Using Oracle 9i Table Compression For Star Schemas

Towards the end of last year, I came across an article on OTN about table compression, a new feature in Oracle 9i. As the article explains, table compression in Oracle9i can significantly accelerate query performance, especially in star schemas.

"Table Compression, a feature introduced in Oracle9i Database Rel 2, can compress entire tables, table partitions, and materialized views. It will drastically reduce the disk space and buffer cache requirements, and in many cases improve query performance, especially on I/O bound systems. Compression is targeted at decision support and OLAP applications, but others may experience great benefits as well."

The case study, on OTN's Technical Articles section, also points to an Oracle Technical White paper which gives a bit more background on table compression. Interesting.