Advanced Oracle PL/SQL Programming with Packages

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2. Best Practices for Packages

Contents:
Starting With Packages
Using Effective Coding Style for Packages
Selecting Package Names
Organizing Package Source Code
Constructing the Optimal Interface to Your Package
Building Flexibility Into Your Packages
Building Windows Into Your Packages
Overloading for Smart Packages
Modularizing for Maintainable Packages
Hiding Package Data
Simultaneous Construction of Multiple Packages

Packages are the most important construct in PL/SQL for building reusable code and plug-and-play components, and for employing object-oriented design techniques. As you become more comfortable with the language, you will find more of your time spent inside packages -- and using programs from packages built by other developers. This may be a very pleasant and rewarding experience -- if the packages are designed and implemented properly. If, on the other hand, you decide to build your packages in the same helter-skelter method (or lack thereof) I run into way too often, life out there in front of the monitor may get pretty miserable.

This chapter discusses some of the most important "best practices" for package construction and goes into detail on an effective coding style for packages. If you follow the ideas presented below, you have a very good chance of writing packages that are readable, maintainable, and enhanceable. It is also much more likely that other developers will find your packages usable and useful. You will find additional explanation regarding these practices, along with examples of the application of these practices, in the sections covering specific PL/Vision packages.

The following list offers a summary of the best practices for packages covered in this chapter:

2.1 Starting With Packages

Late in July 1996, I received this note from one of my technical reviewers, John M. Beresniewicz:

I've built half a dozen pretty hefty packages, and still I find myself wondering at the start of implementing some new functionality: how should I do this? I think packages are intimidating developers out there (maybe I'm wrong) and part of the reason may be that it is very hard to decide what to put where and why. It seems like most of my packages start with an idea that becomes a JMB_procname stored procedure. (All initial experiments are named with the prefix JMB_ to let me know they are part of my playground.) As soon as the procedure becomes more than 100 lines long or contains code duplication or a related but different procedure suggests itself or needs to stash some persistent data, a package is magically born.

Once spawned, packages often have a life of their own, they grow and mature and sometimes die or are subsumed by larger packages. I don't know if there is an idea here, but something that makes deciding what and how to start a package may help developers... I suppose the whole book is just that in a sense.

There is definitely an idea in there, but my perspective is somewhat simpler than what John probably had in mind: Get out of the habit of building standalone procedures and functions. Instead, start with a package! It is certainly the case that most complex programs eventually mutate into or are absorbed by packages. There is nothing wrong with that evolutionary process. You can, however, save yourself some trouble by creating a package to hold that seemingly simple and lonely procedure or function.

If you start with a package, several benefits accrue:

You will never regret the minuscule amount of extra time required to encapsulate your standalone programs inside a package.


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