Oracle PL/SQL- Advantages and Comparison over other languages

PL/SQL i.e Procedural Language/Structured Query Language is an extension to SQL. It contains design features of programming languages and helps in execution of procedural logics on databases. It involves procedural language elements like loops and conditions.

PL/SQL is way better than other languages as it contains modular code blocks and is robust in terms of error handling. The code of PL/SQL is also stored directly in Oracle Database. Along with this, PL/SQL and SQL both run in same server processes, at run-time. It is well-known as a safe functionality tool that effectively helps in controlling, manipulating, restricting illegal access and validating the data from the database.

Advantages of PL/SQL:

Reduction in Network Traffic: It is one of the greatest advantages of PL/SQL, as it executes entire block of Oracle engine altogether; hence, bringing down the network traffic issues.

Error Handling: While execution of a PL/SQL program, it effectively handles all the errors and gives user-friendly error messages to resolve the issues.

Application Portability: Applications written in PL/SQL contain portability feature and can be easily transferred into any Operating System. PL/SQL program runs independently on any computer.

Procedural Language Capability: PL/SQL comprises of conditional checking tools or the procedural language constructs like conditional statements, looping, and branching.

Block Structures: PL/SQL contains code blocks that can be nested into each other. Every block forms a logical module that can be stored in database and can be reused later.

Modules of PL/SQL Codes:

PL/SQL codes are broadly divided into four categories mentioned below:

• Procedure: It is a series of statements that accept and/or return zero or more variables.

• Function: It is a series of statements that accept zero or more variables, but return only one value.

• Package: It is a collection of procedures & functions which is further divided into two parts; a list containing available procedures & functions and body that contains the real code of functions & procedures.

• Trigger: It gets executed whenever a triggering event occurs. These events include select, update, delete or insert.

PL/SQL Compared to Other Languages:

Gaining knowledge about PL/SQL can help the aspirants to become expert Database Administrators. A formal training can prove helpful in learning about Explicit Cursors, Writing Control Structures, Creating Stored Procedures & Functions and much more.