In the new version, we’ve made a huge effort to improve usability of our Intellisense and paid a lot of attention to the application quality in general. Together with the new features, meet new look of the suggestion list and new level of the usability of our application!

New features

• Support of SQL Server 2012 and SQL Server Compact Edition As support for the new version of SQL Server was introduced together with full support for Compact Edition, developers got an opportunity to use the advanced SQL Intellisense functionality with any server version and edition, starting with SQL Server 2000 and up to SQL Azure.
• Column picker feature New functionality will make it possible to create SELECT and INSERT queries, as it allows defining column lists for selecting, grouping, sorting and inserting without typing any code at all. The suggestion list appearance was changed – now it supports hierarchical view for table columns and shows information about data type.
• Intellisense in SQLCMD mode Scripts that are executed with the help of the command line utility, are usually parameterized. But often it is the reason of the fact that ability to show correct suggestions for objects is lost, because database or schema name can be a variable. Now SQL Complete solves this problem. Values of variables are taken from the text of the document and object suggestions work as with an ordinary SQL script.
• Automatic formatting of keywords on typing Keywords are formatted according to the option settings. This will help to avoid appearance of keywords written in different registry, when part of them was inserted from the suggestion list and part was typed manually.
• Extended and revised SQL Snippets We’ve revised existing code templates, added new ones, and changed the behavior of the suggestion list on selecting a template. This will allow choosing the needed template as quickly as possible and reducing time needed for typing recurring code constructions. Also keep in mind that users can create their own SQL snippets with the help of the special editor.
• Extended T-SQL syntax support Context-sensitive prompt of objects in the MERGE statement and a number of SQL Server 2012 T-SQL construction is supported.
• SQL formatting improved Formatting of procedure and function code, CASE statements, comments, and column list inserted on wildcard expansion is improved.
• Express edition feature set extended The free Express edition of our product is also improved. Now it supports SQL Server 2012 and SQL Server Compact Edition. Besides, information on columns is expanded, and hierarchical list structure that simplifies working with SELECT and INSERT statements is also available in the free edition.

Availability

Consumers can give the updated dbForge SQL Complete a test drive by downloading the 30-day trial Standard edition at the product download page. SQL Complete’s Standard edition is available for a retail price of $99.95. Volume discounts apply.

If you don’t need advanced code completion features but want to get more than SSMS IntelliSense can give, you are welcome to try free Express edition.

To leave feedback, users can go to the dbForge SQL Complete feedback page. The Devart team is looking forward to receiving any comments and suggestions.

As Christmas holidays are drawing closer, we offer you to get 20% off any product license order.

Don’t think twice, just save 20%. And what more, you get free access to all future releases of the respective products for one year.

Hurry up, this offer is available only from December 01, 2011 till January 10, 2012. Decide and order right now.

We wish you all the best in the coming year, let joy and happiness be your constant partners and friends!

Best Christmas Wishes,
Devart Team

As a result we’ve devoted the new release of dbForge Studio for Oracle to improving the possibilities for users who work with PL/SQL code and data. And in addition we’ve improved the application performance and added support for Win-x64 platform.

dbForge Studio for Oracle v3.1

New Features

• 150 improvements in the code autocompletion system
  We’ve made nearly 150 changes and improvements in the dbForge Studio for Oracle component that helps users edit PL/SQL code. Among them:
  • Oracle SQL and PL/SQL syntax support is expanded
  • Work of quick info hints for schema objects is improved
  • Keywords case is changed automatically on typing (if the corresponding options are set)
  • Usability shortcomings and errors are fixed
• SQL document works with additional PL/SQL file types:
  • Support for editing .pls, .plb, .pks, .pkb, .pck Oracle PL/SQL files is added
  • Support for editing files with PL/SQL code created in some competitor products is added
• Data export to SQL statements
  • Possibility to export data to INSERT, UPDATE, DELETE, and MERGE statements is added
  • Data can be exported from a table or data grid using a wizard
  • Quick export from data grid without opening wizard
• Convenient work with result sets of several SELECT queries
  If there is more than one SELECT statement in a document, after execution query results will be displayed on separate tabs in the Data window.Such approach allows working with each data set independently.
• Editing data of object fields
  The new product version provides possibility to edit data in object fields in tables using a pop-up editor.
• Support for editing temporary tables
  There is a capability to create and edit temporary tables in Table Editor.
• Document Outline window for code navigation is improved
  • Grouping nodes by IF, FOR, etc. flow-control statements blocks is added
  • Displaying labels and navigation among them is added
• More convenient working with query execution plan
  • Quick query plan obtaining (without turning the Profiling mode on) is added
  • Displaying of the EXPLAIN PLAN results without creating an additional table in the user’s scheme is added
• Performance improvements
  • Time required on application startup and connection opening is reduced
  • Building of the Database Explorer tree, refreshing it, and receiving table list is quicker now
  • Getting metadata for code completion becomes faster
  • Work of Schema Export with large amount of objects and data is improved
  • Data Editor working speed is increased
  • Object Viewer and Property Browser windows working speed is increased
  • Navigation to schema object editors from code is improved
• Win-x64 Native Support
  Now the application does not require 32-bit Oracle client software installed when working with 64-bit Windows operating system – the application works with 64-bit Oracle client software.

