Direct Oracle Access (DOA) - do they really work?
Sergei Zhyzhyn
Hi all.
If you are using DOA from Allround Automations in real life development,
you can help a lot by sharing your experience/views. People know about
DOA, but there is no real feed back on it - either because it is so good
people simply use it and never have any problems (and never ask any
questions) or nobody is using it!!!
Specific questions:
1) Does the Delphi source code (you can buy) call OCI directly or does it
call an (intermidiate) C library with no source to it?
2) Is TOracleDataset flexible enough to do validation and so on properly?
Is it really good to be used daily?
3) It looks like one can share an Oracle connection from many apps by
having TOracleConnection in a DLL - anybody tried it?
Thanks VERY much.
Sergei.
Marco Kalter
It seems that all of our (happy) users are too busy to answer you. Let
me answer some of your questions:
1) Direct Oracle Access calls OCI directly from within the Delphi
source code.
2) The TOracleDataSet can pick up server constraints dynamically and
allows you to translate error codes/messages to something more user
friendly. Server-side check constraints that apply to one column (e.g.
Sal between 1000 and 3000) can be immediately checked when the user
enters a value.
3) If you mean that one database session can be shared by several
applications, than this requires a 3 Tier architecture, which we're
working on right now.
Marco Kalter
Allround Automations
Gurkan Karagoz
Marco is right.
I am one of the happy users of DOA , and really busy to write something
about it.
Sergei Zhyzhyn
Thanks Marco.
> It seems that all of our (happy) users are too busy to answer you.
Could you give a (rough) estimate of how many sites are actually using it
for industrial-strength systems?
> Let
> me answer some of your questions:
>
> 1) Direct Oracle Access calls OCI directly from within the Delphi
> source code.
And it does not have any DOA C/C++ DLLs, as I discovered (we bought src
already). Great.
>
> 2) The TOracleDataSet can pick up server constraints dynamically and
> allows you to translate error codes/messages to something more user
> friendly. Server-side check constraints that apply to one column (e.g.
> Sal between 1000 and 3000) can be immediately checked when the user
> enters a value.
Thanks.
Is there a .pas file with Oracle error codes defined somewhere - so I can
use a named constant as opposed to a number when I am checking it? I hate
using 1827 in my code. Or is it too version specific?
> 3) If you mean that one database session can be shared by several
> applications, than this requires a 3 Tier architecture, which we're
> working on right now.
Although Borland is doing it somehow with D3 (when you run dbexplorer form
IDE it seems to share the same connection). But this is probably because it
runs it as a DLL -
and this is possible with DOA too, isn't it?
Just a couple of questions.
1.Is it possible to write my own SQL (use TOracleQuery for example) and do
updates insert deletes to records from a TOracleDataSet (- effectively I
want to do it myself sometimes, but still keep TOracleDataSet to get the
populate a DBGrid for me). This is similar to cached updates, but I am
happy to do it for current record, so I do not need cache. This would be
usefull if I need to update 2 tables joined in a select.
2.If above is possible - can I have a TOracleDataset based on a stored
procedure (using a PL-SQL block somehow maybe?) and then do
updates/deletes/inserts myself. Otherwise I have to populate a
non-database aware grid manually and code navigation through it and so on
manually.
3. Is there a way of seeng fired selects while you debug a DOA app (like
you can with SQL Monitor in BDE)? Preferably on a PC?
Thanks for your time. I really beleive DOA is great, but you are small (one
person? two people?) and my (big) company is going to evaluate it properly
before committing to it and I NEED FEEDBACK BADLY.
Sergei Zhyzhyn
Dear Gurkan and everybody using DOA out there.
Gurkan Karagoz <gur...@workmail.com> wrote in article
<3541F637...@workmail.com>...
> Marco is right.
> I am one of the happy users of DOA , and really busy to write something
> about it.
Thanks. At least there is one(?) person who is happy ( I am not - I am on
BDE).
Please if you have time.
1. Are you 100% happy? (too good to be true?)
2. How many programs/lines/projects written OR years/months are you
using DOA?
3. Did you try BDE before DOA? Missing some/many BDE features in DOA?
4.What you hate in BDE most and how it is solved in DOA for you?
5.How often do you use database - aware controls and TOracleDataSet
and
6.how often you have to use non-database-aware controls with it?
