RE: What's Oracle Trying to Hide ???

because the list is so slow today, I'll add my response to it... 

I agree with Jared...  but have one other thing to mention. 

Working for a company that continually delves into the internal structures and workings of Oracle I learned to respect how it works, and what it does.  Internally oracle does some pretty strange things with it's transactions (when you apply DDL, what happens to the underlying $ and # tables), and especially on how it stores different objects in the database (like Nested tables and IOT's.) Understanding these new objects and they way that they work within oracle... is very strange... and I'm not sure if it is all implemented with performance/ease of use in mind. 

Now don't get me wrong... I love Oracle...  but if we ALL really knew how things worked internally... I think people would not be so ready to use the new functionality. 

I think one of the reasons they 'hide' and wrap these procedures is so we don't know how it works, and makes it more 'magical.'

And yes... undoc'd procedures are useful... and fun too!  

Nick

-----Original Message-----
From: Jared.Still_at_radisys.com [mailto:Jared.Still_at_radisys.com] Sent: Wednesday, December 26, 2001 2:15 PM To: Multiple recipients of list ORACLE-L Subject: Re: What's Oracle Trying to Hide ???

I suspect that they are trying to prevent headaches by hiding 'features' that are intended for internal use only.

Sometimes a "DBA" will get hold of some undocumented feature and use it just because it's there, sometimes causing database problems in the process.

This type of behavior is common in the PC world.  Just take a look at PC magazine and Windoze websites and you will find all kinds of "tips" and "tricks" that add no value to the system and usually eat up resources.

It seems that this mentality carries over from the Windoze world to those that are new with Oracle, and the "DBA" starts twisting and turning every knob available.

Kind of messes things up for times when one of those undoc features might be useful.

This may be pure speculation on my part , but it's my story, and I'm sticking to it.

Jared

                                                                                                                  


                    "Orr, Steve"                                                                                  

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                    .com>                cc:                                                                      

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                    12/26/01 11:30                                                                                

                    AM                                                                                            

                    Please respond                                                                                

                    to ORACLE-L                                                                                   

                                                                                                                  
                                                                                                                  

Here's a paste from the $ORACLE_HOME/rdbms/admin/dbmsutil.sql script: Rem         dbms_system           - database system level commands (moved to

Rem                                 prvtutil.sql for more obscurity)

Not only do they want to "obscure" the dbms_system package but I can't find the prvtutil.sql script. Where is this stuff and why do they want to hide it? Any ideas?

...Just found the ./rdbms/admin/prvtutil.plb file and now I'm wishing I could un-"wrap" this "present" on boxing day!

Eschew Obfuscation,
Steve Orr
Skiing Bridger Bowl

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