Packaging summary

Which method of packaging our functions is the best?

• Standalone functions: These are great for developing and testing algorithms or creating something one off or standalone that can be given to others. But they could become unwieldy, if they grow too many interdependencies.

• Packages: These allow for shared package variables, which are related to some logical function, but are more loosely coupled in relation to each other or to the data stored in the package.

• Types: These allow for the consistent and homogeneous packaging of all the methods of an object with its persistent data. Methods in an object type tend to be tightly coupled with the object data as they provide the property inspectors and manipulators for them.

Programming with object types is clean and logical. While within Oracle it is possible to store any object type in a database table (persisting it across database sessions), storage of the T_GEOMETRY type is not recommended for the simple reason that it is presented...