Each of the authors has arrived at this collaboration through a different path, but we would all like to thank the team at O'Reilly for making this book both possible and a joy to write. At the top of the list is Debby Russell, who was able to leverage her robust scalability throughout the deployment of this work (go edit that one!). Debby not only helped to create this book, but believed in the concept enough to take it on as a projectthree times over. We are lucky to have her as an editor and a friend. The rest of the O'Reilly crew also deserve a lot of credit, especially Reg Aubry, the production editor; Rob Romano, who developed the figures; and John Bickelhaupt, who wrote the index. It's incredible how they were able to strike the perfect balancealways there when we needed something, but leaving us alone when we didn't.
We're all grateful to each other. Giving birth to a book is a difficult process, but it can be harrowing when split three ways. Everyone hung in there and did their best throughout this process. We'd also like to give our sincere thanks to the technical reviewers for various editions of this book. These include Craig Shallahamer of OraPub, Domenick Ficarella, Jonathan Gennick, Jenny Gelhausen, and Dave Klein. This somewhat thankless but crucially important work really enhanced the value of the book you're reading.
Rick thanks the incredibly bright and gifted people who have shared their wealth of knowledge with him over the years, including Bruce Scott, Earl Stahl, Jerry Chang, and Jim Milbery. In particular, he thanks the two individuals who have been his technical mentors over the course of his entire career: Ed Hickland and Dave Klein, who have repeatedly spent time explaining to and discussing with him some of the broader and finer points of database technology.
For the later editions of this book Rick would also like to thank all those colleagues at Oracle who helped him in his time of need, checking on those last- minute clarifications, including John Lang, Bruce Lowenthal. Alice Watson, Dave Leroy, Sushil Kumar, Mughees Minhas, Daniela Hansell, Penny Avril, Mark Townsend, and Mark Drake. And a special thank you to Jenny Tsai-Smith, who always seemed to have the time and knowledge to clear up any Oracle database problem. And last, but certainly not least, my primary coauthor, Bob Stackowiak, who has become a good friend over our years of collaboration.
Robert acknowledges all his friends over the years around the world at Oracle Corporation, IBM, Harris Computer Systems, and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Through personal relationships and email, they have shared a lot and provided him with incredible opportunities for learning. At Oracle, he would especially like to thank members of Andy Mendelsohn's team who have always been helpful in providing material ahead of releases, including Mark Townsend, Raymond Roccaforte, George Lumpkin, Hermann Baer, the Dutch guys in California developing Oracle Warehouse Builder, and many others. Special thanks are also extended to Louis Nagode for the Discoverer image he captured on his laptop for this edition and to Lilian Hobbs for early access to Oracle Enterprise Manager 10g on a development server. Also, he'd like to thank his management for recognizing the value of such projects. including Greg Barker, Susan Cook, and Mark Salser. He'd also like to thank his customers, who have always had the most practical experience using the products and tools he has worked with and from whom he will continue to learn.
Jonathan thanks Murray Golding, an excellent friend and Oracle practitioner, for his insights and analogies; Sam Mele, a true friend, for plucking him from the "frozen North" and opening doors; and the Oracle Server Technologies members and their teams, including Juan Tellez, Ron Weiss, Juan Loaiza, and Carol Colrain for their help during his years at Oracle.