Listing all table names in a database

I know this one was already answered for MsAccess, but I am wondering for Oracle, is there a way to list them through either an sql statement or by java. Either will work for me, I looked around and found a page talknig abotu a resultset using databaseMetaData from the connection but that didn't seem to work.

Any ideas?

lots of ways, ie. select * from cat is the easiest. for more info try user_objects

That works perfect actually and I also found another one that was "select * from tab;" what are these keywords like cat and tab? This is just a knowledge question more than I really need to know... because as long as it keeps working i am happy

They're are all kinds of tables and views that Oracle uses to store your objects. Some you can see, some only the system user can see.

tab and cat are some easy synonyms that relate to the base system tables in Oracle. user_objects will show just your objects whilst dba_tables and dba_objects will show all tables and objects respectively (providing the dba views have been installed and you have access to view them).