Thoth Gateway moved to GitHub, now supports Apex 5.0

As with the Alexandria PL/SQL Utility Library, the source code for the Thoth Gateway, a mod_plsql and Apex Listener/ORDS equivalent for Microsoft IIS, now has a new home on GitHub. This should make it easy for anyone to look at and perhaps contribute to the code.

If you don't care about the source code, you can head straight to the releases page to download just the binaries. Updated installation instructions for IIS 8 will be forthcoming, but deploying the Thoth Gateway is really as easy as just dropping the binaries into the wwwroot and using IIS Manager to turn the folder into an application.

Also, there were a few minor tweaks needed to support Apex 5.0. As far as I can tell from my own testing, everything now works, but do let me know if you have any issues.

Download the lastest version of the Thoth Gateway with Apex 5.0 support here.

Thoth Gateway version 1.3.6 available

There is a new version of the Thoth Gateway, a mod_plsql replacement for IIS, available for download. The latest version is 1.3.6.

CC by Flickr user gzayatz

The previous version available for download was 1.3.0, so there are a number of enhancements and bug fixes rolled up into this release, including:


Version 1.3.6

Bug fix: Value of the CGI environment variable LOGON_USER was empty on IIS 7 running in Integrated pipeline mode: This was due to a breaking change on IIS 7. The Thoth Gateway now hooks into the PostAuthenticate event, rather than the BeginRequest event, in order for information about the current user to be available when using Windows Integrated Authentication.

Version 1.3.5

Hide server banner: A new top-level (non-DAD-specific) configuration parameter, HideServerBanner, has been added. If this is set to true (the default is false), the server will not emit the response server headers that identify the server as IIS powered by ASP.NET. This can improve security in certain situations, and reduces the response size. Requires IIS 7 with "integrated pipeline" mode.

Set SOAP date format: A new DAD-specific configuration parameter, SoapDateFormat, has been added. The default is YYYY-MM-DD"T"HH24:MI:SS. This is used to set the database session NLS date format when the gateway receives a SOAP request. You can adjust this parameter if your SOAP clients are sending dates with an UTC time indicator or offset.

Bug fix: Don't upload empty files: The gateway incorrectly uploaded files even from an empty file browse field (when the user submitted a form without having selected a file).

Bug fix: Handle responses with HTTP headers but no HTTP body: An ArgumentOutOfRangeException was thrown if the request included (just) HTTP headers without any body.

Version 1.3.4

Bug fix: Handle missing accept-encoding header: Dynamic content compression did not correctly handle clients with missing accept-encoding header.

Version 1.3.3

Serve static content from gateway folder: A new top-level (non-DAD-specific) configuration parameter, ServeStaticContent, has been added. If this is set to true (the default is false), the gateway will check if the requested URL maps to a physical file, and if so, will serve up this file instead of connecting to the database.

Compress dynamic content: A new top-level (non-DAD-specific) configuration parameter, CompressDynamicContent, has been added. If this is set to true (the default is false), and the client (browser) signals that it can accept compressed content, the gateway will compress the generated output (using GZip or Deflate, depending on the client's stated preference). This reduces network traffic at the cost of more CPU usage on the server. Note that although the default value of this is false (for backwards compatibility), I recommend you set the parameter to true, as it can give your website a significant performance boost.

Version 1.3.2

SOAP Faults: A database exception during a SOAP request now creates a SOAP Fault response that contains the database error message (see the SoapErrorStyle configuration parameter), instead of the normal 404 error (or debug error page).

Version 1.3.1

Performance optimization: The main PL/SQL procedure call issued by the gateway now also includes the call to check if the response is a file download (which used to be a separate PL/SQL call). This reduces the total number of database calls, thereby improving performance.



For existing installations, simply overwrite the existing PLSQLGatewayModule.dll file in the "bin" folder with the latest version from the downloaded archive.

Thoth Gateway version 1.3 available

There is a new version of the Thoth Gateway, a mod_plsql replacement for IIS, available for download. The latest version is 1.3.

It contains the following bug fixes and enhancements:

• Bug Fix: Issue with parsing client IP address: Added exception handling to prevent error when parsing client IP address with invalid format.
• Ignore additional request parameters: Certain tools and frameworks may dynamically add additional parameters to a request, which causes the corresponding PL/SQL call to fail, since these parameters are not defined in the procedure signature. As of this version, the gateway will now retry the call after dropping (ignoring) any parameters that cannot be found in the Oracle data dictionary for the procedure being called.
• Support for Oracle proxy authentication (and Single Sign On) via dynamic username substitution: Oracle proxy authentication, combined with Integrated Windows Authentication in IIS, allows you to pass the end-user's identity from the client to the database session (so the function USER will return the end-user's Windows username, with no login required). This is useful in an intranet scenario where users are defined in an Active Directory domain and use Internet Explorer to access the PL/SQL web application.

For existing installations, simply overwrite the existing PLSQLGatewayModule.dll file in the "bin" folder with the latest version from the downloaded archive.

Thoth Gateway: mod_plsql replacement for Microsoft IIS

Take a look at this screenshot:



Yes, that's right... Oracle Application Express running on Microsoft's Internet Information Server (IIS)! In-between trips to the beach this summer, I decided to write a PL/SQL gateway module for IIS. The result, called the Thoth Gateway, is now available as open source.

This means that the deployment options for PL/SQL web applications are now:

• The Embedded PL/SQL Gateway (DBMS_EPG), which is a webserver built into the database itself
• The Oracle HTTP Server (OHS), which is based on the Apache codebase, with mod_plsql
• Java-based web servers (such as Tomcat, WebLogic, and others) with the open-source DBPrism plugin, or the upcoming, Oracle-supported Apex Listener
• And now, Microsoft Internet Information Server (IIS) with the Thoth Gateway module

The Thoth Gateway is implemented in C# as an ASP.NET HttpModule and uses the Oracle Data Provider for .NET (ODP.NET) to communicate with the database.

The Thoth Gateway supports almost all of mod_plsql's features, and even adds a few more (such as CLOB parameter support for values over 32K). Check out the project page for the details.

It's also worth noting that the Thoth Gateway, being a volunteer project, is not officially supported by Oracle in any way. But at least now you have the option of using Microsoft's IIS as the web server for Oracle PL/SQL web applications. In fact, you can use any of the above listed gateways side-by-side for the same PL/SQL web application (all on the same box, or on different physical servers).

I am very interested in feedback if you decide to go ahead and try the Thoth Gateway, so feel free to add comments to this post about any bugs or problems you encounter, or use the project's issue tracker (adding issues requires a Google account).