Flashback, LogMiner and The Light Fantastic…

I put an article about Flashback and LogMiner new stuff live the other day, but forgot to put a post here. Better late than never. I feel a bit cheap and dirty admitting this, but I’m starting to like the web based Enterprise Manager. 🙂

The new LogMiner interface is really easy to use, and the integration with Flashback Transaction is right on the money. I guess LogMiner isn’t the sexiest of features, and I’ve had very little cause to use it since I first tried it out in 8i, but at least now it’s a no-brainer in terms of ease of use.

On a separate note, I finished The Light Fantastic last night. It seemed marginally more serious than the first book, but was still very funny. The introduction of character Cohen was very cool. Had me in stitches. I adopted a Sean Connery accent (in my head) for most of his dialog. Off to the book shop on the way home to buy the next couple…

Cheers

Tim…

SQL Performance Analyzer…

In addition to my reading exploits, I also had a trot through the SQL Performance Analyzer last night. It all looks pretty neat.

When I was using Database Replay I didn’t feel like the Enterprise Manager screens were easier to use than the PL/SQL APIs. They didn’t exactly feel like they added any value I guess. Part of that may have been because you still had to jump out to the command line to start the replay clients. Perhaps I was just being a bit fussy…

In contrast, I felt the SQL Performance Analyzer was a little bit easier to use through Enterprise Manager. That’s not to say the APIs are difficult, just that the Enterprise Manager screens add a little value. The basic running is the same, but the Enterprise Manager screen includes a couple of quick tests for optimizer version and parameter changes which are quite handy.

To be fare, the biggest difference in terms of ease of use is the creation and manipulation of the SQL tuning sets, which feels much simpler in Enterprise Manager, although some of functionality was present in 10g also, so I guess it’s a bit unfair to throw it into the mix. 🙂

Cheers

Tim…

Database Replay…

I logged in this morning and noticed I’d released my Database Replay article by accident last night. It wasn’t far off being finished, but it was in need of some “refinement”. Sorry to anyone who had the misfortune of reading the “beta” version. 🙂

At OpenWorld last year there was much talk of both Database Replay and SQL Replay, the latter being the capture and replay of just a specific SQL workload. I was quite surprised when I couldn’t see SQL Replay on the list of new features in 11g. It turns out is is there, but it has the new whiz-bang name of “SQL Performance Analyzer”. I guess this will be my next port of call.

Cheers

Tim…

Oracle 11g RAC on Windows…

I guess you would have to be in a coma to not notice that Oracle 11g is now out for Windows 32-bit.

To celebrate this release I’ve done an 11g RAC on Windows 2003 article, which is an update of my 10g RAC on Windows 2003 article. With both installations, if you get the networking stuff sorted, the installs are a breeze. Miss any steps out and you’re in for a world of hurt. 🙂

Cheers

Tim…

PL/SQL updates in Oracle 11g

On the surface, the changes to PL/SQL look rather minor, but there is some seriously cool stuff in there. I originally intended to write a single article, but some sections got too big so I thought it was worth sectioning them out into separate articles.

As usual, I’ve tried to keep the explanations brief and include cut & paste examples.

There are a couple more things I might add, but I’m not sure if they are too niche. I’ll see what I think over the next couple of days.

Cheers

Tim…

Oracle 11g RAC on NFS…

As a follow-on from my 10g RAC on NFS article, I thought it would be nice to have an 11g RAC on NFS article. The process is very similar, with a couple of exceptions:

  • The Virtual IP Configuration Assistant (vipca) runs in silent mode without any problems now. Under 10g, you had to use a “real” public IP address for this to work. Under 11g it now works with private IPs like “192.168.x.x” etc.
  • Oracle 11g includes a Direct NFS Client for “optimized” Oracle over NFS performance. I don’t have the relevant kit to do a performance comparison, so I don’t know if it’s worth it or not. If someone has some figures for this I would be interested to hear them.

Cheers

Tim…

Update: For information on Direct NFS Client performance look here.

Database 11g…

You’ve gotta love Eddie Awad! I think he deserves “Oracle Blogger of the Year” again for this post alone:

Download Oracle Database 11g Release 1 Now

I’ve added links to the 11g documentation, a documentation search and an error message search to the ORACLE-BASE.com website navigation bar.

Currently 11% downloaded. The internet is too slow. I demand it gets faster! 🙂

Cheers

Tim…

PS. Don’t talk to me for a month!

PPS. Just kidding. 🙂

Update: My first 11g article is now complete:

Oracle Database 11g Release 1 (11.1) Installation On Enterprise Linux 4.5 and 5.0

When is Oracle 11g released?

So all the pomp and ceremony is over and Oracle 11g is launched, but as yet I’ve not heard anything about a release date. Does anyone know when it is likely to hit the shelves. I kind-of though that was the big news, but as yet I’ve not seen any press releases or blog entries that specify a date. It’s not available for download on OTN yet, so I’m assuming the “Launch” and the “Release” are not the same thing.

Have I missed something?

Cheers

Tim…