Surveying, Mapping and GIS

There is a second Software Alert you should be aware of as it may impact your Oracle customers using our 9.2 ST_Geometry spatial type with Oracle 10g R2. This may result in incorrect query results under certain conditions. Our HQ marketing group will also send a newsflash email to all the BPs with additional details.

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Summary of the Problem
An Oracle RDBMS bug (Patch 6756089) has been encountered that can cause spatial selections to be wrong for feature classes using ST_Geometry (ESRI’s implementation of a SQL type for Spatial).
When a feature is inserted into a table that stores features using ST_Geometry, its envelope calculation can be truncated, leading to incorrect results with a spatial selection.

Who is affected?
This Oracle bug affects Oracle 10g users of ArcSDE 9.2 geodatabases using the spatial type (ST_GEOMETRY) to store their features and where the precision goes beyond the 5th decimal place. Again, this problem only affects users that work with geometry data that has an x,y decimal precision greater than 5 (e.g.; 11.1234567 will be truncated to 11.12345).

What is ESRI doing about it?
ESRI submitted a problem report to Oracle. Oracle has acknowledged, repaired, and patched the defect (Patch 6756089 and 6867052). Additionally, ESRI is building a utility to update the envelope and spatial index for each feature class once the Oracle patch has been installed.

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Additional info on second reported ST_Geometry issue

There is a second Software Alert you should be aware of as it may impact your Oracle customers using our 9.2 ST_Geometry spatial type with Oracle 10g R2. This may result in incorrect query results under certain conditions. Please read the notice below and inform your customers as appropriate.

Software
Alert for Oracle 10g DBMS Patch 6756089 and 6867052

Communication to Our Users
April 3, 2008

Summary of the Problem
An Oracle RDBMS bug (Patch 6756089) has been encountered that can cause spatial selections to be wrong for feature classes using ST_Geometry (ESRI’s implementation of a SQL type for Spatial). When a feature is inserted into a table that stores features using ST_Geometry, its envelope calculation can be truncated, leading to incorrect results with a spatial selection.

Who is affected?
This Oracle bug affects Oracle 10g users of ArcSDE 9.2 geodatabases using the spatial type (ST_GEOMETRY) to store their features and where the precision goes beyond the 5th decimal place. Again, this problem only affects users that work with geometry data that has an x,y decimal precision greater than 5 (e.g.; 11.1234567 will be truncated to 11.12345).

What is ESRI doing about it?
ESRI submitted a problem report to Oracle. Oracle has acknowledged, repaired, and patched the defect (Patch 6756089 and 6867052). Additionally, ESRI is building a utility to update the envelope and spatial index for each feature class once the Oracle patch has been installed. We expect our utility to be available by the end of the week of March 31. It will be available as a download from the ArcSDE download page (the
same location as hot fixes and service packs).

Where and when can I get the patch from Oracle?
There are a number of platforms to patch. To date, Oracle has only provided patches for the Linux, Sun Solaris and Windows (32-bit) platforms for Oracle 10g. Please go
to Oracle’s MetaLink page (http://metalink.oracle.com/) to check patch availability and to download the patch when it becomes available for any given platform needed.

The patch description for Linux and Sun Solaris is:
Patch:
6756089
Description: USING A DBMS TYPE IN OCI AND FLOATS ARE BEING ROUNDED OFF
Product RDBMS Server
The patch description for Windows is as follows:
Patch: 6867052
Description: ORACLE 10.2.0.3 PATCH 19 BUG FOR MICROSOFT WINDOWS 32BIT

ESRI Products and Versions that are affected by this Oracle bug
Any ArcSDE client application (e.g., ArcGIS 9.2, ArcIMS 9.2) that uses ArcSDE 9.2 for Oracle 10g (and service packs) with the ST_Geometry spatial type

Additional Information
Q. How do I know if I have the problem?
A. If you are using ArcSDE 9.2 for Oracle 10g, storing features as the spatial type (ST_GEOMETRY), and have greater than 5 decimal places of precision, you should assume the problem exists, even if you have not seen incorrect spatial query results.

Q. When should I install the Oracle patch?
A. As soon as it becomes available for your platform. After installation of the Oracle patch, please be sure to download the utility provided by ESRI to fix the envelope and update your spatial index.

Q: I've noticed that Oracle has released the patch for version 10.2.0.3 on some platforms. What does that mean to our customers that have upgraded or are planning to upgrade to 10.2.0.4? Do they need to drop back a patch release in order to install this? Apply the patch again?
A: We do not know the answer to this yet. We’ll provide the answer in KB34527 when we know it.

Q. What do I do if Oracle has not released a patch for my environment?
A. Contact your Oracle account team, reference the Oracle Metalink and tell them
you need the patch.

Q: Is the utility to fix the envelopes and re-create the spatial index for each feature class available for download?
A: Not yet. We expect to put it up on the ArcSDE download page (where patches are downloaded) by the end of the week of March 31.

Q: Will we have documentation that explains this problem in more detail?
A: Yes, please see KB article 34527.

Q. Does this issue impact our customers that are using the SDO_Geometry type?
A. No. Oracle Spatial (SDO_GEOMETRY) does not store the envelope of the geometry as an attribute of the object.

Q. Is Oracle 9i affected?
A. No, this problem is in 10g only.

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Related ongoing discussion in ESRI forums:

http://forums.esri.com/Thread.asp?c=158&f=2291&t=250200&mc=8