Oracle database support 12c 18c 19c patching vs upgrade
To help you plan ahead the Oracle database upgrades and patching, below is an Oracle Database Releases roadmap, showing their lifetime support stages (Premier + Extended) for the latest releases.
Oracle Support Notes
- Ensure to maintain Oracle releases that are under Oracle Premium Support (black bars on the chart) or Extended Support (red bars on the chart)
- Extended Support is typically for three years following the expiration of Premier Support and only for the Terminal Patch Set release
- After end of Premium + Extended Support no new patches are released by Oracle + lower SLAs apply for the corresponding database release
- To receive Extended Support, you must:
- Continue to pay the support fee for Premier Support
- Purchase Extended Support on top of Premier Support fee (unless the fee is waived (usually for the 1st year)
- Most ULA/PULA contracts include Extended Support fee
- Enable Extended Support for your Support Identifier (SI) on MOS
Oracle Openworld 2019 Major Technology Announcements
Below are major technology announcements or highlights that came from the Oracle OpenWorld conference 2019. Most of them are round Oracle Cloud (OCI), Oracle Autonomous database, Exadata and Linux
Redwood – New User Experience Design
If you navigate to www.oracle.com or cloud.oracle.com you see the new Oracle look & feel called „Redwood“. In future all Oracle Presence will follow this new Modern UX Design, including GUI of Cloud & On-Premises.
Connectivity between OCI & Azur Cloud
Oracle announces close partnership with Microsoft in the area of Oracle Cloud Infrastructure & Microsoft Azure by introducing High Speed Interconnect between OCI & Azur Clouds:
Read more »Oracle database 12cR2 new patching concept RU RUR
The new database patching for Oracle 12cR2 (12.2) and above using new RUs and RURs patches replaces the old patching concept. Means, the legacy terms and patches Patchset, Patchset Update (PSU), Database Bundle Patch, Critical Patch Update (CPU) will no longer be meaningful for 12.2 database software. The new patches will be applied in the same way using opatch utility with ability using RAC Rolling or Data Guard/GG switchover techniques.
The major points about the new patching concept are below:
New quarterly Release Update (RUs)
– More aggressive patching for test / dev and early production roll-outs -> more testing required
– Released quarterly (Jan, Apr, Jul, Oct)
– Proactive, highly tested bundles of critical fixes
– Include all security fixes for the same quarterly cycle
– Enable customers to avoid known issues.
– Might contain small, important new features
– Query optimizer fixes that can change execution plans might be included but must be enabled manually by the customer after patching.
– Separate Database RU, Grid Infrastructure RU, and OJVM RU available
New quarterly Release Update Revisions (RURs)
– A bit similar to former PSUs
– Less aggressive pathing for stable production environments -> less testing required
– Released quarterly (Jan, Apr, Jul, Oct) Read more »
Oracle Open World Conference 2017 Highlights
JavaOne & Oracle OpenWorld (OOW) conference is one of the biggest and most important technology conference in the world. It hosts tens of thousands of attendees as well as millions online who want to connect, learn and explore industry trends and breakthroughs driven by IT technology. The conference offers more than 2,500 educational sessions, hundreds of demos and hands-on labs, plus exhibitions from more than 400 partners and customers from around the world.
The conference does not focus purely on databases. There are many more interesting technology areas presented from HW, OS and software development to modern IT trends like Cloud, Big Data, Blockchain, Internet of Things, Machine Learning, etc. But what about the database? Is Oracle not a pure database provider? No, it was probably long time back, but NOT ANY MORE.
Below are a few major topics that were dominating at the last OOW
Cloud
Oracle is aggressively scaling its cloud business and effectively catching-up with competitors like Amazon (AWS), Azur and Salesforce introducing at OOW17 an array of new Cloud offerings and enhancements and demonstrating its cost efficiency and unbeatable Infrastructure performance. At the same time comparing these all the way against AWS. For example, Larry Ellison (Oracle Founder & CTO) stated that Oracle Cloud would cost at least 50% less of your AWS bill and they would write this in the contract.
The recent launch of Oracle data Centers in Frankfurt supporting European Availability region can only confirm serious Oracle intention in the Cloud business. I personally think that soon only a few large Cloud providers will cover the major Cloud market that in turn will be driven mostly by Software Cloud Services (SaaS and partly PaaS). And there is a big chance that Oracle will be soon in the Cloud leaders caused by a large range of own quality software, modern Java development platform as well as own cost efficient HW, OS and Virtualization stack.
Machine learning
What is this thing by the way? Read more »
Oracle database In-Memory development workshop
This month I had a chance to talk with the Oracle database In-Memory development team at the Oracle Headquarter in Redwood Shores and meet there the Oracle product managers, VP of Oracle In-Memory and the mother of Oracle Query Optimizer Maria Colgan. In a 3 hours workshop we discussed the current challenges in implementing new database and in-memory computing technologies, talked about new trends and possibilities in the future product versions.
I really liked the atmosphere of the workshop, the openness of the Oracle development team and the constructive discussion that we could have there. This certainly can help us to be prepared and build a database platform of tomorrow that will be capable to cope with enormous data growth and tough availability and performance requirements that come from the customers.
Thanks to Maria, Tirthankar, Raj, Andy, Shasank and entire Oracle In-Memory team to make it happen.