Preface

This guide explains basic concepts behind development with Oracle Database Express Edition (Oracle Database XE) and provides examples on how to use basic language features of SQL and PL/SQL. This guide is intended to be a very basic introduction to development and references are provided in the text to detailed information about subjects.

This section contains the following topics:

Documentation Topics
Audience
Documentation Accessibility
Related Documentation
Conventions

Documentation Topics

This guide contains the following topics:

Title	Description
Overview of Development	Provides an overview of application development with Oracle Database Express Edition.
Managing Database Objects	Discusses creating and managing database objects in your schema, plus design considerations when developing applications with the Oracle Database XE. Also discusses the datatypes used with database objects in Oracle Database XE.
Using SQL	Describes how to use SQL with Oracle Database XE, including how to retrieve and manipulate data, use SQL functions, and create database objects.
Using PL/SQL	Describes the PL/SQL language, which can be used to develop applications for use with Oracle Database XE.
Using Procedures, Functions, and Packages	Describes how to develop procedures, functions, and packages with PL/SQL for use with Oracle Database XE.
Using Triggers	Discusses the development of triggers with PL/SQL code and the use of database triggers with Oracle Database XE.
Working in a Global Environment	Discusses how to develop applications in a globalization support environment, providing information for SQL and PL/SQL Unicode programming in a global environment.
Using SQL Command Line	Provides an introduction to SQL Command Line (SQL*Plus), an interactive and batch command-line query tool that is installed with Oracle Database XE.
Reserved Words	Lists the Oracle Database XE SQL and PL/SQL reserved words and keywords.
Using a PL/SQL Procedure With PHP	Provides an example of the use of a PL/SQL procedure with PHP.
Using a PL/SQL Procedure With JDBC	Rrovides an example of the use of a PL/SQL procedure with Java and JDBC.

Audience

This guide is intended for anyone interested in learning about the Oracle Database Express Edition development environment.It is primarily an introduction to application development for beginning developers.

To use this guide, you need to have a general understanding of relational database concepts as well as an understanding of the operating system environment under which you are running the Oracle Database XE.

Documentation Accessibility

Our goal is to make Oracle products, services, and supporting documentation accessible, with good usability, to the disabled community. 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. Accessibility 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 more information, visit the Oracle Accessibility Program Web site at

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

Accessibility of Code Examples in Documentation

Screen readers 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, some screen readers may not always read a line of text that consists solely of a bracket or brace.

Accessibility of Links to External Web Sites in Documentation

This documentation may contain links to Web sites of other companies or organizations that Oracle does not own or control. Oracle neither evaluates nor makes any representations regarding the accessibility of these Web sites.

Conventions

The following text conventions are used in this document:

Convention	Meaning
boldface	Boldface type indicates graphical user interface elements associated with an action, or terms defined in text or the glossary.
italic	Italic type indicates book titles, emphasis, or placeholder variables for which you supply particular values.
`monospace`	Monospace type indicates commands within a paragraph, URLs, code in examples, text that appears on the screen, or text that you enter.

Preface

Documentation Topics

Audience

Documentation Accessibility

Related Documentation

Conventions