Availability

Consumers can give the updated dbForge Studio for Oracle a test drive by downloading the free Express edition or the 30-day trial Professional edition at the product download page. dbForge Studio license price starts at $149.95.

To leave feedback, users can go to the dbForge Studio for Oracle feedback page. The Devart team is looking forward to receiving any comments and suggestions.

SQL Complete SSMS add-in

New Features

• Linked servers support The new version of SQL Complete features support for IntelliSense when working with linked servers. Just imagine – now you can type your queries with the kind of IntelliSense you are accustomed to even when using all advantages of linked servers configuration!
• SQL statements support extended Standard edition provides support for GRANT, REVOKE, DENY, ENABLE/DISABLE TRIGGER, and ALTER SCHEMA statements.
• New Highlight Occurrences option The new option allows you to turn highlighting of occurrences on and off. Besides, all existing options were rearranged to improve product’s usability.

Improvements

• Usability of code completion improvement We revised rules for showing suggestion list especially when editing existing SQL queries. Now the suggestion list does not appear for arithmetic operations, numbers, and semicolons.
• Installation process customization We improved the product’s usability basing on users’ requests. Now you can select the development environment in which SQL Complete will function when installing the add-in – just select the needed environment from the list of available environments on a special page of the installation wizard.
• Tracing support We added tracing support for you to help us find and fix errors in our application – if you encountered any problems with SQL Complete, start tracing and send the created file to Devart afterwards.

Express Edition Extension

• SQL statements support extended Support for DROP, EXEC, DECLARE, and SET statements was added.
• Variables and parameters support
• Qualify Column Names option is available

Availability

Consumers can give the updated dbForge SQL Complete a test drive by downloading the 30-day trial Standard edition at the product download page. SQL Complete’s Standard edition is available for an estimated retail price of $99.95.

If you don’t need advanced code completion features but want to get more than SSMS IntelliSense can give, you are welcome to try free Express edition.

To leave feedback, users can go to the dbForge SQL Complete feedback page. The Devart team is looking forward to receiving any comments and suggestions.

dbForge Studio for MySQL - Best IDE Product

Support Your Favorite Devart Products in 2011 DevProConnections Voting!

We would like to invite you to take part in 2011 DevProConnections voting. The Community Choice Awards, as presented by Windows IT Pro, SQL Server Magazine, and DevProConnections, allow you to decide, which IT products get chosen for acclaim and recognition.

This year Devart dbForge Studio for MySQL is nominated in the following category.

2011 DevProConnections Community Choice Awards:

Category 14 (page 2): Best IDE Product – dbForge Studio for MySQL

If you think that Devart’s MySQL GUI Client is worth of being the best in the given categories, vote now for your favourite Devart products:

2011 DevProConnections Community Choice Awards

With Best Wishes,
The Devart Team

Main New Features Highlights

New SQL Server versions support

SQL Server 2011 (codename Denali)
SQL Azure
SQL Server Compact edition

Added integration into Visual Studio

Visual Studio 2010: Professional, Premium, and Ultimate editions
Visual Studio 2008: Professional and Team System editions

“Go to definition” for database objects

This function allows navigating from code editor to the object in the Object Explorer (Server Explorer in VS) tree.

When the cursor is on the object identifier, the program will find the needed object and show it in the treeview on pressing F12 or clicking the corresponding item in the context menu.

If the object is declared in the script, the cursor will be moved to the beginning of its declaration.

Code Snippets

This feature makes it easy and convenient to use fragments of code over and over. The new functionality includes:

Showing code templates in the dropdown list
Opening templates on pressing Tab
Adding and editing templates with the help of templates manager
Possibility to add parameters to templates. Parameter values are entered by a user on inserting

New code completion features

IntelliSense for temporary tables and table variables
Expand EXEC statement feature. All parameters with value stoppers are inserted automatically on pressing Tab
sys.sp_* procedures are now suggested without schema prefix in EXEC statement
Expand ALTER statement for procedure, function, view, and trigger. Object body is inserted into the document automatically on pressing Tab
Suggestions for DROP statements added
Context-sensitive code completion for CREATE TRIGGER statement
Extended support for T-SQL DECLARE statement
Option for including default schema (dbo) into object name when pasting it into the text
Hierarchyid data type support in code completion

Document Outline window

This feature makes navigating through large SQL documents a real pleasure. The Document Outline window shows the structure of the current document. Besides, a user can synchronize structure with text right from the code.

