This book is focused on the subject of Oracle performance firefighting. But some performance firefighting skills require a separate book or technical paper to adequately cover the topic.

SQL tuning is a unique and highly prized skill. We all have our own SQL tuning guru we turn to when we need help.4 In this book, I will show you how to diagnose very precisely and with full confidence which SQL statements need our attention. However, I will not cover how to tune the SQL. For that information, you can refer to any of the many resources devoted to SQL tuning.

Oracle forecasting/predictive analysis is my other area of expertise. In fact, I wrote the first book on the subject entitled, Forecasting Oracle Performance. But this topic is clearly not the focus of this book. However, I will take some key concepts from forecasting, creating a bridge between firefighting and forecasting. This bridge will allow you to naturally switch between these subject areas and also help in communicating the performance issues and possible solutions.