Like the bestselling Oracle PL/SQL Programming, also written by database expert Steven Feuerstein, 'MySQL Stored Procedure Programming' covers a lot of ground. The book starts with a thorough introduction to stored procedures programming and functions, covering the fundamentals of data types, operators, and using SQL in stored procedures. You'll learn how to build and maintain stored programs - covering transactions, stored functions, and triggers - and how to call and use MySQL- based stored procedures in a variety of languages, including PHP, Perl, Python, .NET, and Java. The book also includes advanced material that describes what you need to know to write high-quality, performance-oriented programs with an emphasis on tuning and best practices.