Highlight occurrences of an identifier

This unique feature allows users to see all entries of an identifier in the document text. When the cursor is on the identifier, after a time lag all occurrences of this identifier into the text are highlighted.

SQL formatting component improved

Stream formatting for large documents. Application no longer hangs when formatting large SQL document. User can cancel the formatting process
Common table expression formatting supported
New formatting options for indenting JOIN clauses
Message for invalid statements

Quick database object information extended

Tool tip with parameters and descriptions of procedures and functions is shown
Tool tip with columns list when the mouse cursor hovers over the asterisk in the SELECT list is shown
For the alias in the FROM list, a table or expression with the list of columns is shown (if possible)
Now name, type, keys, and some other properties are shown for columns
Quick info is shown for the dropdown list items

“Execute current statement” feature

Now user can execute the current SQL statement (i.e. the one where the input cursor is located) in the document using the hot key.

Performance improvements

Formatting speed increased
Parsing speed of complex statements increased

What about SQL Complete Express?

Of course, most functionality is available only in the Standard edition of SQL Complete.

But all the same some improvements were made in the Express edition. There are the new features that were added:

Support for the new SQL Server versions
Visual Studio integration
SQL formatting component improvements
“Execute current statement” feature
Performance improvements

Availability

Consumers can give the updated dbForge SQL Complete a test drive by downloading the free Express edition or the 30-day trial Standard edition at the product download page. SQL Complete’s Standard edition is available for an estimated retail price of $49.95.

To leave feedback, users can go to the dbForge SQL Complete feedback page. The Devart team is looking forward to receiving any comments and suggestions.

Funny video about history of our MySQL GUI tool

We did not intend to have a professional video made by clip-makers. The video was shot frame-by-frame using a common digital camera. After that jpg files were rendered to the mp4 video format. Shooting took almost 7 hours. All models were made by hand from plasticine by one of our employees, whose hobby is design and model-making. All of us want to thank him for this!

Cutting-Edge MySQL GUI Client: dbForge Studio for MySQL

With the help of our users we could work on the product on the new level, and as a result of such successful tight cooperation its standard of quality grew. This new standard includes taking into account actual needs of people using our product and implementing their exact requirements except studying the market in general and implementing features that are theoretically demanded.

When you open the application to get acquainted with the new version, you will be surely stunned and pleasantly surprised by its new look. When you start using it, we hope you will be thrilled by the inner improvements and make the best use of them:

Dependencies List

First of all, test the usability of Dependencies List – a unique feature that will allow you to see the object’s references and dependants. No more need to spend precious minutes on looking all this up!

Full support for MySQL server 5.5

Master-Detail Data Browser

You are welcome to explore and analyze master-detail data in a browser with rich settings, and save your data and diagrams for future use.

Enhanced Data Editor

Foreign key lookup editor was added. Resources of client machines will be spared with server-side sorting and filtering. Data Editor now informs about its state. Capabilities to edit tables in join statements, to number records, copy data with header, and build graphical representation of data with a wizard are now available.

Improved Security Manager

Maintaining server security is one of the most responsible tasks. We did our best to make it easier by redesigning Security Manager. Now you can edit several users at once, group them by hosts, and grant definite sets of privileges with the help of virtual roles.

Data Export and Import improvements

Export data from several tables at once and save your time by exporting and importing data through the command line.

Object Viewer - a simple way to view object’s details

Object Viewer (formerly known as Summary Window) was totally redesigned to provide an easier way for analyzing objects and their structure.

Appearance improvements

Brand new start page for quick access to the most frequently used features and new skins for a better look.

Other improvements

Ability to view internal SQL queries that are sent to the server with parameter’s values added
Few UI improvements in Database Explorer were made
Options to ignore clauses during the comparison of events added to the Schema Comparison wizard
Highlighting of differences on comparing SQL profiling results added
More informative progress during Schema and Data comparison

Availability

Consumers can give the updated dbForge Studio for MySQL a test drive by downloading the free Express edition or the 30-day trial Professional edition at the product download page. dbForge Studio license price starts at $49.95.

To leave feedback, users can go to the dbForge Studio for MySQL feedback page. The Devart team is looking forward to receiving any comments and suggestions.