Thanks again. DOA FOREVER?
Sergei.
>
>
>
> Marco Kalter wrote:
> >
> > It seems that all of our (happy) users are too busy to answer you. Let
Stuart Rich
Gurkan,
I have been using DOA for a large Oracle 7.3 project for the past eight
months. I could not be happier with either the product, which is excellent,
or the support, which is even better. By eliminating the BDE, I was able to
significantly speed up the application. I have found that there is nothing
that I needed to do with my application that could not be elegantly handled
by DOA. It is truly a superb product if drastically underpriced.
A word about support. I have truly never found an organization that offers
such remarkable tech support. I have never waited more than 48 hours for an
answer to my questions and often receive an answer within 8 hours. I have
often found answers from Marco on issues that should rightfully been asked
of Oracle. But as you may have noticed, Oracle's tech support really
STINKS.
In my humble opinion, anyone who is developing for Oracle with Delphi3 and
is NOT using DOA is really hurting themselves and the project.
Hope that this helps.
Stu Rich
St. George Consulting Group
stu...@midcoast.com
Gurkan Karagoz wrote in message <3541F637...@workmail.com>...
>Marco is right.
>I am one of the happy users of DOA , and really busy to write something
>about it.
>
>
>
Gurkan Karagoz
Sergei,
Your questions are really very important. I am going to answer them as a
user. Some of them are for Marco and I am also looking for the answers.
> 1. Are you 100% happy? (too good to be true?)
Let's say %99!
> 2. How many programs/lines/projects written OR years/months are you
> using DOA?
> 3. Did you try BDE before DOA? Missing some/many BDE features in DOA?
> 4.What you hate in BDE most and how it is solved in DOA for you?
One answer for the last three question. I started to develop a large
application for an international company (Organon) six months ago. The
project was a complete office automation project from A to Z. I used
BDE first, but I hate to install the BDE for more than 100 clients.
While BDE is a general tool , DOA is only for delphi and oracle. BDE
does not use some important features of Oracle. For example, with BDE
you cannot change the size of buffer of retrieved rows dynamically, DOA
does it. With this option my reports are now 5 times faster. To see the
real difference you must have a large database. The company has more
than 1 million entries for a year, and they have to be keep them for 5
years.
I am waiting the answers of these questions from Marco.
Marco Kalter
Hello Sergei,
>Could you give a (rough) estimate of how many sites are actually using it
>for industrial-strength systems?
Amongst our clients are Banks, Airports, (huge) Software companies,
Hospitals, (Nuclear) research companies, and so on. But I must admit I
don't always know what kind of applications they are developing.
> Is there a .pas file with Oracle error codes defined somewhere - so I can
>use a named constant as opposed to a number when I am checking it? I hate
>using 1827 in my code. Or is it too version specific?
We didn't do this, there are just too many of them. They are not
version specific though.
>Although Borland is doing it somehow with D3 (when you run dbexplorer form
>IDE it seems to share the same connection). But this is probably because it
>runs it as a DLL -
>and this is possible with DOA too, isn't it?
Yes, the same is possible with DOA. Our SQL property editor and
database explorer do this as well.
>
>Just a couple of questions.
>
>1.Is it possible to write my own SQL (use TOracleQuery for example) and do
>updates insert deletes to records from a TOracleDataSet (- effectively I
>want to do it myself sometimes, but still keep TOracleDataSet to get the
>populate a DBGrid for me). This is similar to cached updates, but I am
>happy to do it for current record, so I do not need cache. This would be
>usefull if I need to update 2 tables joined in a select.
We are working on this for the next release (3.1). We will create an
event that you can use to insert, update, delete and lock records. It
will not be related to cached updates.
>
>2.If above is possible - can I have a TOracleDataset based on a stored
>procedure (using a PL-SQL block somehow maybe?) and then do
>updates/deletes/inserts myself. Otherwise I have to populate a
>non-database aware grid manually and code navigation through it and so on
>manually.
This will be possible in 3.1, but 3.0 already allows you to execute a
stored procedure that returns a cursor variable and let the
TOracleDataSet handle the inserts, updates, deletes and locks.
>
>3. Is there a way of seeng fired selects while you debug a DOA app (like
>you can with SQL Monitor in BDE)? Preferably on a PC?
