Oracle® PL/SQL Training

Course Outline

This Oracle® PL/SQL training course will teach you to increase the productivity, performance, scalability, portability, and security of your Oracle database. With this training, you will learn how to execute PL/SQL programs in Oracle, build stored procedures, design, and execute modular applications, and increase the efficiency of data movement — essential skills for any Oracle developer.

Oracle® PL/SQL Training Benefits

In this Oracle PL/SQL Programming training, you will learn how to:
- Develop efficient PL/SQL programs to access Oracle databases.
- Create stored procedures and functions for reuse and maintenance.
- Design modular applications using packages.
- Manage data retrieval for front-end applications.
- Invoke native dynamic SQL to develop high-level abstract code.
Oracle PL/SQL Programming Training Course Prerequisites

Students taking this course should have basic knowledge of SQL as taught in Learning Tree course 925, Introduction to SQL Course.

Oracle PL/SQL Course Outline

Module 1: Introduction and Overview

PL/SQL fundamentals

Declaring and anchoring variables to database definitions
Flow control constructs

Oracle 11g and 12c PL/SQL features

PL/Scope in Oracle 11g
Returning implicit cursor results from stored procedures in Oracle 12c
Declaring local functions within SELECT statements in Oracle 12c

Module 2: Data Manipulation Techniques

Maintaining data with DML statements

Employing the RETURNING INTO clause
Solving the fetch-across-commit problem

Managing data retrieval with cursors

Implications of explicit and implicit cursors
Simplifying cursor processing with cursor FOR LOOPs
Embedding cursor expressions in SELECT statements

Cursor variables

Strong vs. weak cursor variables
Passing cursor variables to other programs
Defining REF CURSORS in packages

Module 3: Developing Well-Structured and Error-Free Code

Error handling using EXCEPTIONs

Propagation and scope
"Retrying" problem transactions with EXCEPTION processing

Debugging PL/SQL blocks

Simplifying testing and debugging with conditional compilation
Interpreting compiler messages
Applying structured testing techniques
Building and applying a test bed
Leveraging the debugging facilities in SQL Developer

Module 4: Achieving Maximum Reusability

Writing stored procedures and functions

Calling and invoking server-side logic
Passing input and output parameters
Implementing an autonomous transaction

Coding user-written functions

Calling PL/SQL functions from SQL
Building table-valued functions

Developing safe triggers

Employing :OLD and :NEW variables
Avoiding unreliable trigger constructs
Exploiting schema and database triggers

Module 5: Exploiting Complex Datatypes

Collection types

PL/SQL tables, nested tables, VARRAYs
Stepping through dense and nonconsecutive collections

Bulk binding for high performance

Moving data into and out of PL/SQL blocks
BULK COLLECT INTO and FORALL
BULK cursor attributes
BULK EXCEPTION handling

Module 6: Invoking Native Dynamic SQL

Finessing the compiler

The EXECUTE IMMEDIATE statement
The RETURNING INTO clause

Types of dynamic SQL

Building SQL statements during runtime
Autogenerating standard code

Module 7: Package Tips and Techniques

Package structure: SPEC and BODY
Eliminating dependency problems
Overloading for polymorphic effects
Evaluating application frameworks
Declaring and using persistent global variables

Oracle® PL/SQL Training

Course Outline