Oracle 12 with VFP 9

[RoadRunnerOz]

I have client that is running VFP 9 with a Oracle 10g database. They want to upgrade to Oracle 12. Does anyone know if that will be an issue.
The Oracle database stores all their messages both inbound and outbound.

TIA

Michael Ouellette

 

[Olaf Doschke]

As long as

1. ...the VFP application can use a new Oracle 12 driver,
2. ...there is a DSN in 32bit ODBC manager you can change to use this new Oracle 12 driver or a configuration item with some connection string you can change,
3. ...Oracle12 is fully downward compatible to 10g,
4. ...the database(s) also have same schema/structure in any aspect relevant to whatever queries or calls are done,

...the transition might work. Nobody can tell you until you try, so you better have a test migration.
Notice in general: No version change questions can plainly be answered yes, have you ever heard a yes and then had problems?
Developers intend to change OSes, databases, applications in a downward compatible way. More things work and get unnoticed than don't.

Bye, Olaf.

 

[RoadRunnerOz]

Thanks Olaf:

My plan is to test in their User Test environment first.

Michael Ouellette

 

[GriffMG]

I think, if this were me, I would carefully read the 'what's changed' and bug fixes list for the newer versions and try to identify anything massive.

Look for things like defaults changing from read/write to read only, stuff like that.

It is hard to know what will break on an update - often it's the unexpected, like a security thing, you can't delete files on the server from the client any longer so how do you remove back-ups or temporary or log files are moved to different default locations, so they aren't where you expect them to be on NEW databases, but the existing ones work fine.

Regards

Griff
Keep [Smile]ing

There are 10 kinds of people in the world, those who understand binary and those who don't.

I'm trying to cut down on the use of shrieks (exclamation marks), I'm told they are !good for you. ​

 

[Olaf Doschke]

Staging the new version to a test environment sounds like a plan. As Griff says, "white-box" knowledge of changes allows testing aiming to investigate whether these known changes affect you, but to know that you most likely meed white box knowledge about the VFP application, too. It's not clear to me, whether you actually have that insight in the VFP application or this is closed source to you.

You'll know a set of most important features of the VFP app you use and test along these features in order of descending importance, typically. Perhaps prioritizing tests, that are shortest.

I also have the feeling this isn't just about the upgrade of the Oracle Database itself, but the update of some main software like SAP. It's very likely something also deprecates and may already have been announced to deprecate long time ago and still the VFP app won't adapt automatically unless it's actively maintained by the vendor about checking such announcements not only of the Oracle RDBMS changes but also the data structure of the SAP or another software suite the VFP application based on. It's always a harder job to keep such a third party application working, if you're the vendor, as you don't control the roadmap of development.

You can get some whitebox knowledge by profiling what queries the VFP application uses or what stored procs it calls, if you have a profiling tool and can apply it. That'd also enable testing just the data access in a testsuite/script collecting the different queries, which are found in short/mid term profiling.

Bye, Olaf.

 

[GriffMG]

Yes it's quite difficult to maintain an app - in conjunction with any third party interface - if you don't have source code access.

Regards

Griff
Keep [Smile]ing

There are 10 kinds of people in the world, those who understand binary and those who don't.

I'm trying to cut down on the use of shrieks (exclamation marks), I'm told they are !good for you. ​

 

[Olaf Doschke]

The situation is also complex, if you are the vendor of the VFP app but only have access to the database of some software version and can't prepare for unannounced changes of interface or database of the software you do an add-on for. It becomes easier, if an add-on uses intended extensibility vectors. The situation might be simpler, anyway you can't simply say yes, nor should you assume no.

I only assume the VFP app is an add on and not the major application, you would rarely only update the database server for security or performance reason, and I don't see a VFP developer mainly using an Oracle backend, they either use DBF or MSSQL or perhaps MySQL. An Oracle backend is not rare, I've come along questions about Oracle ODBC and even AS400 mainframes, but most of theses cases the VFP part is just a third party add on.

There's a reason official SAP extensions and licensed SAP consultants are more expensive - and even though they could perhaps upgrade their software in accordance of SAP or profit from integration tests SAP or Oracle does, I hear these extensions are often judged not worth the extra price.

Bye, Olaf.

 

[RoadRunnerOz]

Yes it's going to be fun. We own the app but they own the database. VFP exceeded the 2 gig limit 10 years ago so
they decided to move to oracle. We have no access to the database except through the app.

Michael Ouellette