5 comments about Building Oracle Websites.

1. This is a GREAT book! I was asked by my boss to figure out what it would take to place our inventory database on the Web for our suppliers to access. This book not only showed me a number of ways to do that, but gave me some great tips. This is NOT a book to buy if you want to learn how to do Oracle programming. It clearly states it though in the front matter. But, if you already know how to access an Oracle database and want to learn how to couple an Oracle database with a Web application, then this is a "must buy" book.



2. This book was very useful in deciding on many aspects of web development with an Oracle. The author explained the application development tool and CGI scripting selection process, the make-up of a development team, HTML and other pertinent topics very well. I feel very comfortable with the project I have to tackle.



3. ...and you will learn how to make Oracle-based web sites from this book, as long as you do it on WinNT and as long as you do it the one way the author explains, which is through proprietary executables. Anyone looking for CGI access via PERL or other "open" languages will be better served with other books. I'm sure it's fine for beginners, but if you're implementing Oracle on any other platform that NT, this book will be of no use.



4. It didn't help me at all, too generic



5. I was hoping some of the reviewers were wrong. At least I was hoping to get some useful samples to connect web/HTML to Oracle database. I am wrong! The whole book is repeating and repeating some concepts/subjects about HTML, database and etc. They maybe good for presentations (managers), not for real people doing the work. When I "finally" read the key chapter 14, Accessing Oracle databases using CGI programs on page 301, I was hoping "this is the chapter" that I was looking for. I was totally disappointed. No explanation of how the cgi programs "query.exe (and others)" connect the HTML to Oracle. Anyway, if you are just getting into web/database business, this book may give you good concepts of it. However, this book is already outdated! I am sorry to buy this book. Hoping people not repeating my mistake.

No comments about Oracle 10g New Features for Administrators (IT Solutions for the Enterprise).

5 comments about Oracle PL/SQL: The Complete Video Course.

1. I bought the video expecting a better speaker. The woman who is the lecturer has a very heavy Russian accent, pauses often in mid sentence, blinks a lot and lacks dynamic presentation skills. The content seems ok, but a better presenter would improve the video greatly. Also, I can't understand why the cameraman doesn't center the camera.



2. A deft and knowledgeable hand who ably presents lean and well thought out material, Ms. Silvestrova avoids the trap of spending too much time attempting to create a glossy and slick presentation, and quickly gets down to the business of teaching PL/SQL. Her slight accent was melodious, and served to inject freshness into the teaching of a technical subject.

   I found this course not only highly satisfying, but also very effective in making PL/SQL an easily approachable subject. The emphasis obviously is placed on teaching a technical subject in a down to earth fashion, not on entertaining the audience with a glitzy set and air brushed actors. If the latter is what you want, better wait for the Walt Disney version (or buy one of the slickly produced competing PL/SQL videos on the market - this is experience speaking here). However, if you are a serious student, who seeks a sound introductory foundation and a solid immersion into the heart of intermediate PL/SQL, delivered by an apparently seasoned professional, then look no further. A+




3. Both this book and the similiar Oracle DBA book are magnificent. Each in their subject area is the most effective training books I've ever used, and I've had to read WAY too many in my career. The PL/SQL book gives superb examples- each example is a complete runnable block, not an excerpted fragment. So you don't have to flip all over the place to understand how the statements work together ot to test it out yourself. The book's diagrams are also very good. The explanation text is lucid and well organized. I really dont see how the books could be much better unless they could do a Vulcan Mind Meld!
   The video on the other hand is quite disappointing, really almost useless. I had real difficulty understanding the instructor. The pronunciation and mangling of english constructs results in a presentation that is very difficult to follow - especially considering you are trying to learn a difficult and complex technical subject. Buy the book (seperately), and you will have the best tool for learning PL/SQL short of a personal tutor. Makes the Complete Reference series seem like random monkey typing!



4. With over twenty years in large scale IT development using Java/C++/C/Assembly languages on HP-UX/Solaris/AIX/Windows 2000/NT platforms, but a neophyte with PL/SQL, I needed a PL/SQL package that would assume no background knowledge in PL/SQL, get me up to speed fast, and at the same time be comprehensive. In other words, I wanted everything. This package no only satisfied this need, but opened up new avenues of thought concerning approaches to database programming. The book is simply matchless (it should get 6 stars--an extra star for the terrific exercises that incorporate hidden pearls of IT wisdom), and yes I have perused others on the market. Ms. Silvestrova demonstrates that she is a consummate professional. The flow of the book, depth of the hands-on exercises, and scope of material is an inimitable combination. This so far may sound over-glowing, but a workman is worthy of her hire. I would recommend this package to any introductory or middle level PL/SQL student. If you desire to be a competent PL/SQL professional, look no further. If you desire to have a guide that provides you with a solid answer to specific types of PL/SQL problems, look no further. However, if you seek a slick product that spoon feeds you programming palaver (under the guise of teaching), fly you fool: you have many under-performing options available. The video is as effective as any video can be on a Sequential Non-Event Oriented and Non-GUI programming language. It provides a visual venue that reinforces and compliments what the student should have accomplished in the workbook. Let's avoid any petulance or semantic superciliousness: Yes, Ms. Silvestrova has a slight accent, but no more than how someone from Alabama would sound to a New Yorker or vice-versa. She is easy to listen to, and more importantly, easy to learn from.
   Buy it, try it, apply it!!!



