APEX

ORAdiff is live – compare two Oracle Database and Patch releases

Did you ever wanted to find out the differences between two Oracle database releases? Today, I am super-super excited. Especially, since this was a long journey. And I have to thank our entire team,  Rodrigo especially but also Bill and all the others working and helping here. THIS is the tool many of you have looking for since years. It is time now, ORAdiff is live – compare two Oracle Database and Patch releases.

ORAdiff is live - compare two Oracle Database and Patch releases

What is ORAdiff?

This tool is made for you. It allows you to compare two Oracle releases to each other. And not only core

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Oracle Database World in London – THE event in April 2023

You may have heard or seen – or even registered already – for the regional Oracle Cloud World in London on April 19, 2023 already. But were you aware that the “event to be at” happens just the next day on April 20? It will be Oracle Database World in London – THE event in April 2023.

Oracle Database World in London - THE event in April 2023

When and where will it happen?

April 20, 2023, a Thursday will be the day to mark in your calendar. We’ll meet you at Oracle Database World, the regional database event to be at in London this year at the …

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APEX is invalid after upgrading to 12.2 – ORA-20001

We are running the AutoUpgrade-for-RAC beta test since last week. And the first issue one customer encountered … is neither an AutoUpgrade nor a RAC issue. It has to do with APEX and SPATIAL, and missing grants. APEX is invalid after upgrading to 12.2 – ORA-20001

APEX is invalid after upgrading to 12.2 - ORA-20001

Photo by Aditya Vyas on Unsplash

What is happening?

You are doing an upgrade to Oracle Database 12.2.0.1. And you receive a number of errors during the component validation phase.

19:04:14 SQL> EXECUTE dbms_registry_sys.validate_components;
...(19:04:15) Starting validate_apex for APEX_180100
ORA-20001: MISSING GRANT: grant execute on "MDSYS"."SDO_DIM_ARRAY" to APEX_180100
ORA-20001: MISSING GRANT: grant execute on 
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Mobiliar Insurance consolidates over 350 PDBs to new Exadatas

The year is almost over and many of you will take off in your well-deserved holidays. At this point it’s not time yet for a 2019 summary or my “Best Records of 2019” list, but to highlight a great success story from Swiss Mobiliar Insurance’s Oracle team.

Mobiliar Insurance consolidates over 350 PDBs to new Exadatas

Photo by Melina Kiefer on Unsplash

Mobiliar Insurance – never heard about them?

There are actually two typical situations when you’ve never heard about Mobiliar Insurance (“Die Mobiliar“) before. You either don’t live in Switzerland and you never visited one of our workshops nor any of the talks Alain Fuhrer and …

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Be aware of database options selections for PDBs in DBCA

I did blog about several things-to-know with DBCA (Database Configuration Assistant) in the past. And one issue came up in our internal mailing list the other day. Be aware of database options selections for PDBs in DBCA. Missing one or the other “click” may bring you in trouble later on. I blogged about this already a while ago but this was only part of a larger post: Create Multitenant Databases with DBCA – Things to Know.

Be aware of database options selections for PDBs in DBCA

When you create a custom container database with DBCA you will see this …

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Oracle APEX (Application Express) Clean Up in Oracle Database 11.2-12.2

Oracle APEX (Application Express) Clean Up in Oracle Database 11.2-12.2Oracle APEX (Application Express) clean up in Oracle Database 11.2-12.2 is fairly simple and straight forward. With the upgrade to Oracle Database 12.2.0.1 Oracle APEX does not get upgraded automatically anymore. If necessary you should upgrade Oracle APEX upfront of afterwards. But please do keep an eye on the APEX certification with Oracle Database 12.2.0.1 to avoid any issues:

Oracle APEX (Application Express) Clean Up in Oracle Database 11.2-12.2

Before you start removing anything from your database please …

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Is your APEX version certified with your Database release?

