They say time flies when you’re having fun, and it seems like 2007 has gone by at a record pace. 2007 has seen quite a few exciting developments in the ‘Toad World’ arena. In addition to Toad World itself, we have seen a new unit testing tool for PL/SQL and a version of Toad made just for analysts released. In addition we’ve seen the industry leading Toad for Oracle, Toad for SQL Server, and Toad for DB2 products enhanced with new versions and new capabilities in the last few months.
The B-I-G event it seems in the Oracle spectrum each year is Oracle Open World. This year’s event seems to continue that trend with a big blowout series of talks, presentations, product debuts, and lounging in San Francisco scheduled for next month. At the same time, Quest will be putting out new versions of the Quest® SQL Optimizer for Oracle, Toad® for Oracle, Toad for Data Analysis, and Benchmark Factory® for Databases. Let’s take a quick peak at what each has in the works.
Benchmark Factory for Databases, version 5.5
This award-winning tool has been helping IT professionals stress test their technology for the past decade. Version 5.5 will be plugged into the Quest SQL Optimizer so you can automatically stress test your batch optimized tuning scenario re-writes. In addition you will see:
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an optimized TPC-C test for SQL Server
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an Oracle repository option to store your benchmark runs and reports
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enhanced SQL Trace file replay for Oracle, including date/timestamp bind variable support and better dependent SQL processing
Quest SQL Optimizer for Oracle, version 7.2
Quest’s SQL Tuning solution saw a major leap forward with the 7.0 release this year. It introduced the concept of ‘batch tuning’ to our Oracle users. Instead of manually tuning problematic SQL statements one at a time, users now have the option of creating a job that automatically scans multiple objects for SQL tuning candidates, automatically tuning them in the background, and viewing the ‘winning’ queries re-writes. Version 7.2 will be fully integrated within the Toad for Oracle version 9.5 Xpert and Development Suite editions. In addition you will see:
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A Job Summary Report – automatically see the performance improvement and overall activity for all tuning jobs
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SGA Inspector – option to automatically tune all SQL found in the SGA
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Batch Optimizer Integration with Benchmark Factory for Oracle – automatically validate your query re-write candidates under varying load conditions
Toad for Data Analysis, version 1.1
The first Toad offering that allowed multiple connections to multiple database platforms in a single IDE, Toad for Data Analysis has been one of the more talked about product releases at Quest in recent memory. A frequent request from our users is scheduled to be implemented in version 1.1: the ability to simultaneously query from different data sources. Do you need to upload data from Excel to Oracle? Wouldn’t it be nice to query ‘SELECT * FROM ORACLE’ MINUS ‘SELECT * FROM EXCEL’ to see exactly what data needed to come over? And then take the results and save as INSERT statements so you can run a ‘migration’ script on the fly? You can take a sneak peak now by joining the community and trying out the beta. In addition to the heterogeneous database join support, version 1.1 will also introduce the following:
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FROM clause Sub Query support in the Query Builder
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Date Ranges – where conditions on columns of type ‘date’ will now activate a new ‘Date Range’ tab that will allow you to build date filters super quick
Version 1.1’s Query Builder Date Range support for Where Clauses will be
extremely useful when automating and scheduling reports as it will remove the need to hardcode your dates.
Toad for Oracle, version 9.5
Summing up all of the changes and new features for a Toad release can be quite a challenge. I’m not even going to try to do that in this forum, but I will share a few of my favorites:
1. Schema Browser Detail view for no objects selected shows ALL object details
2. StatsPack browser for DBA Module users, supports 8i and higher
3. Underlying parser updated to support newer 10g syntax – formatting support to follow
4. 11g connect support, and a decent smattering of 11g feature support including the new 11g partitioning and subpartitioning types AND virtual columns in Create/Alter Table wizards
5. Hierarchical PL/SQL Profiling is available for 11g database connections
6. Ability to save a file open in the editor to a FTP location
7. Stronger integration with Benchmark Factory, Quest SQL Optimizer and Quest Code Tester for Oracle
For a more thorough walk through of Toad’s new features for version 9.5, stay tuned to the Yahoo! Discussion board.
Speaking of Quest Code Tester…
No new release for Open World, but we did put out an EXTREMELY nice .1 patch for version 1.6 last week. If you’ve taken a look at Code Tester before and found its interface confusing or lacking for non-PL/SQL experts, I HIGHLY recommend giving it another shot. I was visiting a customer last week and they were thrilled of the prospect of no longer doing code reviews of their test code and eliminating 80%+ of their time dedicated to testing in development because of how completely Code Tester anticipated and transformed their testing needs and policies.
A Quick Note regarding product releases:
The contents of this blog should not be taken as a guarantee of what products will be released when and with what features. Product releases and features are likely to change without advance notice.