification Series, Programming in PL/SQL.
As the name implies, this series focuses on preparing you for certification in Oracle.

The information covered in this series helps you get started on the Oracle Certified Database Administrator and/or Certified Application Developer paths. Another important goal of this series is to enable you to

1. create advanced SQL queries,
2. write beginning to intermediate PL/SQL blocks, and
3. familiarize you with Oracle's unique SQL extensions.

PL/SQL is an integral part of the Oracle database engine. This course will introduce you to PL/SQL and explain how you can build PL/SQL programming structures. PL stands for Procedural Language.
This language offers procedural techniques to build your SQL (Structured Query Language) commands.
You can use this language to construct procedures, triggers, functions, packages, and more.

After completing the course, you will be able to:

1. Describe the basic structure of a PL/SQL block
2. Create a nested PL/SQL block
3. Describe the different PL/SQL and non-PL/SQL variables
4. Identify the scope of variables when using nested blocks
5. Apply best practices for naming conventions and commenting your code
6. Gain an overview of the different PL/SQL datatypes, including composite datatypes such as PL/SQL RECORD and TABLE
7. Place identifiers and use literals and operators within a PL/SQL block
8. Build logic by using PL/SQL control structures, including loops, labels, and the GOTO statement
9. Use explicit cursors to process multiple records
10. Raise implicit and explicit exceptions

The bottom line is this:

1. Inside PL/SQL programs, the most flexible, and often the best-performing, of the collections is the index-by table.
2. Use nested tables when working with nested table data stored in the database. Nested tables are appropriate for large collections that the application typically stores and retrieves a portion of at a time.
3. Use VARRAYs when working with VARRAY table data stored in the database. This type of collection is appropriate for small collections that the application stores and retrieves in their entirety.

In this course, you will learn and practice PL/SQL skills using diagams, carousels and Slide Shows.

Programming in PL/SQL is the second of three courses in the introduction to Oracle Certification Series. In the next lesson, the Oracle PL/SQL Course Requirements will be discussed.