The “best” tool
I had a question the other day that constantly pops up on my feed whether it’s on social media or people asking Q&A at a conference etc. And that...
2026-07-15 (first published: 2026-07-13)
202 reads
Tip: Expanding a SQL statement
In all recent versions of the database you can call DBMS_UTILITY.EXPAND_SQL_TEXT to get the “true” version of a SQL that the database will run. It takes your SQL as...
2026-07-03 (first published: 2026-07-02)
178 reads
The Goldilocks problem – Materialized Views
I’m sure you’ve all heard the tale of Goldilocks and the Three Bears, but I’d like to apply the Goldilocks principle to a database object-namely, a materialized view. You...
2026-06-30
239 reads
Blue Sky Programming – The Optimism Trap
Many years ago, before I joined Oracle, I was working on a major modernisation project. We were replacing an existing non-Oracle system with an entirely new Oracle database application...
2026-06-27 (first published: 2026-06-26)
183 reads
Keeping your tech ego in check
In my usual twitter doom scrolling, I came across this post the other day Now it’s pretty obvious to me that this is one of the standard “engagement bait”...
2026-06-07
154 reads
First dabblings with APEXlang
Obviously there are plenty of folks in the Oracle APEX team with waaaayy more experience in APEXlang than I have, so this isn’t an in-depth expose into all of...
2026-05-27
120 reads
Vanishing objects; hello ORA-08103
In the previous post we saw that even though we had done an exchange partition mid-flights through a query execution, the query kept on running to successful completion. The...
2026-05-13
253 reads
A very robust query
Some times I’m blown away by how the database will try very hard to save you from yourself :-). Consider the following example: I’ve got a table called T....
2026-05-12
220 reads
The secret APEX performance hack
Here’s a little secret APEX performance hack if you are running on the Autonomous database. As background, I’m running an Autonomous database with six CPUs and a terabyte of...
2026-05-08
169 reads
Signal to noise ratio – the AWR trap
Its never been easier to analyze an AWR report. With our new oracle skills repository, your favourite agent can do a respectable job giving some insights into the AWR...
2026-05-06
163 reads
Blogs
T-SQLTuesday 204: Are blogs still relevant?
This month’s blogging party is hosted by Jeff Ianucci – his challenge is to...
Are Blogs Still Relevant? I Think They Still Are.
As for me, I'll keep writing whenever time permits. I don't expect every post...
Reading Blogs: T-SQL Tuesday #204
By Steve Jones
This is an interesting invitation this month. Jeff Ianucci is a new host, and...
Forums
Pay for Performance
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Pay for Performance, which is...
Switching Schemas I
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Switching Schemas I
Enforcing Unique Customer Emails When Duplicates Already Exist
Comments posted to this topic are about the item Enforcing Unique Customer Emails When...
Question of the Day
Switching Schemas I
I run this query:
SELECT s.name AS schemaname , o.name AS objectname FROM sys.objects o INNER JOIN sys.schemas s ON s.schema_id = o.schema_id WHERE o.name = 'Beer'I get one row back for an object named dbo.beer. There is an ETL schema and both of these are nonpartitioned tables. I run this code:
ALTER TABLE dbo.beer switch TO etl.beerWhat happens? See possible answers