Release Notes

SharePlex™ 9.0

Release Notes

Revision: 8/16/2017

About SharePlex

SharePlex provides high-speed replication from Oracle and SQL Server databases to different target databases and messaging containers on major Unix, Linux and Windows platforms — both on-premise and in the cloud. SharePlex supports a wide variety of configurations to meet different and complex data availability needs.

SharePlex supports reliable Oracle high availability configurations where replication maintains a duplicate database in a different location that is ready for fast, seamless failover and failback in planned or unplanned mode.

You can also use SharePlex to replicate data from Oracle and SQL Server sources to maintain a change history database in an Oracle target. Rather than updating or deleting target rows based on the source change, SharePlex inserts a new row on the target for every source change. The result is an archive that reflects the chronological history of every change made to the source database.

SharePlex also includes, at no extra charge, the compare and repair tools that you need to verify the accuracy of a target maintained by replication. These tools not only detect hidden out-of-sync conditions, but they also repair the target to restore parity of your source and target data.

SharePlex value and versatility continues to grow with the requirements and requests of our customers. Although SharePlex is a reliable, relatively low-maintenance solution, our top-rated support team is ready around the clock to help with any trouble you may have. To get you started with your deployment, our professional services team is highly experienced and readily available.

Join our community

For expert advice and the latest news about SharePlex, join the SharePlex Community at www.quest.com/community. Take advantage of our forums, blogs, videos, and more from our own experts, as well as input from our customers and partners.

About this release

This is a patch release with little or no new functionality.

New Features

New features in this release

The following new features are introduced in this release.

For more information about each of these features, see the documentation that is provided with this release.

Note about the documentation:

The following content from the Administration Guide has been moved to the Installation Guide:

• Set up an Oracle environment for replication (Formerly Prepare an Oracle environment for replication)
• Set up replication between different database types (Formerly Configure replication to Open Target targets)

Additionally, the Installation Guide now includes the following new setup topics:

• Set up replication between SQL Server databases
• Installation and setup for cloud-hosted databases

Capture from SQL Server tables

SharePlex can now capture from Microsoft SQL Server tables. The following are specifics for configuring SQL Server tables for capture:

Support for MySQL

SharePlex now supports replication to a MySQL target. Ther following new utilities support this target:

• mysql_setup: Sets up connectivity to the MySQL database for SharePlex.
• mysql_cleansp: Restores a MySQL replication environment to a clean state.

For more information about these utilities, see the SharePlex Reference Guide.

New horizontal partitioning configuration

Horizontal partitioning is now completely database-independent and no longer requires inserts into a database table.

To configure horizontal partitioning, you use the following commands in sp_ctrl:

add partition

drop partition

drop partition scheme

modify partition

view partitions

See the SharePlex Reference Guide for more information.

Event log aging

The SharePlex event log is no longer truncated when the file reaches its maximum size. Now, when file reaches its maximum size, it is renamed to event_log_n, where n is a sequence number, and then a new file is created as the active log. For example, when the first event log reaches its maximum size, it is renamed to event_log_0000000001 and then a new file is opened as the active event log. When that file reaches its maximum size, it is renamed to event_log_0000000002, and so forth.

New and changed parameters

The following parameters were introduced.

• SP_OPO_NLS_DEFAULT_COMPAT: This parameter controls whether Post converts character data (CHAR, VARCHAR). By default no conversion is performed. When set 7, Post will not convert character data, but will convert CLOB data. The compare/repair commands will compare and repair character data without conversion and CLOB data with conversion. The replication of NCHAR data is not affected. SP_OPO_NLS_DEFAULT_COMPAT takes precedence over SP_OPO_NLS_CONVERSION.
• SP_OPO_UPDATE_SCN: This parameter controls the tracking of Oracle SCNs and allows SharePlex to recover quickly when operating in a high-availability cluster. When this parameter is enabled, SharePlex tracks SCNs in its internal transaction table. This enables SharePlex to activate to the lowest applied transaction and then reconcile to the correct transaction when there is a failover.

• SP_DEQ_PARTIAL_REPAIR_CLR_OOS: This parameter enables the repair process to clear out-of-sync messages from the statusdb for a table after a compare-repair of only a subset of rows of that table, such as:

  • Row subsets specified with a WHERE clause or an Oracle [sub]partition name.
  • Row subsets specified with horizontally partitioned replication.
• SP_OCT_DDL_UPDATE_CONFIG: This parameter controls whether SharePlex updates the table name in the configuration file when processing ALTER TABLE RENAME. By default, SharePlex updates the table name when it processes this DDL operation. To prevent updates the configuration file, disable this parameter.
• SP_OCT_TRUNC_PARTITION_BY_ID: For Oracle 12.2 or later, setting SP_OCT_TRUNC_PARITION_BY_ID is not necessary, and the setting of the parameter will be ignored. The requirement to set it for earlier Oracle versions still remains. For more information about setting this parameter, see the SharePlex Reference Guide

See the SharePlex Reference Guide for more information.

Delete queue enhancements

The delete commands to delete queues and export processes have been simplified. The following are the new commands:

delete capture queue for datasource

delete export process to host [queue queuename]

delete export queue queuename

delete post queue queuename for datasource-datadest [cleartrans]

See the SharePlex Reference Guide for more information.

Support for IPv6

SharePlex now supports the IPv6 protocol. SharePlex automatically detects whether IPv4 or IPv6 is in use on a server.

Note:  See the System Requirements for platforms that were tested.

Deprecations

Deprecations in this release

This section contains a list of SharePlex items that were deprecated in this release line.

Note: For a list of all deprecated parameters and commands, their replacements (if any), and the version of SharePlex in which they were deprecated, see the SharePlex Reference Guide.

9.0

• The name of the SP_OCT_TARGET_COMPATIBILITY parameter has been changed to SP_SYS_TARGET_COMPATIBILITY.
• The SP_XPT_ALTERNATE_HOST parameter is deprecated. To update the SharePlex configuration with the alternate IP address, run the provision utility. For more information, see the SharePlex Reference Guide.

Resolved Issues

Resolved Issues in this release

Resolved in version 9.0

Resolved in version 9.0