Changes in This Release for Oracle Database Utilities

This section describes new features in the following utilities:

• Oracle Data Pump Export and Import

• Oracle SQL*Loader

• Oracle External Tables

• Oracle LogMiner

The following Data Pump features are new in this release:

• The transportable option can now be used during full-mode exports and imports to move an entire database using transportable tablespace technology, where applicable. This new mode is referred to as full transportable export and full transportable import. See the Export "FULL" parameter and the Import "FULL" parameter for more information. Also see Oracle Database Administrator's Guide for more information about full transportable export/import.

• Data Pump Export and Import support multitenant container databases (CDBs) and pluggable databases (PDBs). You can use Data Pump to migrate all, or portions of, a database from a non-CDB into a PDB, between PDBs within the same or different CDBs, and from a PDB into a non-CDB. See "Using Data Pump With CDBs".

• The new VIEWS_AS_TABLES parameter allows you to export one or more views as tables. See the Export "VIEWS_AS_TABLES" parameter . You can then import the dump file using the Import "VIEWS_AS_TABLES (Non-Network Import)" parameter. You can also perform a network import of views as tables. See "VIEWS_AS_TABLES (Network Import)".

• During import jobs, you can now reduce the amount of data written to the archive logs. See the new DISABLE_ARCHIVE_LOGGING option for the Import "TRANSFORM" parameter.

• During import jobs, you can now change the compression type for all tables in the job, including tables that provide storage for materialized views. See the TABLE_COMPRESSION_CLAUSE option for the Import "TRANSFORM" parameter.

• During import jobs, you can now change the LOB storage (either SECUREFILE or BASICFILE) for all tables in the job, including tables that provide storage for materialized views. See the LOB_STORAGE option for the Import "TRANSFORM" parameter.

• You can now enable unified auditing for Data Pump jobs. See "Auditing Data Pump Jobs".

• The new ENCRYPTION_PWD_PROMPT parameter allows you to specify whether Data Pump should prompt you for the encryption password, rather than you entering it on the command line. See the Export "ENCRYPTION_PWD_PROMPT" parameter and the Import "ENCRYPTION_PWD_PROMPT" parameter.

• The new COMPRESSION_ALGORITHM parameter allows you to specify a specific level of compression for dump file data. This allows you to choose a compression level based on your environment, workload characteristics, and size and type of data. See "COMPRESSION_ALGORITHM".

• The maximum size of the VARCHAR2, NVARCHAR2, and RAW data types has been increased to 32 KB when the COMPATIBLE initialization parameter is set to 12.0 or later and the MAX_STRING_SIZE initialization parameter is set to EXTENDED. Data Pump supports this increased size unless the Data Pump VERSION parameter is set to a value earlier than 12.1. See the Export "VERSION" parameter and the Import "VERSION" parameter.

• The direct path load method is now supported even when a LOB column has domain indexes on it. See "Using Direct Path to Move Data" for more information about situations in which Data Pump does and does not use the direct path method.

• The new LOGTIME command-line parameter available in Data Pump Export and Import allows you to request that messages displayed during export and import operations be timestamped. You can use the timestamps to know the elapsed time between different parts of a Data Pump operation, which can be helpful in diagnosing performance problems and in estimating the timing of future similar operations. See the Export "LOGTIME" parameter and the Import "LOGTIME" parameter.

The following SQL*Loader features are new in this release:

• A new SQL*Loader express mode provides a streamlined way to quickly and easily load tables that have simple column data types and data files that contain only delimited character data. See SQL*Loader Express .

• A new DNFS_ENABLE parameter allows you to enable and disable use of the Direct NFS Client on input data files during a SQL*Loader operation. And a new DNFS_READBUFFERS parameter allows you to control the number of read buffers used by the Direct NFS Client. See "DNFS_ENABLE" and "DNFS_READBUFFERS".

• The maximum size of the VARCHAR2, NVARCHAR2, and RAW data types has been increased to 32 KB when the COMPATIBLE initialization parameter is set to 12.0 or later and the MAX_STRING_SIZE initialization parameter is set to EXTENDED. SQL*Loader supports this new maximum size. See "SQL*Loader Data Types" for information about SQL*Loader data types.

• You can now enable auditing of SQL*Loader operations that use direct path mode. See "Auditing SQL*Loader Operations That Use Direct Path Mode".

