Oracle SQL Developer Reviews

Off the top of my head (I don't use it that often):

• Included Oracle SQL Developer Data Modeler. No PL/SQL IDE has such modelling capabilities, as far as I know. This is a killer feature for me.
• Database Export
• Database Diff
• Debugging capabilities

Off the top of my head (I don't use it that often):

• Just copy IntelliJ's IDEA for PL/SQL
• Projects - there are none and are much needed
• More code formatting options
• To be able to handle db object scripts that end with /
• File browser
• Filtering
• Favourite locations
• Versioning is there, check. But it sucks a lot, double check. Maybe except SVN.

It's getting better with every release. I would have rated it much lower a couple of years ago. With Oracle's resources, it could be much much better.

I have used this solution for eight years.

It is not very stable on MacOS, but it's much better on Windows I think.

I haven't used customer service.

I haven't used technical support.

IDE help is there, but it could be much better.

I did and still haven't fully switched to Oracle SQL Developer.

Setup is piece of cake. Various options are well hidden in settings, but the search helps a lot.

An in-house team implemented it.

It's free. The required time investment and change of thinking while using it is too much for me, anytime I seriously think about switching to Oracle SQL Developer as my main tool for PL/SQL development.

Invest enough time beforehand so you would fully understand how Oracle SQL Developer works and behaves in some situations. It is a very powerful tool, but sometimes it "works in mysterious ways", just like any Oracle's desktop product. (JDeveloper is the best example.)

For the last few years: Ctl + F7. That shortcut will format my queries the way I desire. This is especially helpful since I work with a query generator (OBIEE) and sometimes have to look at hundreds of lines of SQL. Formatting it helps me read the SQL. If I didn’t have this capability, I would format it by hand which would add time to my day.

At a prior organization, we had no reporting capabilities. Business Users would ask me to run reports for them. Since there were restrictions in other delivery mechanisms (think: web front end), I ended up creating SQL Developer Reports and then distributing those to the Business Users. This isn’t an ideal way to distribute reports, but it worked, and freed up my time to do other more important things.

Feature-wise, it has everything that I need. My only complaint over the years has been memory usage, which seems to improve with each release. I also understand that this may be out of the developer’s control (i.e. Java).

I have used this solution for 10+ years. I downloaded and used Project Raptor when it was first released.

Customer service has been most excellent. The Product Manager is on Twitter (and happens to be a friend), Jeff Smith. I’ve bothered Jeff myself and have watched him help others routinely via Twitter and his blog. I honestly can’t think of a better PM out there. Additionally, Kris Rice (also a friend) was one of two of the initial developers (if I remember correctly).

Technical support has been excellent. If Jeff (or Kris) can’t answer in 140 characters, he’s probably written it up as a solution for whatever ails you on his blog. I frequently go there to find answers before asking.

I would use Toad to monitor database sessions. It had a pre-built reporting solution for that. But Toad cost quite a bit of money. When SQL Developer (Project Raptor) came out, I installed it and built the same session monitoring reports there. No more worrying about cost.

Initial setup was very straightforward: Unzip, find the executable and go. I have it installed on Windows, Mac and Linux (Ubuntu, Oracle Enterprise Linux).

I did not really evaluate other options before choosing this product. I mainly used SQL*Plus and occasionally Toad.