6 Ways Progress OpenEdge 12.8 Boosts Database Administrator Productivity

Efficient database management is paramount for businesses to excel in today’s data-centric landscape.

Progress OpenEdge 12.8, the latest release of OpenEdge, brings many powerful features that significantly enhance database administrator (DBA) productivity. The OpenEdge 12.8 release empowers administrators to streamline their operations and optimize database management, from data regulation support to improved performance and enhanced management capabilities.

Let’s explore the key features that make OpenEdge 12.8 a game-changer for DBAs.

1. Data Regulation Support

The OpenEdge 12.8 release includes robust data regulation support, helping facilitate compliance with regulatory frameworks and data privacy laws. One of the standout features is Dynamic Data Masking, which allows administrators to conceal sensitive data in real time. Administrators can protect data privacy and limit unauthorized access by masking sensitive information, such as credit card or social security numbers. OpenEdge 12.8 also offers SQL support for Dynamic Data Masking, simplifying the implementation of data masking rules.

2. Management Productivity

With OpenEdge 12.8, the OpenEdge Command Center (OECC), a modern web-based console revolutionizing database management, allows DBAs to clone a Progress Application Server (PAS) for OE instances, eliminating the overhead in load-balancing setups. This feature gives administrators a simplified and streamlined approach to managing OpenEdge environments. Additionally, OECC supports PAS for OpenEdge Advanced Business Language (ABL) application startup configuration management, making it easier to update and modify application startup configurations through the intuitive web-based interface.

3. Improved Database Performance

The OpenEdge 12.8 release brings several enhancements that optimize database performance. The Database Restore feature improves performance by efficiently restoring databases from compressed backup files, reducing downtime during recovery processes. Another performance boost comes from Index Check Threading. These options validate keys for each record, perform index scans and validate key order. These improvements enhance database integrity and speed up data retrieval, improving overall performance.

4. Encryption Key Management

Data security is paramount in modern database management, and OpenEdge 12.8 strengthens encryption key management capabilities. The Online TDE (Transparent Data Encryption) DB Policy Maintenance feature enables administrators to change the database master key online, minimizing disruption to database operations. OpenEdge 12.8 also adds an extra layer of security by integrating Hardware Security Modules (HSMs) as a second authentication step to the TDE Keystore. Additionally, encrypted DB replication data transfer supports more secure replication of sensitive data across environments.

5. Database Replication

OpenEdge 12.8 enhances database replication capabilities by introducing client monitoring of replication status. Administrators can now easily monitor the replication process and track the synchronization of databases through a user-friendly interface. This feature empowers DBAs to promptly identify and address replication issues to support data consistency and minimize downtime.

6. PAS for OpenEdge Management Support

The ability to clone a PAS for OpenEdge instance simplifies load-balancing setups so identical instances are easier to manage. Furthermore, the web-based admin console offered by OECC enables efficient management of OpenEdge environments and facilitates seamless updates to ABL application startup configurations.

The above are all enhancements in 12.8 specifically, but we have had dozens of features added in innovation releases since the last Long Term Support (LTS) version, 12.2. Here is a summary of just a few.

Enhanced Security

OpenEdge has new security features to enhance the protection and integrity of your applications. With OpenEdge 12.8, you can:

• Use Protected Compile to encrypt your OpenEdge code to help prevent unauthorized access or modification.
• Set the OpenEdge Root Path as the single source of truth for your application files and libraries so they are loaded from the correct location.
• Verify the authenticity of the OpenEdge components since OpenEdge now ships with signed archive libraries.
• Enjoy support for the latest version of TLS (1.3), which offers improved performance and security for your network communications.

Improved Performance

Performance is a key aspect of OpenEdge, and the latest version offers several enhancements to optimize your database operations. OpenEdge 12.8 enables you to:

• Modify hundreds of database startup parameters online without restarting the database.
• Perform faster backups that use more compression, reducing the storage space and time required.
• Enjoy improved database query operations that execute faster and more efficiently.

Elevated ABL

The new version of ABL introduces several features that make your code more concise, expressive and flexible. With OpenEdge 12.8, you can:

• Declare and initialize variables in one line using the new VAR statement.
• Use the new compound assignment operators to combine arithmetic or logical operations with assignments.
• Pass methods as callbacks to other methods or procedures, enabling higher-order functions and dynamic behavior.
• Leverage the Safe Navigator (aka Elvis Operator) to access properties or methods of nullable objects without checking for null values.
• Integrate your ABL applications with Kafka, a distributed streaming platform that allows you to publish and subscribe to data streams.

All the features listed by release can be found on our OpenEdge 12 documentation page.

A Powerful Solution for Database Management

Progress OpenEdge 12.8 introduces an array of features that significantly enhance the productivity of database administrators. From data regulation support to improved performance, encryption key management and streamlined database replication, OpenEdge 12.8 equips DBAs with powerful tools to optimize their database management workflows. By leveraging these advanced features, administrators can support data compliance, improve performance, enhance security and streamline management processes.

Learn more about what's new in OpenEdge 12.8.