More News On The 9.2.0.5 Patchset For Oracle OLAP Users

More news on the Oracle 9i 9.2.0.5 patchset, and it's suitability for Oracle OLAP users.

Anthony Waite confirms in an OTN OLAP Forum posting that the 9.2.0.5 patchset contains all of the functionality in the previous 9.2.0.4 patchset, and the 9.2.0.4.1 OLAP-specific patchset. As there are no API changes in the 9.2.0.5 release, existing tools such as the Analytic Workspace Manager and the Oracle Warehouse Builder OLAP Bridge should work, although he's registered a bug with the AWM Aggregation Wizard, which used to work with the 9.2.0.4.1 release but doesn't now with the 9.2.0.5 release. The 9.2.0.5 patchset also includes a number of bug fixes and enhancements that build on the 9.2.0.4.1 release, so it's probably worth checking out as long as you're not currently using the AWM Aggregation Wizard.

Anthony also confirms in another post that there'll be a further OLAP-specific patch, known as OLAP PS# 3557028 (a.k.a. OLAP 9.2.0.5.0A) coming out later in April, that contains functionality required for EPB and the new thin-client BI Beans. Lastly, Anthony also confirms that the current BI Beans release (9.2.0.3) will work with the 9.2.0.5 patchset, although Keith Laker advises us to be careful applying the patch, as it's a quite complicated process and can easily break if applied incorrectly.

Lastly, the word on comp.databases.oracle.server is that the 9.2.0.5 patchset won't be the terminal patchset for Oracle 9i, and that there'll be a further 9.2.0.6 patchset released by the end of 2004. The significance of the 'terminal patchset' designation is that some customers wait until the terminal patchset before attempting an upgrade from an earlier release (as this is when all the issues should have been ironed-out) so it looks as if it'll be a while yet before we get to this final state.