Oracle releases Raptor – free tool for Database Development (SQL, PL/SQL, database object browsing)

Lucas Jellema 9
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Project Raptor, announced and demonstrated at Oracle Open World, this Fall, has now been released (sort of, as it is still an early adopter release). A free download (60Mb) is available, for Windows or other platforms that run a JDK.

Project Raptor is a new, free graphical tool that enhances productivity and simplifies database development tasks. With Project Raptor, you can browse database objects, run SQL statements and SQL scripts, and edit and debug PL/SQL statements. You can also run any number of provided reports, as well as create and save your own. Raptor is direct competition for tools such as TOAD and PL/SQL Developer and joins the ranks of other free tools such as SQuirrel and many others. Note: Raptor is not open source.

For those of us that have done database development and PL/SQL editing using the facilities in JDeveloper, Raptor will feel familiar. While it has been extended and is more focused than the database oriented functionality in JDeveloper, much of it has been taken from there. An overview of all features can be downloaded here: Feature Matrix

An Early Adopter release is now available for download for Windows and Linux. Project Raptor can connect to any Oracle Database version 9.2.0.1 and later. Support for this release is provided via an OTN Discussion Forum. Go to the Raptor Project Page on Oracle Technology Network.....

Architecture

Project Raptor was developed in Java leveraging the Oracle JDeveloper IDE framework. Default connectivity to the database is through the JDBC Thin driver (no Oracle Home required); the JDBC Type 2 driver (OCI client side driver) is also supported. Raptor is bundled with JRE 1.5 (with an additional tools.jar to support debugging). Installation is performed simply by unzipping the downloaded file. There is support for the Windows and Linux platforms today; Mac OS X support is planned for a future release.

Installation of Raptor

The Installation Guide – stripped of all overhead – boils down to: “1.2.1 Windows Systems with JDK1.5
To install and start Raptor on a Windows system on which the Sun Java SDK release 1.5 is installed, follow these steps:
1. Unzip the Raptor kit into a folder (directory) of your choice (for example, C:\Program Files). This folder will be referred to as . Unzipping the Raptor kit causes a folder named raptor to be created under the folder (for example, C:\Program Files\raptor). It also causes many files and folders to be placed in and under that directory.
2. To start Raptor, go to <raptor_install>\raptor, and double-click raptor.exe.

After Raptor starts, you can connect to any database by right-clicking the Connections node in the Connections Navigator and selecting New Database Connection. Alternatively, if you have any exported connections (see Section 1.3 or Section 1.7), you can import these connections and use them.”

First Impressions and Remarkable Features

My first impressions: installation is really as simple as it is made out to be (just like JDeveloper in fact): unzip and run. Took about 5 minutes – it is a big archive to unzip. Setting up a Connection is very simple. A familiar Database Object Tree or Navigator is shown. You can quickly inspect the objects available under the connection that was just created. Multiple connections can be created and can coexist.

Raptor has a SQL Window, where statements can be edited and executed. During editing, it provides Code Insight  – for example offering a list of available columns when you have typed table alias.. Code Completion is invoked with CTRL+Space. It shows a list of Tables, Views, Functions, Procedures and Packages available to the current connection.

 

Executing the script with F6 or clicking on the 5th button in the button bar will display the Explain Plan results. It is good for SQL Developers to have that at their fingertips… The tab OWA Output presumably – though I did not find anyhing about it in the help – shows the results of htp.p commands used in code to be run with the PL/SQL WebToolkit. I had hoped it would show the interpreted HTML, instead it returns the full HTML. Still, it can be useful.

 

The SQL Worksheet can run scripts and supports SQL*Plus commands to a certain extent: The SQL Worksheet supports some SQL*Plus statements. SQL*Plus statements must be interpreted by the SQL Worksheet before being passed to the database; any SQL*Plus that are not supported by the SQL Worksheet are ignored and not passed to the database. The following SQL*Plus statements are supported by the SQL Worksheet: @
@@
acc[ept]
conn[ect]
def[ine]
desc[ribe]
doc[ument]
exec[ute]
exit (Stops execution and reinstates the specified connection)
pro[mpt]
quit (Stops execution and reinstates the specified connection)
rem[ark]
roll[back]
sta[rt]
undef[ine]

Future Direction

A production release of Project Raptor is scheduled for early 2006. The production release will be supported by Oracle Support for any customer with a current Oracle Database support contract. The enhancements made for Raptor will be included in a future release of Oracle JDeveloper (post 10.1.3).
 

