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Question and Answer

Tom Kyte

Thanks for the question, Andrew.

Asked: June 07, 2012 - 7:52 am UTC

Last updated: June 09, 2012 - 1:59 pm UTC

Version: 11.2.0

Viewed 1000+ times

You Asked

Is this really true, are they really giving away your book, and is it OK with you?

http://allthingsoracle.com/free-ebook-expert-oracle-database-architecture/?goback=.gde_146455_member_109782483

and Tom said...

Yes, I even 'tweeted' this a while ago:

https://twitter.com/OracleAskTom/status/199117482185867264

You see, it is free to you - but they (Red Gate) are paying for it. So, it is not "free from the publisher" but rather free from someone that paid the publisher an amount of money so they can give it away.

Kudos to Red Gate for making it available.


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Comments

Talk about useful

Chuck, June 07, 2012 - 8:13 am UTC

Thanks Tom and Red Gate.

Great, but I wonder what's in it for Red Gate..

Hoek, June 07, 2012 - 9:14 am UTC

Ofcourse I downloaded the Ebook as well.
Thanks to you and Red Gate, Tom!

Now I'm not a commercial kind of guy, so I wonder what the benefit will be for Red Gate?
What will be their ROI?
Do you get some fee per download?
I checked their site, but (ofcourse) didn't find anything comprehensive from that point of view.

Any idea if, and if so, when we may download Jonathan Lewis'Oracle Core: Essential Internals for DBAs and Developers as well? ;)

Regards,
Martijn
Tom Kyte
June 07, 2012 - 10:27 am UTC

Publicity would be my guess.

they paid a certain amount of money in order to be able to give the e-book away for a certain period of time.

I'll be doing a web seminar with them later this month as well.

http://allthingsoracle.com/tom-kyte-evil-implicit-conversions-sql-skullduggery/

Classic topics

Hoek, June 08, 2012 - 5:31 am UTC

Do you have Toon Koppelaars ( http://harmfultriggers.blogspot.nl/2011/11/triggers-considered-harmful-considered.html ) as a side-kick for this part of your webinar:

* Triggers - much trickery is possible via triggers, and much of it causes pain, confusion and unexpected side effects

?

Just kidding, I'll register anyway ;-)

Regards,
Martijn
;-)


Tom Kyte
June 08, 2012 - 7:56 am UTC

:) I've seen his presentation in person and agree with it 100%


He demonstrates how complex it is to generate transactionally correct triggers to enforce integrity constraints - and suggests to not leave that up to mere mortals, but to software instead. And I concur.


It is possible to write well formed, correct triggers. It just takes a good knowledge of how the database actually works.

And triggers to enforce data 'correctness' do not have side effects - they just validate data (they do not for example write to the :NEW record - a scary proposition if you ask me, they do not create data automagically, they just check stuff)

Trouble with triggers

Doug, June 08, 2012 - 6:35 pm UTC


Trouble with triggers - article by Tom Kyte

http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/issue-archive/2008/08-sep/o58asktom-101055.html

This is great!

Al Ricafort, June 08, 2012 - 9:53 pm UTC

I almost pass up this topic. It's a good thing my curiosity got the better of me. Otherwise, I would have probaby missed this opportunity.

A pdf version?

Al Ricafort, June 08, 2012 - 10:03 pm UTC

Ok, I just downloaded it and they have 3 formats and one of them is in PDF. Now, did they realize that with a PDF format your book can be all over the internet regardless this is a limited offer or not?

And a question for you Tom. I remember reading probably in this site where one asked you why not publish your book in soft copy. And you said something like you don't want your book to be illegaly downloaded.

So why the change of mind?
Tom Kyte
June 09, 2012 - 6:40 am UTC

It was always the publishers decision. I've never had any control over it.

RE: What's in it for RedGate

Duke Ganote, June 09, 2012 - 1:37 pm UTC

I hope RedGate is gaining some good recognition in the Oracle world with this offer. RedGate already sponsors such great sites as simple-talk.com for the SQL Server world.

Tom Kyte's even been "Geek of the Week" on Simple-Talk!
http://www.simple-talk.com/opinion/geek-of-the-week/tom-kyte-geek-of-the-week/

and Tim Gorman's been mentioned
http://www.simple-talk.com/opinion/opinion-pieces/bad-carma/

So, while I've never used RedGate tools before, they seem to know what's good, so I'm inclined to give them a serious evaluation when tool selection time comes around. Just my opinion.
Tom Kyte
June 09, 2012 - 1:59 pm UTC


book

A reader, June 10, 2012 - 9:12 am UTC


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