A big part of an Apps DBA’s job is patching, so I know the Patch Wizard in Oracle Applications Manager is something about which you have a few opinions.  These opinions are sometimes expressed in energetic and colorful language.  It’s clear that some of you feel strongly about this area. 
OAM Patch Wizard screenshot:


Some of you have recently provided feedback on the Patch Wizard, which I forwarded to our development team.  They reviewed your comments and provided some glimpses of functionality to come in future versions such as Release 12.  Here’s a sampling of your comments and some selected responses from the team:
  1. Patch Wizard downloads patches which have already been downloaded

    This is by design in the current Release 11i version.  Release 12 will download a patch from Metalink only if it doesn’t match an existing patch in your staging directory.

  2. Patch Wizard gets some patch prerequisites wrong

    This is a known issue, complicated by the interrelationships between patches, Family Packs, and the wide array of bundles that patches can be delivered in.  The issue of handling patch prerequisites more sensibly is being revisited in Release 12.
  3. Patch Wizard recommends patches included in already-installed patches

    This shouldn’t happen for patches that are explicitly included, i.e. patches whose definitions directly include specific sub-patches.  If you encounter this behaviour, file a bug with Oracle Support and we’ll investigate this.

    If a patch is implicitly included (i.e. all files in a patch are included in an already-applied patch), this can happen.
  4. Patch impact analysis doesn’t note when a patch is significantly changing your installed patch level, e.g. from Minipack H to Minipack J.

    This is true.  This is functionality that is slated to be improved in Release 12.
  5. Patch Wizard should show analysis results even when no patches are recommended.

    This is a commonly requested enhancement request.  This functionality is slated to be delivered in Release 12.
  6. There should be better correlation between analysis runs and concurrent requests.

    The technology used for concurrent requests places some restrictions on this; we’re looking at what’s feasible for future releases.
  7. Analysis runs may take some time to complete.

    This is true.  Some of the current analysis being performed by the Patch Wizard take some serious computation time.

    It’s expected that Release 12 will include some performance gains over earlier releases, partially resulting from avoiding downloads of existing patches, changes in .LDT file packaging, and changes in the logic used by the prerequisite analysis engine.
  8. Large patches may trigger “out of memory” errors in some rare cases.

    If you encounter this behaviour, please file a bug and we’ll investigate this. 
Stay tuned to this website for more patching updates for Release 12.  Thanks for your comments — keep them coming, and I’ll do my best to route them to the right teams.

Related
The above is intended to outline our general product direction.  It is intended for information purposes only, and may not be incorporated into any contract.   It is not a commitment to deliver any material, code, or functionality, and should not be relied upon in making purchasing decision.  The development, release, and timing of any features or functionality described for Oracle’s products remains at the sole discretion of Oracle.