PL/SQL Developer

PL/SQL Developer
PL/SQL Developer is an Integrated Development Environment that is specifically targeted at the development of stored program units for Oracle Databases. Over time we have seen more and more business logic and application logic move into the Oracle Server, such that PL/SQL programming has become a significant part of the total development process. PL/SQL Developer focuses on ease of use, code quality and productivity, key advantages during Oracle application development.

Basic Properties:
Powerful PL/SQL Editor
With its Syntax Highlighting, SQL and PL/SQL help, Object Descriptions, Code Assistant, Compiler Hints, PL/SQL Beautifier, Code Contents, Browse Buttons, Hyperlink Navigation, Macro Library and many other sophisticated features, the editor will appeal to the most demanding user. Information is automatically presented to the user when needed, or is at most one click away.

Integrated Debugger (Oracle 7.3.4 or later)
The integrated debugger offers all features you could wish for: Step In, Step Over, Step Out, Run Until Exception, Breakpoints, View & Set Variables, View Call Stack, and so on. You can debug any program unit without making any modification to it, including triggers and Oracle8 object types.

Query Builder
The graphical Query Builder makes it easy to create new select statements or modify existing ones. Just drag and drop tables and views, select columns for the field list, where clause and order by clause, join tables based on foreign key constraint definitions, and you're done.

PL/SQL Beautifier
The PL/SQL Beautifier allows you to format your SQL and PL/SQL code through a user-defined set of rules. Your code can automatically be beautified when you compile, save, or open a file. This feature will increase your coding productivity and will improve the readability of your PL/SQL code if you are working in large project teams.

SQL Window
The SQL Window allows you to enter any SQL statement and view or edit the results in a grid, which supports a Query By Example mode to search specific records in a result set. You can easily recall previously executed SQL statements from a history buffer. The SQL editor provides the same powerful features as the PL/SQL Editor.

Command Window
To develop and execute SQL scripts you can use PL/SQL Developer's Command Window. This window has the same look and feel as SQL*Plus, and additionally has a built-in script editor with corresponding syntax highlighting. Now you can develop your scripts without the "edit script / save it / switch to SQL*Plus / run script" cycle, and without leaving the comfortable PL/SQL Developer IDE.

Object Browser
This configurable tree-view displays all information that is relevant to PL/SQL development. Use it to get object descriptions, to view object definitions, to create test scripts for the debugger, to enable and disable triggers and constraints, to recompile invalid objects, to query or edit table or view data, to search for text in object sources, to drag and drop object names into an editor, and so on.

The Object Browser additionally displays dependencies among objects, and lets you recursively expand these dependent objects (e.g. package references view, view references table, and so on).

Performance Optimizing
To optimize the performance of your SQL and PL/SQL code, you can use the PL/SQL Profiler to view timing information of each executed line of PL/SQL code (Oracle8i and later).
Furthermore you can automatically get statistics on executed SQL statements and PL/SQL programs. These statistics can include CPU usage, block I/O, record I/O, table scans, sorts, and so on.

Compare User Objects
After making changes to table definitions, views, program units, and so on, it may be useful to propagate these changes to another database user, or to find out what exactly the differences are. This maybe another development environment, a testing environment, or a production environment. The Compare User Objects function allows you to compare a selection of objects, to visualize the differences, and to execute or save a SQL script that will apply the necessary changes.

Export User Objects
The Export User Objects tool can be used to export the DDL (Data Definition Language) statements of a selection of objects of a user. This way you can easily recreate the objects for another user, or save the file(s) as a backup.

Tools
PL/SQL Developer includes several tools to make everyday development easier. You can recompile all invalid objects, search for text in database sources, import and export tables, monitor dbms_alert and dbms_pipe events, view session information, and so on.

Multi-threaded IDE
PL/SQL Developer is a multi-threaded IDE. This means that you can continue to work as SQL queries are executing, PL/SQL programs are executing, debug sessions are running, and so on. It also means that the IDE will not "hang" if you make a programming error: you can break execution or save your work at any time.

 Easy Installation
No middle-ware required other than SQL*Net. There is no database object installation. Just a simple one-button installation procedure and it is ready to use.

System Requirements
PL/SQL Developer will run on Windows 95, 98, ME, NT4, 2000 and XP. The supported Oracle Server versions are 7.x, 8.x, 8i and 9i on any platform. To connect to an Oracle database, PL/SQL Developer requires a 32-bit SQL*Net or Net 8 or Net 9 version.