LINQ to Entities Improvements
The following methods of the SqlFunctions class, when called from LINQ to Entities, are now converted to Oracle-specific SQL statements in runtime: Acos, Asin, Ascii, Atan, Atan2, Char, Cos, CurrentUser, DataLength, Exp, Rand, Sign, Sin, SoundCode, SquareRoot, StringConvert, Tan. Thus, using SqlFunctions class methods provides better capabilities for creating cross-database LINQ to Entities queries, for example, queries for SQL Server and Oracle.
Starting and Stopping Oracle Database Instance
dotConnect for Oracle 8.2 introduces OracleDatabase class that allows you to start and stop Oracle database instances.
OCI Statement Caching Support Improvements
Now OCI Statement Caching is also supported when Unicode=true or "OCI Connection Pool"=True. The new "Statement Cache Purge" connection string parameter allows you to clean OCI Statement Cache when returning a connection to a pool. OCI Statement Cache can be also cleaned at any time by calling the new PurgeStatementCache() method of the OracleConnection class.
DBMS_APPLICATION_INFO Package Support
The new version of dotConnect for Oracle allows you to record names of executing modules or transactions in the database using the DBMS_APPLICATION_INFO package in order to ease the process of tracking the performance of various modules and debugging. The following properties of the OracleConnection class allow you to record the tracking information:
- ModuleName
- ActionName
- ClientInfo
Proxy Connection Improvements
dotConnect for Oracle allows you to specify proxy connection using the new connection string parameters "Proxy User Id" and "Proxy Password" in the OCI mode.
Other Improvements
dotConnect for Oracle 8.2 also offers a number of other improvements, for example, the ShortServerVersion property of OracleConnection, that simplifies getting the version of the Oracle database, a connection is made to.
The new "Describe Stored Procedure" connection string parameter along with the new ImplicitRefCursors and IsTableValuedFunction properties of the OracleCommand class are implemented for increasing the performance of the stored procedure execution with the ExecuteReader()/ExecuteScalar() methods of OracleCommand, when using CommandType.StoredProcedure For the full list of the new features see the dotConnect for Oracle history page.
Download and try the new version of dotConnect for Oracle now!
For detailed information on dotConnect for Oracle please refer to the product pages. If you wish to provide feedback on the new version, you can do it in our forum or with the contact form. We are always glad to hear your comments and take into account your development needs.