Preface

This manual describes all features of the Oracle server, an object-relational database management system. It describes how the Oracle server functions and lays a conceptual foundation for much of the practical information contained in other Oracle server manuals. Information in this manual applies to the Oracle server running on all operating systems.

Oracle9i and Oracle9i Enterprise Edition

Oracle9i Database Concepts contains information that describes the functionality of the Oracle9i (also known as the standard edition) and the Oracle9i Enterprise Edition products. Oracle9i and Oracle9i Enterprise Edition have the same basic features. However, several advanced features are available only with the Enterprise Edition, and some of these are optional. For example, to use application failover, you must have the Enterprise Edition with the Real Application Clusters option.

For information about the differences between Oracle9i and the Oracle9i Enterprise Edition and the features and options that are available to you, see Oracle9i Database New Features.

This preface contains these topics:

Audience

This manual is intended for database administrators, system administrators, and database application developers.

To use this document, you need to know the following:

Relational database concepts in general
Concepts and terminology in Chapter 1, "Introduction to the Oracle Server"
The operating system environment under which you are running Oracle

Organization

This document contains:

Part I: What Is Oracle?

Chapter 1, "Introduction to the Oracle Server"

This chapter provides an overview of the concepts and terminology you need for understanding the Oracle data server. You should read this overview before using the detailed information in the remainder of this manual.

Chapter 2, "Oracle Server Features"

This chapter provides an overview of some of the features of the Oracle server.

Part II: Database Structures

Chapter 3, "Data Blocks, Extents, and Segments"

This chapter discusses how data is stored and how storage space is allocated for and consumed by various objects within an Oracle database.

Chapter 4, "Tablespaces, Datafiles, and Control Files"

This chapter discusses how physical storage space in an Oracle database is divided into logical divisions called tablespaces. It also discusses the physical operating system files associated with tablespaces (datafiles) and files used in recovery (control files).

Chapter 5, "The Data Dictionary"

This chapter describes the data dictionary, which is a set of reference tables and views that contain read-only information about an Oracle database.

Part III: The Oracle Instance

Chapter 6, "Database and Instance Startup and Shutdown"

This chapter describes an Oracle instance and explains how the database administrator can control the accessibility of an Oracle database system. This chapter also describes the parameters that control how the database operates.

Chapter 7, "Distributed Processing"

This chapter discusses distributed processing environments in which the Oracle data server can operate.

Chapter 8, "Memory Architecture"

This chapter describes the memory structures used by an Oracle database system.

Chapter 9, "Process Architecture"

This chapter describes the process architecture of an Oracle instance and the different process configurations available for Oracle.

Chapter 10, "Database Resource Management"

This chapter describes how the Database Resource Manager can be used to control resource use.

Part IV: The Object-Relational DBMS

Chapter 11, "Schema Objects"

This chapter describes the database objects that can be created in the domain of a specific user (a schema), including tables, views, numeric sequences, and synonyms. Optional structures that make data retrieval more efficient, including indexes, materialized views, dimensions, and clusters, are also described.

Chapter 12, "Partitioned Tables and Indexes"

This chapter describes how partitioning can be used to split large tables and indexes into more manageable pieces.

Chapter 13, "System-Provided Datatypes"

This chapter describes the types of relational data that can be stored in an Oracle database table, such as fixed- and variable-length character strings, numbers, dates, and binary large objects (BLOBs).

Chapter 14, "User-Defined Datatypes"

This chapter gives an overview of the object extensions that Oracle provides.

Chapter 15, "Object Views"

This chapter describes the extensions to views provided by the Oracle data server.

Part V: Data Access

Chapter 16, "SQL, PL/SQL, and Java"

This chapter briefly describes SQL (Structured Query Language), the language used to communicate with Oracle, as well as PL/SQL, the Oracle procedural language extension to SQL. It also discusses the procedural language constructs called procedures, functions, and packages, which are PL/SQL program units that are stored in the database.

Chapter 17, "Transaction Management"

This chapter defines the concept of transactions and explains the SQL statements used to control them. Transactions are logical units of work that are executed together as a unit.

Chapter 18, "Triggers"

This chapter discusses triggers, which are procedures written in PL/SQL, Java, or C that execute (fire) implicitly whenever a table or view is modified or when some user actions or database system actions occur.

Chapter 19, "Dependencies Among Schema Objects"

This chapter explains how Oracle manages the dependencies for objects such as procedures, packages, triggers, and views.

Part VI: Parallel SQL and Direct-Path INSERT

Chapter 20, "Parallel Execution of SQL Statements"

This chapter describes parallel execution of SQL statements (queries, DML, and DDL statements) and explains the rules for parallelizing SQL statements.

Chapter 21, "Direct-Path INSERT"

This chapter describes the Oracle direct-path INSERT feature for serial or parallel inserts, and the NOLOGGING clause.

Part VII: Data Protection

Chapter 22, "Data Concurrency and Consistency"

This chapter explains how Oracle provides concurrent access to and maintains the accuracy of shared information in a multiuser environment. It describes the automatic mechanisms that Oracle uses to guarantee that the concurrent operations of multiple users do not interfere with each other.

Chapter 23, "Data Integrity"

This chapter discusses data integrity and the declarative integrity constraints that you can use to enforce data integrity.

Chapter 24, "Controlling Database Access"

This chapter describes how to control user access to data and database resources.

Chapter 25, "Privileges, Roles, and Security Policies"

This chapter discusses security at the system and schema object levels.

