On The Market:

BMC Introduces Oracle Database Storage and Recovery Software

As reported by Kevin Reichard, BMC Software has announced an update for Patrol Recovery for Oracle, a network-storage application that centralizes management of Oracle-database backup and recovery functions across the network. It's designed for Oracle database administrators (DBAs) who want to manage multiple databases, including those managed from Oracle, DB2, Microsoft SQL Server and Exchange.

New in the release of Patrol Recovery 2.0:

Centralized management of heterogeneous databases across the enterprises, allowing customers manage databases other than Oracle-managed databases, all from a single console; Elimination of management boundaries through remote management of backup and recovery tasks; Greater flexibility and the elimination of guesswork by allowing DBAs to perform the smallest, most efficient recovery through precise point-in-time recovery analysis; and The enabling of quick and efficient transaction recovery of bad transactions through log analysis. Patrol Recovery 2.0 for Oracle will be available in January 2002.

"With responsibilities for 70+ Oracle databases, we have a strong need for a single solution that will allow us to simplify our complex management environment," said Mike Harris, senior Oracle DBA of Volvo IT North America, in a prepared statement. "Our team of four Oracle DBAs, with a range of experience from beginner to knowledgeable with BMC's PATROL Recovery for Oracle, were able to install and configure backups for all servers within a matter of two weeks. The simple drag and click process used in BMC's management solution simplified what had been a rather time consuming task for us in the past. Since then we have seen several times how straightforward and clear database recovery can be. The easy three-step process: configure it, do the setup, and let it run on its own, has not only saved us time and money in setting up backups and recoveries, but frees up the entire team's time, allowing us to focus on more critical business issues."

Cronacle Offers SAP Users Smooth Path to Improved Efficiency

Redwood Software, provider of information and process management solutions, announced its new release of Cronacle, an effective solution for reliable and flexible business process automation both within and between organizations. The new release includes a number of enhancements, including a new migration offering that enables customers to import their R/3 background processing in to the Cronacle environment.

As an SAP certified solution, Cronacle enhances the capabilities of the native SAP job scheduler to provide improved monitoring capabilities and easy execution of jobs from a single console. Cronacle's sophisticated workload-balancing and restart features optimize SAP application throughput to ensure scarce computing resources are allocated appropriately as soon as they become available.

Cronacle will now be able to offer new SAP customers a migration facility that enables batch jobs, which have already been defined within SAP, to be copied and registered in Cronacle, minimizing the overhead associated with implementing Cronacle in an SAP environment.

Freudenberg IT, a heavy user of SAP since 1977, is delighted with Redwood's commitment to the ongoing enhancements of Cronacle for SAP. "Cronacle will continue to form an integral component of Freudenberg's service offering, enabling our users with new mySAP.com solutions, such as mySAP BW and mySAP CRM, and existing SAP solutions to benefit from a better quality of service," commented Peter Oswald, SAP Basis Manager, Freudenberg IT.

Other enhancements in the new release of Cronacle include:

A Job Notes feature allowing context specific help or problem investigation information to be annotated to Cronacle jobs.

A reduction in systems administration overhead with support for Never-ending Recurrences, enabling the unlimited re-execution of a job that is created once.

Minor functional enhancements, such as support for multi-line Windows NT/2000 operating system commands, additional help information and enhanced performance for Redwood Explorer users as well as improved process control.

Mark Nation, Product Manager, Redwood Software said: "Organizations deploying SAP solutions realize the business benefits of implementing integrated technology solutions across the enterprise but often over look the importance of mundane back office functions such as background processing. Only when these business-critical processes fail, with a knock on effect in daily online working, do they appreciate just how important it is to manage all processing within the SAP environment to ensure the smooth running of the organization."

Redwood Software Founded in 1993 in The Netherlands, Redwood Software prides itself in providing high quality software solutions that help businesses become more productive.

All our solutions enable customers to evolve their IT investments in order to meet today's new business challenges. The complexity that comes with increased globalization, business-to-business commerce and business process re-engineering needs to be overcome. Maximum business efficiency can only be realised through the functional integration of the old with the new as each additional layer of technology is introduced. With the help of Redwood Software solutions underpinning business processes, organizations all over the world are achieving their business goals with greater effectiveness, quickly and with greater ease.

Contact Tulin Pledger, Marketing Manager, Redwood Software, Tel: +44 (0)118 977 2200, tpledger@uk.redwoodsoftware.com, www.redwoodsoftware.com.