It discusses procedures, functions, forward declarations, actual versus formal parameters, positional and named notation, parameter modes, parameter default values, aliasing, overloading, and recursion. Once written, your general-purpose package is compiled, then stored in an Oracle database, where its contents can be shared by many applications. You learn how to define object types and manipulate objects. The sample programs illustrate important concepts and features. An ellipsis shows that statements or clauses irrelevant to the discussion were left out.
Lower case denotes user-defined items such as variables, parameters, and exceptions.
Terms being defined for the first time, words being emphasized, error messages, and book titles are italicized . A vertical bar separates alternatives within brackets or braces. An ellipsis shows that the preceding syntactic element can be repeated. Lower case denotes a syntactic element for which you must substitute a literal, identifier, or construct, whichever is appropriate. Sample Database Tables Most programming examples in this guide use two sample database tables named dept and emp .