Introduction to Oracle PL/SQL

About PL/SQL

About PL/SQL :

 

• Stands for “Procedural Language extension to SQL” 

• Is Oracle Corporation’s standard data access language for relational databases 

• Seamlessly integrates procedural constructs with SQL

         

Benefits of PL/SQL :

1.   Integration of procedural constructs with SQL  
2.  Improved performance
     --- ·       Without PL/SQL, you would not be able to logically combine SQL statements as one unit.

3. Modularized program development
4.    Integration with Oracle tools 
5.     Portability 
6. Exception handling

Block Types :

    There are three types of blocks that make up a PL/SQL program:
          • Anonymous blocks
          • Procedures
          • Functions

PL/SQL Block Structure :

• DECLARE (optional) – Variables, cursors, user-defined exceptions

• BEGIN (mandatory) – SQL statements – PL/SQL statements

• EXCEPTION (optional) – Actions to perform when exceptions occur

• END; (mandatory)