Our look is the result of reader comments, our own experimentation, and feedback from distribution channels. Distinctive covers complement our distinctive approach to technical topics, breathing personality and life into potentially dry subjects.

The animals on the cover of Perl for Oracle DBAs are thread-winged lacewings. Lacewings can be found all over the world, primarily in warmer climates. They live mostly in sheltered, sandy areas such as wooded dunes, forest floors, and riverbanks, until they reach adult form, at which time their wings enable them to roam more freely.

In their larvae state, lacewings prey voraciously on such unsuspecting victims as aphids, mites, and scale insects. They hide under pieces of wood or debris, wait for insects to pass, then attack with their pincer-like mandibles.

Lacewings undergo full metamorphosis throughout their lives. The adult form is characterized by two sets of wings, a long, slender abdomen, and clubbed antennae. Lacewings are one type of many nerve-winged insects because of the intricate pattern of lines (nerves) running through their transparent wings.

Darren Kelly was the production editor for Perl for Oracle DBAs. Nancy Crumpton provided production services and wrote the index. Jan Fehler was the copyeditor. Tatiana Apandi Diaz and Claire Cloutier provided quality control.

Emma Colby designed the cover of this book, based on a series design by Edie Freedman. The cover image is a 19th-century engraving from The Riverside Natural History: Volume 2. Emma Colby produced the cover layout with QuarkXPress 4.1 using Adobe's ITC Garamond font.

David Futato designed the interior layout. This book was converted to FrameMaker 5.5.6 with a format conversion tool created by Erik Ray, Jason McIntosh, Neil Walls, and Mike Sierra that uses Perl and XML technologies. The text font is Linotype Birka; the heading font is Adobe Myriad Condensed; and the code font is LucasFont's TheSans Mono Condensed. The illustrations that appear in the book were produced by Robert Romano and Jessamyn Read using Macromedia FreeHand 9 and Adobe Photoshop 6. The tip and warning icons were drawn by Christopher Bing. This colophon was written by Linley Dolby.

The online edition of this book was created by the Safari production group (John Chodacki, Becki Maisch, and Madeleine Newell) using a set of Frame-to-XML conversion and cleanup tools written and maintained by Erik Ray, Benn Salter, John Chodacki, and Jeff Liggett.