how do I read explain plan on multi-levels

[dharma]

I have this plan down below.
Is this traverse correct for reading the plan. Have this doubt because 6,7 and 12 are at the same level. Do I have to move to 6 after 12 is done? or the one below is right.

15
16
14
13
12
11
10
9
8
lower part of View complete
6
7
5
4
3
2
upper part of view complete
1
0

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
| Id  | Operation                    |  Name                 | Rows  | Bytes |TempSpc|
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
|   0 | SELECT STATEMENT             |                       |   303 | 38178 |       |
|*  1 |  HASH JOIN                   |                       |   303 | 38178 |       |
|*  2 |   VIEW                       |                       |  4414 |   288K|       |
|   3 |    SORT ORDER BY             |                       |  4414 |   228K|       |
|   4 |     WINDOW SORT              |                       |  4414 |   228K|       |
|*  5 |      HASH JOIN               |                       |  4414 |   228K|       |
|*  6 |       TABLE ACCESS FULL      | APP_LIC_APPLICATIONS  | 42583 |   914K|       |
|*  7 |       TABLE ACCESS FULL      | APP_APPN_REQS         |  2135K|    63M|       |
|*  8 |   VIEW                       |                       |   391K|    22M|       |
|*  9 |    WINDOW SORT PUSHED RANK   |                       |   391K|    21M|    63M|
|  10 |     VIEW                     |                       |       |       |       |
|* 11 |      WINDOW CHILD PUSHED RANK|                       |   391K|    21M|       |
|  12 |       VIEW                   |                       |   391K|    21M|       |
|  13 |        SORT UNIQUE           |                       |   391K|    17M|    44M|
|* 14 |         HASH JOIN            |                       |   391K|    17M|       |
|* 15 |          INDEX FAST FULL SCAN| ELEC_PK_PRIM          | 18859 |   239K|       |
|* 16 |          TABLE ACCESS FULL   | APP_APPN_REQS         | 15878 |   527K|       |
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Thanks,
-dharma

[dharma]

I checked out the Perf Tuning guide and Metalink docs too, I still couldnt get a grasp of traversing on this query. Any help is really appreciated.

Thanks,
-dharma.

[slimdave]

Your traverse of the plan is correct ... start at the "leaves" and work in till you get to a join between two paths.

So, follow from 7 -> 2, and from 15/16 -> 8, then 1 (hash join) is based on the result sets at 2 and 8.

[dharma]

Thanks Dave.
-dharma