As many of you are aware Quest provides a tool known as Benchmark Factory, BMF for short. BMF is a load generation tool that also allows you to install small databases for testing. The tools out of the box can provide TPC-B, TPC-D, TPC-H, AS3AP and many other standard benchmarks as well as allowing goal and scalability tests from your own code, either manually entered or scanned from text or, in the case of Oracle, from active...

Written by Rene Woody  

This blog is a continuation of a series about the Batch Optimizer in Quest SQL Optimizer for Oracle. It covers the execution options settings that determine which SQL statements will be automatically executed by the Batch Optimizer process and the method used for their execution.

 

Executing Options

 

When the optimization process is finished, the execution of the...

Despite the best intentions of the DBA or the person who designed the data model, the collection of primary keys, unique indexes, constraints, and triggers are not a foolproof method of keeping duplicate records creeping into your tables and views. Any business rule in the database can be disabled. An even more likely scenario is the business rule changing after the fact.   So what’s a person to do when they need to clean up their records?

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As a follow on to last week’s blog about controlling with reconciliation, in this blog we look at another common control – approvals. Here are some key tips for designing systems that demonstrate control with approvals.

Introduction  

At the peak there were an estimated 65 million landmines planted in killing fields world wide. In the 1990’s it was estimated that while 2.5 million landmines were being deployed per year only 80,000 were being removed. According to current estimates this may have turned around in recent years with more being removed than have been deployed per year. Of course with 250 million of the nasty devices stockpiled...

When using either Toad’s Stats Pack Browser or AWR Browser screens (both part of the optional DBA module and/or bundle), the plethora of graphs can sometimes be a wee bit overwhelming – as shown in the screen snapshot below. So how is any DBA in an urgent situation or hurry to both successfully and expediently interpret such database activity?

 

That’s where Toad’s basic mantra once again comes into play – making...

As many of my readers likely know by now, I have been working for the past several years on the Quest Code Tester development effort.  

Code Tester is the most powerful PL/SQL test automation tool available. You describe the expected behavior of your programs and Code Tester generates your test code, which can then be run from the UI or via a script. With Code Tester, you can build comprehensive regression tests and...

In the compliance world, reconciliation is more than just making sure your data loaded properly. Here are some key tips to using reconciliation as a control in your compliance data system.

I’ve seen some people on competing product discussion boards say things like Toad’s schema browser Is far too bloated – with too many tabs and images sucking up all the precious real-estate. But like anything else in Toad, if you don’t experiment with and utilize all the cool options it offers – you could very easily arrive at this quite mistaken conclusion. So now let’s examine just how one configures the schema browser for...

Written by Rene Woody  



This blog is a continuation of a series about the Batch Optimizer in Quest SQL Optimizer for Oracle. The Batch Optimizer process is fully automated with the default settings in the Batch Optimizer options. If you would like, you can have any one of the three steps (searching for SQL,...

A few months ago, I posted on this blog an explanation of how to use Toad's Code Templates to standardize development and improve productivity. I included an XML document that contains over 20 templates that I thought you might find useful. I also asked my readers to produce XML transformations so that the XML document could be "output" in the format that Toad recognizes (and SQL Navigator as well).

 

I am happy...

When audits are involved, you are guilty until proven innocent. Here are 4 key strategies to employ in the design of your compliance data system, that will prove your company’s innocence.

I know – Toad 9.6 was just released this week – on Aprils Fool’s day no less. But we’ve already been hard at work on the next release (and the beta should start in a few weeks).

 

In last week’s blog, I asked you guys - our customers - to submit ideas for what should be added in Toad 9.7, because as we’ve always said, “Toad is your product, thus you should drive it.” So far though (and to my great disappointment), no one has commented. So I’m going to “prime the pump” by leaking some things prior to the first 9.7 beta, to hopefully stimulate you guys to chime in – and help us to drive Toad to where you want it to go.

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On March 26, 2008 I gave a webcast on physical tuning named “Goal! Success through Storage.” Due to some delays starting it overran a bit so I wasn’t able to answer questions afterward as I usually do. So, here are the answers to all the questions that weren’t handled by Darren Mallet (who handles the questions online when I am webcasting, thanks Darren!)

 

During the webcast I discussed topics such as choosing...

An introduction to Compliance Data Systems – a data system for the auditors. Here we explore the need, and see where it fits into the technical architecture.

Recently, my Toad World blog asking whether we needed to update the Toad Handbook generated as many or more replies than all my other past blogs combined. So it obviously seems best to ask you guys – our customers and users – for more opinions and ideas.

 

I’m hoping this week’s post will open up quite a lively exchange. Every time we ask people what they’d like to see in the next version of Toad – we get the stock answer of just fix bugs. And we’ve heard you loud and clear – that remains a key focus for each and every release. But if you had to pick your one new, must have feature – what would it be?

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