The Debug property of a TOracleQuery, TOracleDataSet and
TOraclePackage will cause each SQL statement that is executed to be
displayed in a messagebox.
>
>
>Thanks for your time. I really beleive DOA is great, but you are small (one
>person? two people?) and my (big) company is going to evaluate it properly
>before committing to it and I NEED FEEDBACK BADLY.
We are a little bit bigger than you think. It is a wise decision to
evaluate a development tool thoroughly.
Greetings,
Marco Kalter
Allround Automations
Kyle Cordes
>I have been using DOA for a large Oracle 7.3 project for the past eight
>months. I could not be happier with either the product, which is excellent,
>or the support, which is even better. By eliminating the BDE, I was able to
>significantly speed up the application. I have found that there is nothing
>that I needed to do with my application that could not be elegantly handled
>by DOA. It is truly a superb product if drastically underpriced.
>
>A word about support. I have truly never found an organization that offers
>such remarkable tech support. I have never waited more than 48 hours for an
>answer to my questions and often receive an answer within 8 hours. I have
>often found answers from Marco on issues that should rightfully been asked
>of Oracle. But as you may have noticed, Oracle's tech support really
>STINKS.
Would you like to contribute some of these comments in a review in my BDE
Alternatives Guide?
[* ky...@kylecordes.com | Delphi Developers: *]
[* Kyle Cordes Software Solutions | Come see the *]
[* http://www.kylecordes.com | BDE Alternatives Guide *]
Kyle Cordes
>> 2. How many programs/lines/projects written OR years/months are you
>> using DOA?
>> 3. Did you try BDE before DOA? Missing some/many BDE features in DOA?
>> 4.What you hate in BDE most and how it is solved in DOA for you?
>One answer for the last three question. I started to develop a large
>application for an international company (Organon) six months ago. The
>project was a complete office automation project from A to Z. I used
>BDE first, but I hate to install the BDE for more than 100 clients.
>While BDE is a general tool , DOA is only for delphi and oracle. BDE
>does not use some important features of Oracle. For example, with BDE
>you cannot change the size of buffer of retrieved rows dynamically, DOA
>does it. With this option my reports are now 5 times faster. To see the
>real difference you must have a large database. The company has more
>than 1 million entries for a year, and they have to be keep them for 5
>years.
>
>I am waiting the answers of these questions from Marco.
>
>>3. Is there a way of seeng fired selects while you debug a DOA app (like
>>you can with SQL Monitor in BDE)? Preferably on a PC?
>>Thanks for your time. I really beleive DOA is great, but you are small (one
>>person? two people?) and my (big) company is going to evaluate it properly
>>before committing to it and I NEED FEEDBACK BADLY.
Same question - would you like to contribute some comments to the BDE
Alternatives Guide? Come take a look.
Sergei Zhyzhyn
Hi all.
If you are using DOA, PLEASE SHARE YOUR VEWS.
Anything you think about it and:
1. Are you 100% happy? (too good to be true?)
2. How many programs/lines/projects written OR years/months are you
using DOA?
3. Did you try BDE before DOA? Missing some/many BDE features in DOA?
4.What you hate in BDE most and how it is solved in DOA for you?
5.How often do you use database - aware controls and TOracleDataSet
and
6.how often you have to use non-database-aware controls with it?
Thanks again. DOA FOREVER?
Sergei.
Sergei Zhyzhyn <zh...@sherwood.co.uk> wrote in article
<01bd6d1b$16b531c0$190881c2@zhyzspc>...
Piers Whitney
Sergei Zhyzhyn wrote:
> Hi all.
> If you are using DOA, PLEASE SHARE YOUR VEWS.
> Anything you think about it and:
>
> 1. Are you 100% happy? (too good to be true?)
> 2. How many programs/lines/projects written OR years/months are you
> using DOA?
> 3. Did you try BDE before DOA? Missing some/many BDE features in DOA?
> 4.What you hate in BDE most and how it is solved in DOA for you?
> 5.How often do you use database - aware controls and TOracleDataSet
> and
> 6.how often you have to use non-database-aware controls with it?
>
> Thanks again. DOA FOREVER?
> Sergei.
