Introduction to Transactions in Databases

A transaction is a logical, atomic unit of work that contains one or more SQL statements.

A transaction groups SQL statements so that they are either all committed, which means they are applied to the database, or all rolled back, which means they are undone from the database. Oracle Database assigns every transaction a unique identifier called a transaction ID.

All Oracle transactions obey the basic properties of a database transaction, known as ACID properties. ACID is an acronym for the following:

Atomicity

All tasks of a transaction are performed or none of them are. There are no partial transactions. For example, if a transaction starts updating 100 rows, but the system fails after 20 updates, then the database rolls back the changes to these 20 rows.

Consistency

The transaction takes the database from one consistent state to another consistent state. For example, in a banking transaction that debits a savings account and credits a checking account, a failure must not cause the database to credit only one account, which would lead to inconsistent data.

Isolation

The effect of a transaction is not visible to other transactions until the transaction is committed. For example, one user updating the hr.employees table does not see the uncommitted changes to employees made concurrently by another user. Thus, it appears to users as if transactions are executing serially.

Durability

Changes made by committed transactions are permanent. After a transaction completes, the database ensures through its recovery mechanisms that changes from the transaction are not lost.

The use of transactions is one of the most important ways that a database management system differs from a file system.

Credits: Oracle documentation.

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