5. One star is way to high of a rating for this book!! I bought this set hoping that I would get in-depth knowledge of the PL/SQL programming language. I was greatly disappointed. First of all, I have no clue how the author, Elena Silvestrova, got her job with Columbia University. The presentation material was read directly out of the book. She did not elaborate on any examples at all. Isn't that the point of a video course??? Many times she would read an example incorrectly and then move to the next slide then catch her mistake and go back to the previous slide to correct her mistake! The video was very unorganized and not edited well at all. You could pick the book up and literally read the entire video course with her. Elena Silvestrova has a very heavy accent and it's quite hard to make out what she is reading. Her presentation skills are very poor and she stumbles through sentences. You would be better off to just to skip this one as I have put mine back in box. I stopped this course after chapter four and had to come to this site and leave my comments.

No comments about Oracle Disk I/O Tuning.

No comments about Teach Yourself SQL/PL SQL Using Oracle 8i and 9i with SQLJ.

No comments about Easy Oracle Pl/sql Programming.

3 comments about ComputingFailure.com: War Stories from the Electronic Revolution.

1. I have to admit I was drawn by the book's very provocative title, so I decided to browse through it today, to find that it is a very nice compilation of stories printed with permission, taken from publications such as the Wall Street Journal, The Industry Standard, Barron's and Time Digital.

   This is not to say that the content of the stories was bad at all. On the contrary, all of these publications are highly respectable, but if you have been a close follower of the whole dot.com shakedown process over the course of the past year and a half, and expect to find insights that will allow you to better understand the underlying reasons for it, you might be dissapointed not to find any "new" ones in this book.

   In short, in my opinion, the book does not add significantly to the whole discussion about the topic.




2. The editor (or, more accurately, compiler) of this volume is honest about how he put it together: He clipped interesting stories about unsuccessful dot.com companies and slipped them into a file. When the file was thick enough, he arranged the stories more or less topically, padded them with his file of recent non-dot.com "computer failure" articles, obtained reprint permissions and, voila!, produced a book (or, more accurately, a "book").

   The stories are grouped into chapters, and between the chapters comes the editor's intellectual contribution, consisting mostly of jejune observations that we have all seen or thought before.

   If you read The Wall Street Journal and The Industry Standard, you have already read most of this book, and the parts that you haven't read are of marginal interest. On the positive side, the articles are interesting, even though their moral is generally one that was old when Charles Dow was knee-high to a debenture: Don't throw money into an enterprise that you don't understand.

   And the moral of this review is: Throw money at this book if you want a permanent anthology of schadenfreude. Otherwise, you got some bucks to invest? Right here I have the Next Great Thing. . . .




3. I really like Robert Glass's computer books of which I've read several, but despite the title, this is NOT a computer book. This is a compilation of news reports of dot-com BUSINESS failures. There is nothing about computers in the book, except that the businesses used them. The blurb on the back of the book talks about "why software projects fail" but there is virtually nothing in the book on projects or software. Also the format is useful for illustrating ideas (for a good example see Epstein's The Case of the Killer Robot) but here there is nothing for them to illustrate - this is nothing but news reports.
   
   I was expecting something more like Neumann's Computer-Related Risks.

5 comments about Using Oracle 8 (Special Edition Using).

1. First let me qualify by saying I have worked with Oracle for over 4 years and that I read this book as a refresher to learn the new features of Oracle 8. I mostly stick with the O'Reilly series, but I have to say this is a very good reference book. Who ever gave this book one star is full of crap. If you knew all of the concepts and procedures for running Oracle that are contained in this book, then you are on your way to becoming an Oracle DBA. Notice I said "on your way", which means that you would not yet be qualified to be an Oracle DBA after reading this book, but you would have an excellent foundation of the material that an expert DBA needs and uses everyday. There may have been a few mistakes here or there, but for $30 it's the best deal you'll ever find.



2. I am primarily a Solaris system admin who wants to learn more about the inside of Oracle and what it takes to keep it up and running. The O'Reilly titles were a major disappointment since most of their stuff usually rocks, but let's hope for better 2nd editions on those along with some good tutorial material. The Oracle Press titles are totally disorganized and a major embarassment! David Austin has put together a great book with Using Oracle 8, and if you have to suffer through NT (and thank God I don't), he has plenty of material on Oracle Enterprise Mgr (all of chapter 4). Then he moves on to the nitty gritty, with a Unix-oriented or at least generic "pure Oracle" approach. I have spent two weeks browsing and reading various Oracle books and good choices are hard to find. I strongly recommend Alomari's "Oracle8 and Unix Performance Tuning" as well.



3. The book does not have the in-depth coverage that expert SQL users would expect. If you are a beginner then it may suit you just fine. There are not enough nuts and bolts for people like me who really need the complete reference book.



4. A very good book on Oracle8 administration, performance tuning, backup and recovery. Full of well organized useful information.



5. I come from Iraq and when you want to get a new dook it, the search operation is more defficalt because you know please help me to get more information about learning oracl by the way I'm programmer thanck you for your help .

No comments about VALUECENTRIC USES ORACLE DATABASE FOR PHARMACEUTICAL INDUSTRY.(Company overview): An article from: Worldwide Databases.

No comments about Oracle Designer: A Template for Developing An Enterprise Standards Document.