15.10 Go Forth and Modularize!

As the PL/SQL language and Oracle tools mature, you will find that you are being asked to implement increasingly complex applications with this technology. To be quite frank, you don't have much of a chance of success in implementing such large-scale projects without an intimate familiarity with the modularization techniques available in PL/SQL.

While this book could not possibly provide a full treatment of modularization in PL/SQL, it should give you some solid pointers and a foundation from which to work. There is still much more for you to learn -- the full capabilities of packages, the awesome range of package extensions Oracle Corporation now provides with the tools and database, and the various options for code reusability -- and more.

Behind all of that technology, however, you must develop an instinct, a sixth sense, for modularization. Develop a deep and abiding allergy to code redundancy and the hardcoding of values and formulas. Apply a fanatic's devotion to the modular construction of true black boxes which easily plug-and-play in and across applications.

You will find yourself spending more time in the design phase and less time in debug mode. Your programs will be more readable and maintainable. They will stand as elegant testimonies to your intellectual integrity. You will be the most popular kid in your class and ... but enough already. I am sure you are properly motivated.

Go forth and modularize!