Chapter 26, "Auditing"

This chapter discusses how the Oracle auditing feature tracks database activity.

Appendix A

This appendix lists all the operating system specific references within this manual.

Glossary

The glossary defines terms used in this manual.

Conventions

This section describes the conventions used in the text and code examples of this documentation set. It describes:

Conventions in Text

We use various conventions in text to help you more quickly identify special terms. The following table describes those conventions and provides examples of their use.

Convention	Meaning	Example
Bold	Bold typeface indicates terms that are defined in the text or terms that appear in a glossary, or both.	When you specify this clause, you create an index-organized table.
Italics	Italic typeface indicates book titles or emphasis.	Oracle9i Database Concepts Ensure that the recovery catalog and target database do not reside on the same disk.
`UPPERCASE monospace (fixed-width font)`	Uppercase monospace typeface indicates elements supplied by the system. Such elements include parameters, privileges, datatypes, RMAN keywords, SQL keywords, SQL*Plus or utility commands, packages and methods, as well as system-supplied column names, database objects and structures, usernames, and roles.	You can specify this clause only for a `NUMBER` column. You can back up the database by using the `BACKUP` command. Query the `TABLE_NAME` column in the `USER_TABLES` data dictionary view. Use the `DBMS_STATS`.`GENERATE_STATS` procedure.
`lowercase monospace (fixed-width font)`	Lowercase monospace typeface indicates executables, filenames, directory names, and sample user-supplied elements. Such elements include computer and database names, net service names, and connect identifiers, as well as user-supplied database objects and structures, column names, packages and classes, usernames and roles, program units, and parameter values. Note: Some programmatic elements use a mixture of UPPERCASE and lowercase. Enter these elements as shown.	Enter `sqlplus` to open SQL*Plus. The password is specified in the `orapwd` file. Back up the datafiles and control files in the `/disk1/oracle/dbs` directory. The `department_id`, `department_name`, and `location_id` columns are in the `hr.departments` table. Set the `QUERY_REWRITE_ENABLED` initialization parameter to `true.` Connect as `oe` user. The `JRepUtil` class implements these methods.
`lowercase monospace (fixed-width font) italic`	Lowercase monospace italic font represents placeholders or variables.	You can specify the `parallel_clause`. Run `U``old_release``.SQL` where `old_release` refers to the release you installed prior to upgrading.

Conventions in Code Examples

Code examples illustrate SQL, PL/SQL, SQL*Plus, or other command-line statements. They are displayed in a monospace (fixed-width) font and separated from normal text as shown in this example:

SELECT username FROM dba_users WHERE username = 'MIGRATE';

The following table describes typographic conventions used in code examples and provides examples of their use.

Convention	Meaning	Example
[ ]	Brackets enclose one or more optional items. Do not enter the brackets.	`DECIMAL (``digits` `[ ,` `precision` `])`
{ }	Braces enclose two or more items, one of which is required. Do not enter the braces.	`{ENABLE \| DISABLE}`
\|	A vertical bar represents a choice of two or more options within brackets or braces. Enter one of the options. Do not enter the vertical bar.	`{ENABLE \| DISABLE}` `[COMPRESS \| NOCOMPRESS]`
`...`	Horizontal ellipsis points indicate either: That we have omitted parts of the code that are not directly related to the example That you can repeat a portion of the code	`CREATE TABLE ... AS` `subquery``;` `SELECT` `col1``,` `col2``, ... ,` `coln` `FROM employees;`
. . .	Vertical ellipsis points indicate that we have omitted several lines of code not directly related to the example.
Other notation	You must enter symbols other than brackets, braces, vertical bars, and ellipsis points as shown.	`acctbal NUMBER(11,2);` `acct CONSTANT NUMBER(4) := 3;`
`Italics`	Italicized text indicates placeholders or variables for which you must supply particular values.	`CONNECT SYSTEM/``system_password` `DB_NAME =` `database_name`
`UPPERCASE`	Uppercase typeface indicates elements supplied by the system. We show these terms in uppercase in order to distinguish them from terms you define. Unless terms appear in brackets, enter them in the order and with the spelling shown. However, because these terms are not case sensitive, you can enter them in lowercase.	`SELECT last_name, employee_id FROM employees;` `SELECT * FROM USER_TABLES;` `DROP TABLE hr.employees;`
`lowercase`	Lowercase typeface indicates programmatic elements that you supply. For example, lowercase indicates names of tables, columns, or files. Note: Some programmatic elements use a mixture of UPPERCASE and lowercase. Enter these elements as shown.	`SELECT last_name, employee_id FROM employees;` `sqlplus hr/hr` CREATE USER mjones IDENTIFIED BY ty3MU9;

Documentation Accessibility

Oracle's goal is to make our products, services, and supporting documentation accessible to the disabled community with good usability. To that end, our documentation includes features that make information available to users of assistive technology. This documentation is available in HTML format, and contains markup to facilitate access by the disabled community. Standards will continue to evolve over time, and Oracle is actively engaged with other market-leading technology vendors to address technical obstacles so that our documentation can be accessible to all of our customers. For additional information, visit the Oracle Accessibility Program Web site at

http://www.oracle.com/accessibility/

JAWS, a Windows screen reader, may not always correctly read the code examples in this document. The conventions for writing code require that closing braces should appear on an otherwise empty line; however, JAWS may not always read a line of text that consists solely of a bracket or brace.