I’ve used it with Sun’s Java 6 Update 18; I have not tested it with OpenJDK. If you have problems getting it to work, you may want to check the previous post on this topic.

Oracle provides SQL Developer in either an RPM, or a generic binary install. I like the ability to manage packages, but I’ve never had much luck at getting RPM to run on Ubuntu. I downloaded the RPM file, and, using alien, I converted the package to a .deb package (Debian package format) and installed it. It worked like a charm!

I haven’t tested it with gcj, but using Sun’s Java 6 update 7 from the Ubuntu repositories, it ran just fine. After you install the package, do a directory list on /usr/lib/jvm. You’re looking for the Sun JDK – if it’s installed, you’ll have a symlink java-6-sun that points to java-6-sun-1.6.0.07. Once you’ve determined the location of the JDK, run “sqldeveloper” from the command line – the program will prompt you for the path to your JDK. Enter it (probably “/usr/lib/jvm/java-6-sun”) and you’re good to go. (You have to install the package as root – but, for the rest of these steps, use your normal user, not root, as this puts settings in a .sqldeveloper directory off your home directory.) The package installs an icon in the “Programming” or “Development” group. Once you’ve told it where the JDK is, you can use this to launch it.

Download SQL Developer 1.5.1 Debian Package

To set up the Oracle piece, download the packages for “Basic” and “ODBC Supplement”, and follow the instructions for installation, on the machine with SQL Server. (This is not an “install” per se – it’s basically an unzip.) Next, you’ll need to provide a TNSNAMES.ORA file – this can be any valid file, including a simple shell with an “ifile=” statement pointing to a common TNSNAMES.ORA file. Finally, set the environment variable TNS_ADMIN to point to the directory where this TNSNAMES.ORA file resides.

Now, you can easily create a DTS script through SQL Server to push or pull data however you’d like. Oracle Instant Client will appear in the drop-down list of providers, and you’ll be able to specify your connection the way you normally do (i.e., “DB01.WORLD”).

Happy migrating!

First, you’ll need the temporary table, which will hold a sequence number, the primary key for the table where you’ll want to reconstruct the CLOB, and some text. This table can reside in the source or destination database, but must be linked from the other one. For our purposes, it looks like this…

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CREATE TABLE clob_xfer_area
(
  cxa_pk      NUMBER(12),
  cxa_number  NUMBER(12),
  cxa_text    varchar2(4000 byte)
);
ALTER TABLE clob_xfer_area ADD
(
  CONSTRAINT pk_cxa_id
    PRIMARY KEY (cxa_pk, cxa_number)
);

Second, you’ll need the procedure in the source database that breaks the CLOB apart and populates the temporary table.

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SET serveroutput ON SIZE 1000000
SET LINES 1000
SET pages 0
SET tab off
SET feedback ON
 
CREATE OR REPLACE
PROCEDURE break_clobs_apart
IS
 
  v_line_number   NUMBER(3);
  v_text_piece    varchar2(4000);
  v_total_length  NUMBER(12);
 
  cursor clob_cur IS
    SELECT twc_pk, twc_clob_field
    FROM   table_with_clob;
 
BEGIN /* { */
 
  FOR clob_rec IN clob_cur loop /* { */
 
    v_total_length := 1;
    v_line_number  := 0;
 
    while (v_total_length <=
           DBMS_LOB.GETLENGTH(clob_rec.twc_clob_field)) loop /* { */
 
      v_line_number := v_line_number + 1;
      v_text_piece := DBMS_LOB.SUBSTR(clob_rec.twc_clob_field,
        3999, v_total_length);
      v_total_length := v_total_length + 3999;
 
      INSERT INTO clob_xfer_area (
        cxa_pk,
        cxa_number,
        cxa_text
      )
        VALUES (
          clob_rec.twc_pk, -- cxa_pk
          v_line_number,   -- cxa_number
          v_text_piece     -- cxa_text
        );
 
    END loop; /* } of while */
 
  END loop; /* } of clob_cur */
 
END; /* } of procedure break_clobs_apart */

Third, you’ll need a procedure in the destination database that puts the CLOB back together, and deletes the data from the temporary table.

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SET serveroutput ON SIZE 1000000
SET LINES 1000
SET pages 0
SET feedback ON
SET tab off
 
CREATE OR REPLACE
PROCEDURE put_clobs_together
IS
  v_new_clob   CLOB;
 
  cursor pk_cur IS
    SELECT DISTINCT cxa_pk
    FROM   clob_xfer_area;
 
  cursor piece_cur(p_cxa_pk NUMBER) IS
    SELECT cxa_text
    FROM   clob_xfer_area
    WHERE  cxa_pk = p_cxa_pk
    ORDER BY cxa_number;
 
BEGIN /* { */
 
  FOR pk_rec IN pk_cur loop /* { */
 
    DBMS_LOB.CREATETEMPORARY(v_new_clob, TRUE);
    DBMS_LOB.OPEN(v_new_clob, DBMS_LOB.LOB_READWRITE);
 
    FOR piece_rec IN piece_cur(pk_rec.cxa_pk) loop /* { */
 
      DBMS_LOB.WRITEAPPEND(v_new_clob, LENGTH(piece_rec.cxa_text),
        piece_rec.cxa_text);
 
    END loop;  /* } of piece_cur */
 
    DBMS_LOB.CLOSE(v_new_clob);
 
    UPDATE dest_table_with_clob
      SET  migrated_clob = v_new_clob
      WHERE dtwc_pk = pk_rec.cxa_pk;
 
  END loop; /* } of pk_cur */
 
  DELETE FROM clob_xfer_area;
 
END; /* } of procedure put_clobs_together */

Finally, you’ll need a procedure that controls the whole thing. We’ll assume that this procedure is loaded in the destination database, and the source database is linked with the name “source”.

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SET LINES 1000
SET pages 0
SET feedback ON
SET tab off
 
CREATE OR REPLACE
PROCEDURE xfer_clobs
IS
 
BEGIN /* { */
 
  break_clobs_apart@SOURCE;
  put_clobs_together;
 
END; /* } */

(This does not include a commit – the changes will not be persistent unless they are committed.)

Of course, these processes could (and, to be useful, likely would) be integrated into other procedures and scripts. But, this framework will successfully transfer CLOBs across linked databases in Oracle.