Oracle APEX (or Oracle Application Express) is an online low-code application builder that allows users to develop a database-drive application, customize the application's UI, and then give their users access to the application via URL. Oracle APEX includes a suite of pre-built productivity applications and examples, such as a Survey Builder, Bug Tracking, P-Track project management, etc
$0.32
OCPU per hour
Azure SQL Database
Score 8.4 out of 10
N/A
Azure SQL Database is Microsoft's relational database as a service (DBaaS).
If you need to develop an application very quickly, without unnecessary lengthy specifications or business requirements, something you need right away, while utilizing all the capabilities of the Oracle database, APEX is the right choice. Thanks to the many components you use from the vast Oracle APEX library, working with this tool is exceptionally pleasant, fast, and effective.
We have found it's a great alternative for making older legacy applications work with online databases instead of only on-premises databases. We've converted over a dozen applications this way, and it has allowed our clients to have a distributed workforce using their applications without incurring the expense of a complete application rewrite.
Maintenance is always an issue, so using a cloud solution saves a lot of trouble.
On premise solutions always suffer from fragmented implementations here and there, where several "dba's" keep track of security and maintenance. With a cloud database it's much easier to keep a central overview.
Security options in SQL database are next level... data masking, hiding sensitive data where always neglected on premise, whereas you'll get this automatically in the cloud.
Can't think of any - the Application Express development team does a fantastic job adopting and supporting emerging trends with each new release.
Requires Oracle RDBMS; i.e., is not portable to other RDBMS platforms. On the surface this may seem like a con but it is as it should be - Oracle database is best RDBMS available and tight integration with Oracle RDBMS promotes creation of reliable performant apps.
One needs to be aware that some T-SQL features are simply not available.
The programmatic access to server, trace flags, hardware from within Azure SQL Database is taken away (for a good reason).
No SQL Agent so your jobs need to be orchestrated differently.
The maximum concurrent logins maybe an unexpected problem.
Sudden disconnects.
The developers and admin must study the capacity and tier usage limits https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/azure-subscription-service-limits otherwise some errors or even transaction aborts never seen before can occur.
Only one Latin Collation choice.
There is no way to debug T-SQL ( a big drawback in my point of view).
I felt very comfortable using Oracle Application Express from the start. I designed my data model and quickly developed the basic CRUD pages for master tables. Then I designed the main functionality and was able to test and deploy it in a couple of days work. I will probably share the app with other members of the team and continue adding some features in the short term.
Oracle APEX is an ultra flexible, low code platform having a great easy of use, superior customization capabilities, scalable and provides a very good application and data security. It also has lot of AI capabilities as well as modern features such as GeoLocation maps, Automation capabilities, Workflow approval features and Mobile application capabilities using PWA like features.
The interfaces are intuitive once you are familiar with all the functions. The ability to use different tools to interact with the platform, such as directly via a browser or code editors such as VS Code or Visual Studio is a great option and allows for integrating withn the project and other testing and developing tools.
Very active and knowledgeable community support includes quick and helpful responses from the Oracle employees on the product development team. I've never had to raise an official support request - everything is dealt with via forums and user groups - or via direct emails. The supposrt commuinty is one of the great things about Apex.
We give the support a high rating simply because every time we've had issues or questions, representatives were in contact with us quickly. Without fail, our issues/questions were handled in a timely matter. That kind of response is integral when client data integrity and availability is in question. There is also a wealth of documentation for resolving issues on your own.
Using it on the cloud is really simple, the entire process of configuring and provisioning an Oracle Database takes only a few minutes (less than 10) and then Oracle APEX is already deployed on the database, so you just have to start using it. I would strongly recommend using APEX on Oracle Cloud Free Tier.
If you are expert in SQL and PLSQL and use Oracle Database, then the best choice is Oracle Application Express. The functionality is already complete and very easy to use, so it's useless to find another tool if you are using Oracle. You don't use Oracle APEX only if: (1) you are using other database than Oracle, and (2) your application load is unpredictable.
We moved away from Oracle and NoSQL because we had been so reliant on them for the last 25 years, the pricing was too much and we were looking for a way to cut the cord. Snowflake is just too up in the air, feels like it is soon to be just another line item to add to your Azure subscription. Azure was just priced right, easy to migrate to and plenty of resources to hire to support/maintain it. Very easy to learn, too.
In the mid-size organization, we had a BI tool that had a significant license cost involved. With Oracle back-end we were able to switch to APEX and move all reporting at literally zero cost.
For Oracle PL/SQL users the learning curve is very quick and easy, there are ready templates that you can start with and eventually create complex reports.
You can track authorization and authentication on data editing and usage. High performance as it is native oracle sql codes.
Centralized data capturing, makes your datawarehouse writable for lookup tables or reference tables.