About Post Author

Lucas Jellema

Lucas Jellema, active in IT (and with Oracle) since 1994. Oracle ACE Director and Oracle Developer Champion. Solution architect and developer on diverse areas including SQL, JavaScript, Kubernetes & Docker, Machine Learning, Java, SOA and microservices, events in various shapes and forms and many other things. Author of the Oracle Press book Oracle SOA Suite 12c Handbook. Frequent presenter on user groups and community events and conferences such as JavaOne, Oracle Code, CodeOne, NLJUG JFall and Oracle OpenWorld.
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9 thoughts on “Oracle releases Raptor – free tool for Database Development (SQL, PL/SQL, database object browsing)

  1. hi master
    Sir I design form and complied with Ctr+T and try to run my complied form but not run and show me window open with

    Sir how I run my complied form in my system and user system

    sir i use forms 6i client/server and database 9i

    sir my need i give shortcut icon to user and user run that not go in folder

    thanking you

    Aamir

  2. @zalqarnain turabi:

    Aqua data studio can handle different types of databases. As allround DBA (not restricted to Oracle) this is the better tool.
    So far it has been the best I can find on OS X. The PL/SQL support is not that good, but it is more then half decent.
    As DBA tool it is just as good as any other graphical tool (sqlplus is still the best tool, that works in each and every situation, but that’s just my opinion which can be discarded in this case)

    The main disadvantige I found are:
    1. speed: it is not as lean and mean as a standard tool on windows like pl/sql developer, even though I am running a 1.6 Ghz with 1 GB memory
    2. big packages: as soon as a package grows to big, it won’t compile anymore
    3. no “recompile all” or “compile all invalid packages” feature. It can’t even show you what’s invalid. (well.. without querying user_objects or all_objects)

    The big advantages are for me:
    1. support for mysql, postgres, sql-server and oracle
    2. a quick responding development team: If you submit a but, a developer will contact you directly and you will recieve a bugfix. This will happen quick and with a proper description of the cause (which can help you in your own professional life ;))
    3. stability: it hasn’t crashed on my Mac uptill now.

    I cannot speak for other versions then the one running on OS X. You will need to check them yourself…

  3. Still run in a lot of “features” / aka bugs which were related on XMLType objects.

    For instance:
    a) content of XMLType tables is not shown properly
    b) a “copy” (a CTAS is used, which causes the problems) of a xmltype table results
    in a relational object instead of an identical copy of the source.

    The projec looks promising and i hope they will get the “xml features” more stable,
    whicg would be great.

  4. Oracle Project Raptor is first graphical software which facilitate the oracle developer an DBA.
    b/c this software is 2 dimentional one for dba and second for developers.
    But i am confuse to compare Aqua Data Studio 4.0 and oracle project raptor .
    Please, inform me basic difference between Aqua Data Studio 4.0 and oracle project raptor.
    I shell waite for ur respon .

    Thanks.
    zulqarnaint@yahoo.com

  5. Great tool. The downloads are a bit confusing though; although one of them is titled ‘Project Raptor for non-Windows platforms’ it works fine on windows (XP). The only difference is that it does not contain the java5 jre. When started, a dialog asks you for the path to java.exe, et voila…
    I also like the reports that, although I could not get all the queries to work, provides a wide range of database information like the version nls-language support, xml schema’s, table information and much more.

  6. This may just be the tool I have been looking for to use under Linux. So far I used Toad under Windows but unfortunately it won’t run under Linux (I haven’t tried wine to get Toad working).
    To start Raptor under Linux, a few things need to be done. First of all, the raptor script included in the zip file needs its permissions modified to make it executalbe:

    # cd
    # chmod 755 raptor

    where is the directory Raptor was unzipped to. Next I noticed the raptor script assumes it is started from the directory. In order to make it run from any directory it is invoked from, I defined an evironmental veriable called RAPTOR_HOME like this in my .bashrc file

    export RAPTOR_HOME=/usr/local/raptor

    Modify the path to meet your requirements. Next, I modified the raptor script to be like this

    cd $RAPTOR_HOME/jdev/bin/
    sh ./raptor

    Now it runs from wherever I invoke the script.

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