Pythian Group

Today I’ve read the following email on the mailing list of Sydney Oracle Meetup. I thought that this question is asked many times in attempt to find a silver bullet to learning Oracle so I wanted to publish my reply here on the blog, especially, that I’m a firm believer in one silver bullet that exists — there are no silver bullets.

Hi everybody,

My name is Sebastian and I’m new in the group. Yesterday I arrived late because I had a problem at work at the very last minute. However I found the meeting super interesting.

I’d like to see if someone could give me some piece of advise… I have ZERO experience with Oracle. I’m a Software Engineer and I’ve been working for more than 7 years in development (open source technologies basically). When it comes to DBs, I have some good knowledge about MySQL, PostgreSQL and SQL Server (the only MS product I like). As OS, at the moment I’m working with Linux Ubuntu 9.04.
So, my question is what would be the best way to start working with / studying Oracle?? What can I install to actually have the DBMS running in my laptop and start writing PL/SQL?? Oracle XE??

Then, do you consider I can get any change of getting a internship position (I don’t have much free time) or what would be the best way to get started in this field? I see that ALL the positions require a lot of experience.

Sorry for writing to the whole list about a personal issue. Feel free to write me to my personal email address and thanks everybody.

I look forward to seeing you in the next meet up.

Kind Regards,
Sebastian

Sebastian,

If there is a silver bullet on how to get into new technology field than I don’t know about it. It all depends on personality and what works for you. Read the rest of this entry . . .