Upgrade to Delphi 2007 and Oracle DbExpress drivers

upsys · Post by **upsys** » Fri 14 Sep 2007 13:43

Hi, I'm about to upgrade from Delphi 2005 Pro to Delphi 2007.

I have an application that uses ODBC drivers via ADO to access Oracle. This assumes Oracle client files including the ODBC driver are installed on the client PC.

Soon I will no longer be able to assume an Oracle client on the customer PCs, so I need to change to a direct Oracle driver. It seems DbExpress is the best way to go.

I think that I can either upgrade to Delphi Enterprise version which comes with Oracle drivers, or stick with Professional and buy the Corelab DbExpress driver.

The latter is cheaper (by about £400 sterling).

I can see nothing else I need from Enterprise that is not in Pro.

So my questions of the experts on this forum:
1. Am I missing anything, or this the best way to go?
2. Are there any other pros/cons of the built in Delphi Oracle driver vs the Corelab driver?

Many Thanks

Plash · Post by **Plash** » Fri 14 Sep 2007 15:15

The standard dbExpress driver for Oracle that comes with Delphi requires Oracle client installed on the client computer.
Core Lab driver for Oracle supports Direct mode. If you use Direct mode, only driver's DLL need to be copied to the client computer. The Core Lab driver also supports some extended options.

However, I advise using Core Lab ODAC instead of dbExpress because dbExpress technology has many restrictions, flaws and errors. Moreover, ODAC gives you much more features than dbExpress.

upsys · Post by **upsys** » Sun 16 Sep 2007 08:34

Thanks - on the basis of that advice I have gone ahead with my Delphi Upgrade to 2007 Professional and I'm currently migrating my application, currently using ADO and ODBC, to Delphi 2007.

Then I shall look to migrate from ADO to your ODAC direct access.

I've had a look at the info on your ODAC components, and it certainly looks the way to go. I have a couple of questions about it which I shall ask in the ODAC section of this forum.