I’ve received a question about client certification for Oracle Database 12.2.0.1 the other day.
And this reminded me on this very helpful MOS Note:
It spans the client interoperability back to the Oracle 9.2 days and is a very helpful resource.
And don’t forget that sometimes client software may need a patch as well. A customer I exchange emails with on a regular basis just upgraded the Database server to Oracle Database 12.1.0.2 and saw several strange errors with the JDBC client despite the fact that they were already using the most recent JDBC client.
ORA-904, ORA-923 and ORA-920 were signaled together with:
oracle.jdbc.driver.OracleParameterMetaDataParser.computeBasicInfo(OracleParameterMetaDataParser.java:277)
It turned out that the JDBC client need some patch treatment with merge patch 21623553
on top of the 12.1.0.2. client. It got combined together with some other useful fixes into merge patch 24012252 for the JDBC client:
JDBC Patch for Bug# 24012252 for Generic Platform
Afterwards the errors were gone. For further JDBC client patch recommendations please see:
Furthermore don’t forget that there’s the Instant Client as well which is easy to deploy and downloadable from OTN:
–Mike
And this bug with 12.1.0.2 client on Windows:
The parameter StrLen_or_IndPtr of the API SQLBindParameter() returns length in characters instead of in bytes. As per specification, it should return length in bytes. This is described in the Bug 21616079
See: Oracle ODBC Driver Truncates The Data Length of Output Parameter When Data Type is
SQL_VARCHAR/SQL_WVARCHAR (Doc ID 2101352.1)
Thanks Chris!
Cheers,
Mike
Actually, when I look up the certification for Oracle Client 12.2 against database versions, this is the list I find on MOS:
Oracle Database 12.2.0.1.0
Oracle Database 12.1.0.2.0
Oracle Database 12.1.0.1.0
Oracle Database 11.2.0.4.0
Oracle Database 11.2.0.3.0
Oracle Database 11.2.0.2.0
Oracle Database 11.2.0.1.0
Oracle Database 11.1.0.7.0
Oracle Database 11.1.0.6.0
So from this, it seems that Oracle Client 12.2 is still certified with database 11.1 (of course, this db version is in Sustaining Support mode) which contradicts your screenshot (which you also got from MOS, I suppose).
So looks like MOS made some mistake? or did I interpret it wrong?
Benny,
the MOS note is correct. We SUPPORT only combinations which are supported. At the point when the 12.2.0.1 client got released (I’d guess sometime early 2017) Oracle 11.1.0.7 was already out of bug fixing support. Not sure why CERTIFY shows that an 12.2.0.1 client is certified for use with 11.1.0.6 databases. I can’t answer this.
See the MOS Note:
General Policy
Oracle’s general policy is to test and support each new Oracle release for compatibility with older releases thus:
Test the NEW client to each OLDER server release where the OLDER release is still covered by Premier Support (formerly Primary Error Correction support) at the time that the NEW version is released.
and
Tests between the NEW version and other OLDER releases may be added where Oracle deems it sensible to support interoperability between those releases.
If you have further doubts, may I please ask to open an SR?
Cheers,
Mike