[ACCEPTED]-Is there a good alternative to SQL*PLUS for Oracle?-sqlplus

I presume that you want a low-overhead method 6 of knocking out queries, but want more functions 5 than SQL*Plus provides? Why not use Oracle's 4 SQL Developer? It's free.

Install, make a new connection 3 to your database, then just start typing 2 a script. Press F5 to run it (or just the 1 part of the script that you've highlighted).

Take a look at gqlplus. It wraps sql*plus on linux 3 and makes it more user-friendly by adding 2 things like command history, table name 1 completion and so on.

Emacs can provide so much more powerful text 4 editing features and functionality beyond 3 the default SQL*Plus command-line interface.

Here 2 are a few links on how to use Emacs as a 1 wrapper for SQL*Plus:

• Emacs and Oracle
• EmacsWiki:SqlPlus

TOAD is pretty expensive, but you can download 11 a 90-day trial from the Quest site to see 10 if it's got the feature set you want (don't 9 be fooled by the "freeware" title 8 - it's only free for 90 days, and then it 7 expires, which definitely makes it shareware):

http://www.toadworld.com/Freeware/ToadforOracleFreeware/tabid/558/Default.aspx

Another 6 options is a tool I've seen on CodeProject:

http://www.codeproject.com/KB/database/OQuery.aspx

It's 5 in .NET, so you'd have to see if it compiled 4 on Mono, but it might be worth a shot. I 3 haven't used either tool (Toad or this one), since 2 I'm a SQL Server guy, but I've heard good 1 things about Toad.

If it's command-line you want, I'd recommend 3 rlwrap to go with sqlplus; it gives you line-editing 2 capabilities and command history, making 1 sqlplus a somewhat usable tool.

You could try PL/SQL developer from allroundautomations, there 2 is a trial available and the price is much 1 lower than TOAD.

Regards K

Take a look at Senora. This tool is written in 12 Perl and therefore is cross platform. Also 11 Senora is free, extensible and intends to 10 be your primary Oracle shell. You can extend 9 Senora easily by providing you own plugins. Senora 8 attempts to provide a friendlier output 7 formatting than sqlplus. Columns tend to 6 be only as wide a really needed.

Another 5 interesting alternative is SQLcl. It provides 4 in-line editing, statement completion, command 3 recall, DBA stuff (e.g. startup, shutdown) and 2 also supporting your previously written 1 SQL*Plus scripts.

It depends what you are looking for. If 11 it is a GUI query tool, then Oracle have 10 their free SQL Developer product (though 9 it has a hefty footprint). There's a few 8 free cross-database ones too. I like SQUirrel 7 SQL client myself. There's also DBVisualiser 6 and a few others. JEdit is an editor that 5 has a DBConsole plugin for running database 4 queries and DML/DDL. They are all java based 3 so run most places.

If you like a command 2 line, check out sqlpython (the developer 1 has identified a couple of others too)

I like SQL Developer. It's free, has an intuitive UI, and 3 runs on Windows, Mac, and Linux. It also 2 supports many sql*plus commands and supports 1 version control

open source version of TOAD is TORA: tora.sourceforge.net

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If you're the VIM type kind of guy then I'd look into Vorax. It is 1 basically a VIM wrapper around SQL*plus.

Apparently Oracle itself has phased out 2 sql*plus and replaced it with SQLcl, which 1 supports more modern features such as history, formatting, etc: https://www.oracle.com/database/technologies/appdev/sqlcl.html.

toad from quest software if you can pay 1 for a license

sql squirrel if you can't.

Have used both Toad & SQL Navigator, and I love the 1 stability SQL Navigator has.

i like sqlsh

alias sqr='sqlsh -d DBI:Oracle:MYSERVER.COM -u USER -p PASSWORD'

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I used my own tool ocimlsh in conjunction with 1 rlwrap.

I just use socat to add readline support to sqlplus. History 6 and a working backspace key actually turn 5 sqlplus into a pretty decent tool.

In my 4 .bashrc:

function sqlplus {
        socat READLINE,history=$HOME/.sqlplus_history EXEC:"$ORACLE_HOME/bin/sqlplus $(echo $@ | sed 's/\([\:]\)/\\\1/g')",pty,setsid,ctty
        status=$?
}

You might see alternatives that alias sqlplus 3 to socat, but you will quickly discover 2 that doing so prevents you from invoking 1 sqlplus with its various command line options.

CAVEAT: Be sure to set $HOME/.sqlplus_history permissions to 0600. Passwords that you type end up in the history file. You might also consider adding cat /dev/null > $HOME/.sqlplus_history to your .bash_logout.