+++ Blog post updated on Oct 2, 2019 +++ New additions marked in Red +++

+++ Blog post updated on Aug 3, 2021 +++ New additions marked in Blue +++

Last week I’ve had an interesting discussion with a customer about the certification of APEX and Oracle Database 12.2.0.1.

I did a bit of research and emailing – and thanks to the APEX team – this is the source of truth for APEX certifications.

Is your APEX version certified with your Database release?

Minimum Database version for APEX

See MOS Note:1344948.1: Application Express (APEX) Database and Web Server Certification Reference:

  • For APEX 4.0, the minimum database version is 10.2.0.3
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Use the correct download to patch APEX from 5.1.0 to 5.1.1

When you plan to upgrade Oracle Application Express (APEX) from version 5.1.0 to 5.1.1 please be aware to download a patch from MOS instead the 5.1.1 version from OTN.

The text on the OTN page is a bit misleading – and a customer I work with downloaded the wrong version which led to a failed upgrade – even though the scripts seem to be made for this patch upgrade.

APEX 5.1.1 Full Version Download

Oracle APEX 5.1.1 download on OTN

Even though the page says “This is a cumulative patch set for Application Express 5.1.0” the page offers you a full install and not …

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APEX is in CDB$ROOT again – Journey to the Cloud VII

Well … it’s been a while … but I would like to continue my journey to the cloud …

What happened so far on my Journey to the Cloud?

DBaaS Oracle Cloud

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Clean up APEX – Journey to the Cloud IV

What happened so far on my Journey to the Cloud?

DBaaS Oracle Cloud

Today’s journey: Cleanup APEX removal leftovers 

When you read my “Patch” blog post from Dec 22, 2015 you’ll see

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Upgrade downtime credited to APEX

What do you think when you see this post-upgrade result?

Oracle Database 12.1 Post-Upgrade Status Tool           08-07-2015 15:08:26

Component                               Current         Version  Elapsed Time
Name                                    Status          Number   HH:MM:SS

Oracle Server                          UPGRADED      12.1.0.2.0  00:19:26
JServer JAVA Virtual Machine              VALID      12.1.0.2.0  00:10:52
Oracle Workspace Manager                  VALID      12.1.0.2.0  00:01:52
OLAP Analytic Workspace                   VALID      12.1.0.2.0  00:00:34
OLAP Catalog                         OPTION OFF      11.2.0.3.0  00:00:00
Oracle OLAP API                           VALID      12.1.0.2.0  00:00:42
Oracle XDK                                VALID      12.1.0.2.0  00:01:07
Oracle Text                               VALID      12.1.0.2.0  00:01:36
Oracle XML Database                       VALID      12.1.0.2.0  00:03:55
Oracle Database Java Packages             VALID      12.1.0.2.0  00:00:22
Oracle Multimedia                         VALID      12.1.0.2.0  00:03:57
Spatial                                UPGRADED      12.1.0.2.0  00:08:56
Oracle Application Express                VALID     
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Java in the database – OJVM non-rolling patches – OJVM Removal

Question:

How can I find out if Oracle’s JVM is used in my database?

Answer:

This is unfortunately not as trivial as I thought initially …
Let’s start with:

Until Oracle version 11.2 or later, there was no way to confirm if Oracle JVM is not actively used in the database

However, what can be said is:
1) If there are non-Oracle schemas that contain java objects, then 3rd party products or user defined java programs could be actively using the Oracle JVM.
2) If there are Oracle schemas, other than SYS, that contain java objects, then 

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Save Upgrade downtime: Upgrade APEX upfront

See also:


With almost every patch or release upgrade of the Oracle Database a new version of Oracle Application Express (APEX) will be installed. And as APEX is part of the database installation it will be upgraded as part of the component upgrades after the ORACLE SERVER component has been successfully upgraded to the new releases.

APEXBut the APEX upgrade can take a bit (several minutes or even more in some cases). Therefore it is a common advice to upgrade APEX upfront before upgrading the database as this can be done online while the …

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