• The SQL*Loader control file has several new clauses available that simplify its use. Additionally some existing parameters have been modified and new parameters have been added to streamline load execution.

  • You can specify wildcard characters on the INFILE clause. See "Specifying Data Files".

  • You can direct SQL*Loader to access the data files as comma-separated-values (CSV) format files. See "Specifying CSV Format Files".

  • At the table level, you can specify a datetime format to apply to all datetime fields. See "Specifying Datetime Formats At the Table Level".

  • At the table level, you can specify NULLIF to apply to all character fields. See "Specifying a NULLIF Clause At the Table Level".

  • You can specify that SQL*Loader should determine the field order from the order of the field names in the first record of the data file. See "Specifying Field Order".

• The SQL*Loader command line has new and modified parameters that help to streamline load execution:

  • The new TRIM command-line parameter allows you to override the TRIM=LDRTRIM default when you are using the external tables option. See "TRIM".

  • The new DEGREE_OF_PARALLELISM command-line parameter allows you to specify a degree of parallelism to use for the load when the external tables option is used. See "DEGREE_OF_PARALLELISM".

  • When specifying the bad, discard, and log files on the SQL*Loader command line, you now have the option of specifying only a directory name. See "BAD", "DISCARD", and "LOG".

The following external tables features are new in this release:

• The new DNFS_ENABLE and DNFS_DISABLE parameters allow you to enable and disable use of the Direct NFS Client on input data files during an external tables operation. And a new DNFS_READBUFFERS parameter allows you to control the number of read buffers used by the Direct NFS Client. See "DNFS_DISABLE | DNFS_ENABLE" and "DNFS_READBUFFERS".

• You can specify a level of compression when processing external tables using the ORACLE_DATAPUMP access driver. See "COMPRESSION".

• The maximum size of the VARCHAR2, NVARCHAR2, and RAW data types has been increased to 32 KB when the COMPATIBLE initialization parameter is set to 12.0 or later and the MAX_STRING_SIZE initialization parameter is set to EXTENDED. The external tables feature supports this new maximum size. See "Data Type Conversion During External Table Use" for more information about how data types are handled by external tables.

• The ORACLE_LOADER access parameters list has several new clauses available that simplify its use:

  • You can specify wildcard characters on the LOCATION clause. See "How Are External Tables Created?".

  • When specifying the bad, discard, and log files you can now specify only a directory object. See "[directory object name:] [filename]".

  • You can direct external tables to access data files as comma-separated-values format files. See "CSV".

  • You can specify a datetime format to apply to all datetime fields. See "DATE_FORMAT".

  • You can specify NULLIF to apply to all character fields. See "NULLIF | NO NULLIF".

  • You can specify that SQL*Loader should determine the field order from the order of the field names in the first record of the data file. See "FIELD NAMES".

  • You can tell the access driver that all fields are present and that they are in the same order as the columns in the external table. You then only need to specify fields that have a special definition. See "ALL FIELDS OVERRIDE".

The following LogMiner features are new in this release:

• SecureFiles LOBs are fully supported, including support for deduplication of SecureFiles LOB columns and SecureFiles Database File System (DBFS) operations. See "SecureFiles LOB Considerations".

• Objects and Collections are supported. See "Supported Data Types and Table Storage Attributes".

• CDBs are supported by LogMiner. See "Using LogMiner in a CDB".

• The maximum size of the VARCHAR2, NVARCHAR2, and RAW data types has been increased to 32 KB when the COMPATIBLE initialization parameter is set to 12.0 or later and the MAX_STRING_SIZE initialization parameter is set to EXTENDED. LogMiner supports this new maximum size. See "Supported Data Types, Storage Attributes, and Database and Redo Log File Versions" for more information about data types supported by LogMiner.

• The Data Pump Export DATA_OPTIONS=XML_CLOBS parameter is deprecated because XMLType stored as CLOB is deprecated as of Oracle Database 12c Release 1 (12.1).

  XMLType tables and columns are now stored as binary XML.

  See Oracle XML DB Developer's Guide for more information about binary XML storage.

Some features previously described in this document are desupported in Oracle Database 12c Release 1 (12.1). See Oracle Database Upgrade Guide for a list of desupported features.