Amazon.co.uk
OCP: Oracle8i DBA SQL and PL/SQL Study Guide focuses first on the SQL querying language and then on Oracle's own implementation, PL/SQL, bringing in SQL*Plus, an Oracle tool for interaction with a database. Each chapter starts with a list of objectives and ends with a brief summary, a list of the terms that should have been absorbed followed by 20 multiple choice questions and answers. There is also a practice exam at the end of the book. The CD-ROM contains a bank of questions that includes those from the book and a further series of questions on electronic flashcards that run on a PC or a Palm device. The text of the book is also present in Adobe Acrobat format.
An instance early in the book of a reference to the wrong figure doesn't build confidence and later on a table is split between two pages so that you have to flick back and forth to make sense of it; but in the main the layout is reasonable.
The questions and sample exam paper are useful for getting the feel of what you will face in your attempt to reach the 72 per cent pass mark. Unfortunately there is nothing inspirational about this study guide, just of a lot of hard slog--but whoever said that passing exams was easy? --Mark Whitehorn
