Oracle Database 12.2 released Author: Andra Tarata In June 2016 Oracle made an early announcement that the next major release, Oracle Database version 12 release 2, would only be available in the cloud. In October Oracle released this new major release of its database platform via the new Oracle Database Exadata Express Cloud Service.

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Contents Introduction .................................................................................................................................... 3 Obsoleted and de-supported features ........................................................................................... 4 Deprecated Parameters ................................................................................................................. 5 Included features ............................................................................................................................ 6 Conclusion ..................................................................................................................................... 7

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Introduction Oracle Database Exadata Express Cloud Service delivers a managed Oracle Database 12c Release 2 Enterprise Edition with a number of database options running on Oracle Exadata engineered systems. The Oracle Exadata Express Cloud Service is available in three different configurations depending on the storage capacity. Oracle offers end users a 30-day free trial in order to get familiar with this cloud service.

Service Subscription Price Srorage Maximum Data Transfer Maximum X20 $ 175 / month 20 GB 120 GB / month X50 $ 750 / month 50 GB 300 GB / month X50IM $ 950 / month 50 GB 300

Source: Oracle Database Exadata Express Cloud Service Data sheet available here.

Keep in mind that Oracle Database 12c Release 2 is initially and currently only available through the Exadata Express Cloud Service; end users cannot (yet) make use of the Oracle Database Enterprise Edition 12c Release on their own (on-premises) servers.

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Obsoleted and de-supported features As for any enterprise software programs for which a new release becomes available, it is important to learn what the “Obsolete Features” and the “De-supported Features” related to the Oracle Database 12c Release 2 software are:

- De-supported Features are features that are no longer supported by Oracle. End users can still make use of such a feature, but on their own risk, since Oracle does not provide any bug fixes nor does it resolve any issues related to such a feature anymore.

- Obsolete Features are features which are still available, but for which Oracle decided to not further invest from a development perspective. In many cases such a feature is no longer needed, or there are better alternatives to replace it.

Oracle has now obsoleted and removed the following parameters:

- parallel_server: a parameter that specifies whether Oracle Parallel Server is enabled or not. - parallel_server_instances: a parameter that specifies the number of instances currently configured with

Parallel Server. - parallel_io_cap_enabled: a parameter that specifies whether or not Oracle caps the default degree of

parallelism to no greater value than what the I/O system can support. - parallel_automatic_tuning: a parameter that determines the default values for parameters that control

parallel execution. All the above parameters refer to Oracle Parallel Server. Oracle's parallel server option (PSO) allows multiple instances, each operating a separate node, to share a single database. However, Oracle Real Application Clusters (RAC), introduced with Oracle 9i in 2001, supersedes the Oracle Parallel Server (OPS) database option. Therefore, slowly, Oracle began to encourage end users to stop using the Parallel Server option and move to RAC, as RAC includes all the old Parallel Server functionalities.

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Deprecated Parameters Oracle announced with Oracle Database 12c Release 2 that some parameters will no longer be enhanced or further developed but continuous support services will be delivered. Therefore, these parameters will be deprecated. Deprecated parameters for Oracle Database 12.2 are: - Adaptive Parallelism feature (controlled by the parameter parallel_adaptive_multi_user) was deprecated

prior to Oracle Database 12.2. Therefore, the feature by was by default enabled. Now, the default value of this parameter is false and as such the feature is disabled.

The number of parallel execution servers associated with a single operation is known as the degree of parallelism (DOP). Parallel execution is designed to effectively use multiple CPUs. Oracle Database parallel execution framework enables you to either explicitly choose a specific degree of parallelism or to rely on Oracle Database to automatically control it. The Adaptive Parallelism parameter, which until now was enabled by default, reduces the degree of parallelism as the load on the system increases. To control system load and utilization Oracle recommends end users to use Parallel Statement Queuing and Database Resource Manager.

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Included features Oracle Database 12c Release 2 contains the following features:

- Application Development - Availability - Big Data and Data Warehousing - Compression and Archiving - Database Lifecycle Management - Database Overall - Diagnosability - Exadata - Manageability - Miscellaneous - Performance - Public Cloud - RAC and Grid - Security - Spatial and Graph - Windows

For a more comprehensive description of each of these features please check the Oracle Database 12c Release 2 program documentation available here.

Database 12c Release 2 also features improvements to multitenancy, better performance for in-memory database and enhanced support for big data analytics. Oracle introduced the concept of container database with Database 12c R1 and continues the improvement on multitenancy promising online movement of pluggable databases between servers, data centers and Oracle Cloud.

Multitenancy refers to creating a database container in which tenants’ databases can be imported. This lets more databases run on a single machine with as little overhead as possible and provides one point of management for multiple databases.

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Conclusion Oracle might delay the release of the on-premises version of Database 12c R2, the first major update to the product since 2013, to increase the sales of their Cloud Services. At this moment in time, there is no official announcement of when the on-premises version will be released (if at all). An important point for end users to keep in mind is that (as per Oracle’s Lifetime Support Policy available here) the Extended Support for Oracle Database 11.1 ended in August 2015 and the Extended Support for Oracle Database 11.2 will end in December 2020. A complete overview of the dates on which the regular Premier Support and the Extended Support end for the different database releases can be found in the table below:

Release Premier Support Ends Extended Support Ends Sustaining Support Ends

8.1.7 Dec 2004 Dec 2006 Indefinite

9.2 Jul 2007 Jul 2010 Indefinite

10.1 Jan 2009 Jan 2012 Indefinite

10.2 Jul 2010 Jul 2013 Indefinite

11.1 Aug 2012 Aug 2015 Indefinite

11.2 Jan 2015 Dec 2020 Indefinite

Enterprise Edition 12.1 Jul 2018 Jul 2021 Indefinite

Standard Edition (SE) 12.1 Aug 2016 Not available Indefinite

Standard Edition One (SE1) 12.1 Aug 2016 Not available Indefinite

Standard Edition 2 (SE2) 12.1 Jul 2018 Jul 2021 Indefinite

End users will, in the near future, need to make a decision if they want to migrate their on-premises Database installations to 12cR1 (for which the extended support will elapse in July 2021) or move to the Oracle Database Cloud Services to benefit from the newest release (2) of 12c.

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ORACLE DATABASE 12.2 RELEASED

About the author: Andra Tarata, Licensing Specialist "Shoot for the moon. Even if you miss, you'll land among stars!"- Les Brown Andra has been working in the Software Licensing industry for the last 8 years, analyzing and understanding licensing business practices & product development from multiple software vendors and helping clients to better manage their software entitlements. Andra leverages her experiences of working within Oracle’s License Management Services team to educate, equip and enable end-users to understand their enterprise software license entitlements. Andra holds a bachelor degree in Project Management from the National School of Political and Administrative Studies of Bucharest. Contact Andra: andra.tarata@b-lay.com We share our knowledge, so you can focus on the facts! Do you want to know more about different related license management topics, we have a selection of white papers available through www.b-lay.com. If you are in need of extra expertise and a structured approach, feel free to contact B-lay. We will help you make software compliance an exciting opportunity to improve your business. About B-lay B-lay is a specialist in software license management and provides services around software compliance, software audits, software asset management tools and insight in software spend. Our services offer organizations worldwide insight into the risks associated with software licenses, help prevent license compliance issues and help create considerable cost savings by optimizing their licensing position. B-lay was founded in 2008 and has offices in the Netherlands, Romania and the US. B-lay BV | Maliebaan 79 | 3581 CG Utrecht | The Netherlands | info@b-lay.com | www.b-lay.com | +31 88 0233 700