Hello Sergei,
I have been using DOA for the last 7 or 8 months to develop quite a
sophisticated Aerospace Spares tracking and inventory management system. I
have to say that DOA is one of the best sets of components that I have ever
used. I started developing our software using BDE and SQL Links but after some
problems with Oracle 8 I tried out DOA and then decided to rewrite the software
to use DOA instead. A great advantage of DOA over BDE for me is that it is
much faster - the software is now probably at least twice as fast.
One of the things that I disliked about BDE was the number of redistributable
files that had to be packaged with an application. With DOA there are no extra
redistributables.
Our application uses data aware controls extensively - both the standard
borland ones and Infopower ones which require the TwwOracleDataset. I have not
yet come across a situation where I have had to use a non data aware control
instead.
Also the tech. support from Allround Automations is superb. On the very few
occasions when I have needed to ask a question I have received an answer that
solved the problem within 24 hours.
Since using DOA I would not even consider going back to using the BDE for
Oracle Development.
Hope this assists.
Most definitely DOA FOREVER!
Piers Whitney.
Software Development Director - Oakenhurst Aviation Management LTD
toadman
** I thought I responded before but I must of replied to the original sender
via email. So here goes...
Sergei Zhyzhyn wrote:
> Thanks. At least there is one(?) person who is happy ( I am not - I am on
> BDE). Please if you have time.
>
> 1. Are you 100% happy? (too good to be true?)
You're talking about with DOA, right? Otherwise, I gotta go into finances,
marraige, kids, etc. Yes, I'm totally happy with DOA. The only complaints I
have relate to bugs in the Net8 and Oracle 8 but DOA has been addressing them
or finding workarounds immediately. Compared to the BDE , I'm happy enough
to mess myself. You won't find better support in a product and compared to
virtually no support for the BDE, that's a big step up. .
I converted a very Oracle-intensive application (see www.toadsoft.com if you
want to actually download it) from BDE to DOA in one weekend. Smooth as silk.
> 2. How many programs/lines/projects written OR years/months are you
> using DOA?
TOAD is about 1.8mg compiled. I've been using it since last November.
> 3. Did you try BDE before DOA? Missing some/many BDE features in DOA?
Intensely. I've been using the BDE since Delphi 1. I was the technical lead
on several large Delphi/BDE projects. I originally wrote TOAD usig the
BDE. The only thing missing from the BDE are all bad things, so I dont
really miss them at all. I can not tell you how happy I am to be away from
that awful monster.
> 4.What you hate in BDE most and how it is solved in DOA for you?
BDE1) Sheer Godzilla size (to ship and to load) 2) Installation nightmares
for users 3) Too many bugs not fixed through multiple versions such as
updated rows being refreshed in the cursor without refreshing the entire
cursor. 4) BDE not understanding Oracle.
DOA:
1) VERY small and compiles into the program. The footprint of my program was
cut by 3/4!! Absolutely no install for my users. They fire up my app and
connect to Oracle in minutes. DOA does Oracle and only Oracle- they KNOW
Oracle. I can refresh (actually, it's automatic) individual rows following
updates in live datasets (and Delphi advocates have argued for years that it
wasn't even possible); Varchars are handled as normal strings; lowerlevel stuf
that I use in TOAD is all readily available; NET8 support was incorporated
when it came out.
> 5.How often do you use database - aware controls and TOracleDataSet
> and
Yes. But the only data bound control I use is the dbGrid. You can also buy
DOA with source which means you should'nt have any problems anyway.
> 6.how often you have to use non-database-aware controls with it?
98% of the time.
> Thanks again. DOA FOREVER?
At least as long as Oracle exists!
My question to you is this: As inexpensive as the DOA package is, why are you
sitting here asking questions and not ordering a copy (or copies)? But DO
get the full source version. Not just for DOA; never accept a VCL that
doesn't come with source.
scott
How about a MSSQL server version?
Sergei Zhyzhyn <zh...@sherwood.co.uk> wrote in article
<01bd7353$d3252a70$190881c2@zhyzspc>...
> Hi all.
> If you are using DOA, PLEASE SHARE YOUR VEWS.
> Anything you think about it and:
>
> 1. Are you 100% happy? (too good to be true?)
> 2. How many programs/lines/projects written OR years/months are you
> using DOA?
> 3. Did you try BDE before DOA? Missing some/many BDE features in DOA?
> 4.What you hate in BDE most and how it is solved in DOA for you?
> 5.How often do you use database - aware controls and TOracleDataSet
> and