Thursday, February 23, 2012

Oracle APEX 4.1.1 patch set released on OTN

Oracle Application Express (APEX) latest patch has been released on OTN and is available for download here. This release contains fixes to issues uncovered by our customers (thanks so much for reporting) and our numerous internal deployments. Specifically 221 bugs were fixed; and now this is behind us our development team has clear focus on APEX 4.2.

In addition to the bug fixes we also introduced a new theme and schema provisioning enhancements. The new theme, theme 24, is our best HTML5, CSS3 we have delivered as part of core product to date. It has a blue look and is appealing to my eye. For those who want to craft new themes we recommend starting with theme 24 as a template. The provisioning enhancements are in support of our public cloud initiative documented on http://cloud.oracle.com.

For those who have not yet upgraded to APEX 4.1, now that we have our 4.1.1 patch its likely to be a good time. With 4.1.1 out many may be wondering what's next. Our initial focus is on completing significant mobile work started in our 4.1 release and ensuring that APEX can properly support our next database release; 12c. The "c" is for cloud. You can see our statement of direction here, and yes we are likely to tweak it over time. We never publish dates of releases, but we are planning (not a commitment) to release APEX 4.2 in the database 12c timeframe, thus supporting 12c.

For those interested in all things APEX I strongly encourage you to attend Kscope12, the APEX community will be out in force as will the APEX development team. I will be speaking on Sunday about APEX, 12c, SQL Developer, cloud etc.

Let us know if APEX 4.1.1 is allowing you to unleash your full database centric RAD web development vision, and if not let us know what we need to do in APEX 4.2 to make it better. Happy coding!

Thursday, February 9, 2012

SQL Developer 3.1 released

After lots of hard work we have a new SQL Developer 3.1 release is now available for download here. Even though its a dot release we have lots of new features. Here are the highlights:

DBA Utilities

Release 3.1 continues to expand on SQL Developer's DBA functionality. RMAN, Oracle Recovery Manager, is now part of the DBA navigator. An easy to use wizard takes you through the scheduling of a full database backup. Backups can be stored to disk, tape or a combination. RMAN scripts are generated to restore or recover a whole database, tablespaces, datafiles and archived logs. Reports are available to manage backup jobs, backup sets, image copies and RMAN settings.

Data Pump

To enable very high speed movement of data and metadata from one database to another, SQL Developer has added the Oracle Data Pump technology. Use SQL Developer's Data Pump UI to import and export your Database, Tablespaces, Schemas, and Tables. Select the option to import and export just the DDL, Data or both. Data Pump also offers scheduling capabilities.

Database Diff

Completely redesigned, DB Diff now provides a more reliable comparison and difference management support of your DDL. Select what to include in your DDL Generation and select from various comparison options such as match constraints by name or by definition. Objects can be further filtered. Scripts are generated to synchronize the source and target destinations.

Database Copy

Database Copy is redesigned to enhance performance and offer more flexibility. Choose from various copy options: copy objects, copy a schema or consolidate multiple schemas into one, copy tablespaces, copy DDL, data or both. Further refine your copy by using the filtering capability.

Migrations

Migrations in 3.1 include enhancements to Teradata and Sybase. Teradata support has expanded to include a SQL Translator, Enterprise Capture and Offline Migration. Sybase now offers TSQL Translation with support for outer join syntax including legacy outer join syntax and triggers.

PDF Reports

The Reports dialog is enhanced for ease of use and flexibility to create or update a report. The PDF feature allows the user to change and save their PDF options for a specific report in the Reports Navigator. Customize the visual layout and apply security with password protected encryption to your PDF Reports.