Database Partitioning

Available partitioning types in Oracle database are as under:

Range partitioning

Hash partitioning

Composite partitioning

List partitioning

Interval partitioning

System partitioning

Reference partitioning

Some of the advantages offered:

Partitions can be stored in different tablespaces.

Partitions can be added/ removed while users are working. DBAs can perform maintenance without having to bring down an entire table (import/ export/ load/ etc).

Data can be selected from targeted partitions without having to scan all partitions for rows (partition pruning). The SQL optimizer will bypass partitions that don't contain data pertinent to the query being solved.

Database partitioning involves dividing logical database into distinct independent units to improve its performance, manageability and availability.

Partitioning is only available with Oracle Enterprise Edition as a cost option (you need to buy licenses before you can use it).