Ryan Stephens

For more than 10 years, the authors have studied, applied, and documented the SQL stan- dard and its application to critical database systems in this book. Ryan Stephens and Ron Plew are entrepreneurs, speakers, and cofounders of Perpetual Technologies, Inc. (PTI), a fast-growing IT management and consulting firm. PTI specializes in database technologies, primarily Oracle and SQL servers running on all UNIX, Linux, and Microsoft platforms. Starting out as data analysts and database administrators, Ryan and Ron now lead a team of impressive technical subject matter experts who manage data- bases for clients worldwide. They authored and taught database courses for Indiana University-Purdue University in Indianapolis for five years and have authored more than a dozen books on Oracle, SQL, database design, and high availability of critical systems. Arie D. Jones is the principal technology manager for Perpetual Technologies, Inc. (PTI) in Indianapolis, Indiana. Arie leads PTI’s team of experts in planning, design, development, deployment, and management of database environments and applications to achieve the best combination of tools and services for each client. He is a regular speaker at technical events and has authored several books and articles pertaining to database-related topics.