Chapter 3. Fundamentals of PL/SQL

PL/SQL, or Procedural Language SQL, is Oracle9i's extension to the SQL language. PL/SQL gives SQL many common programming features such as record processing, various looping syntax, data manipulation/calculation capabilities, and as exception handling. The focus of this chapter is to learn and understand the basic constructs and functionality of PL/SQL.

This chapter teaches you the following:

• What is PL/SQL?

• The basic PL/SQL syntax

• Various programming constructs such as IF/THEN/ELSE and Looping

• PL/SQL handles error conditions