Downloads: http://www.devart.com/dbforge/mysql/studio/download.html

So what functionality should be available in such tool?

Firstly, the tool should be easy-to-use and user-friendly. A user should not be obliged to learn a pile of topics in the tool documentation before using it. It should be enough to perform the following set of steps:
1) Select Source and Target
2) Select a schema or several schemas (if the tool provides such possibility) for comparison
3) Tune comparison process by checking the needed options (an optional step)
4) View comparison results
5) Tune script generation options (an optional step)
6) Generate an update script and/or execute it directly to the target database
Secondly, the tool should support comparison of all object types you might have in your schemas – otherwise, how the tool is supposed to look for differences in them? And, at last, the tool should be fast. This point is especially important for searching data differences, when comparison of several schemas is performed, or the size of the project itself is large.

Now let’s look at some tools offering schema comparison functionality.

Oracle SQL Developer

Schema Comparison Wizard of Oracle SQL Developer can be opened through the Tools -> Database Diff menu. After you click this menu item, you’ll get a message telling you that it’s using Oracle Change Management, a payable option of the Oracle database, and you have to acknowledge you have a proper license to use that.

Oracle SQL Developer: Database Diff requires Oracle Change Management Pack be licensed

After that you should choose Source Connection and Target Connection from the existing connections. Also you can choose object types to compare during this step. Available object types are Tables, Views, Indexes, Package Spec, Package Body, Procedure, Functions, Triggers, Types, Sequence, Materialized View, Materialized View Logs, Synonyms, Database Link.

Oracle SQL Developer: Diff Wizard Source and Destination page

Press the Next button to open the Specify Objects page, where you can select objects for comparison and filter them by their type. Then press the Next button to open the Diff Summary page, where the Finish button becomes active. Then Press the Finish button.
After comparison process is completed (it did not take much time), the result is shown as Diff Report.

Oracle SQL Developer: Schema Diff Report

Perfect, Oracle SQL Developer managed to compare test schemas, but it did not meet the requirements we specified in the beginning of the article. These are:
1. The tool needs availability of the Change Management license for your Oracle database. The price depends on your Oracle Database license, but it is quite high if you need to compare only a couple of schemas using the free SQL Developer.
2. There is no possibility to compare several schemas at once.
3. There are no comparison options as such, so you cannot tune comparison process.
4. There is only the number of differences displayed in the provided Diff Report, but they cannot be viewed in the side-by-side DDL Diff. Also Diff Report provides an Update script only for single object selected in the grid and does not allow viewing the generated update script for several objects.
5. There is no Synchronization wizard with options for tuning synchronization process.

As we see, there is quite a lot of requirements the tool doesn’t answer, isn’t there? We did our best to correct all these shortcomings in our tool for schema comparison.

dbForge Schema Compare for Oracle

Let’s run the application and press New Schema Comparison on Start Page. After this we should create connections for source and target (this is impossible in Oracle SQL Developer). Schemas with identical names will be mapped automatically. Schemas also can be mapped manually, and several schemas can be included into comparison.

dbForge Schema Compare for Oracle: Choose Source and Target schemas

On the next two pages you can accurately tune the comparison process with the help of options and select the needed types for comparison of their DDL: Tables, Views, Packages, Procedures, Functions, Triggers, Array Types, Object Types, Table Types, Sequences, Materialized Views, Materialized View Logs, Synonyms, Database Links, XML Schemas. Unlike in Oracle SQL Developer, the Compare button is available on the first page of the wizard.

dbForge Schema Compare for Oracle: Comparison Options and Object Filter

After the comparison process is completed, a user-friendly document with comparison results is shown. In this document, you can inspect the differences visually, view the update script that can be generated for several objects selected in the grid at once, include and exclude the needed objects from synchronization, filter or group objects. It’s enough to call the corresponding Synchronization wizard to perform synchronization.

dbForge Schema Compare for Oracle: Schema Comparison Document

Synchronization Wizard allows selecting the path to save the generated script to disk, executing this script directly to the target database, tuning the synchronization process accurately, generating the update script, viewing warnings and action plan.

dbForge Schema Compare for Oracle: Synchronization Script Output and Sync Options

Well, let’s sum up everything.
The developed tool by Devart answers the requirements we’ve specified in the beginning and leaves Oracle SQL Developer far behind. But dbForge Schema Compare for Oracle cannot be used in the continuous process of database development for Oracle, because it does not provide the possibility of performing comparison process and generating update script through the command line. Yes, it is so in the first version, but we’ve taken this fact into account and it will be corrected in the next version of the product.