Green Bay, Wisconsin, October 24 2016 – Today Flexagon released FlexDeploy 4.0, extending the market leading DevOps and Continuous Delivery platform with new features which help deliver high-quality software faster and with lower cost and risk. The enhancements include improvements in automation, controls, and visibility, key areas which need to be addressed by a holistic automation solution.
Flexagon continues to invest in extensions to the already robust support for Oracle Database, Middleware, Applications, and Cloud, while providing integrations for additional open source and commercial technology such as Docker and Puppet. Beyond core feature/function, the new release includes additional platform support, improved usability, and extensibility. Here is a summary of the FlexDeploy 4.0 content:
New Plugins – Plugins provide pre-built capabilities, which eliminate manual activities and scripting, and provide integration to many tools and technologies used within enterprise IT. FlexDeploy 4.0 includes additional plugins for Oracle products and the popular container and provisioning tools, Docker and Puppet. The Docker and Puppet plugins help extend FlexDeploy’s existing capabilities related to provisioning and configuration management, allowing users to integrate these popular tools into the overall deployment automation lifecycle.
Oracle Fusion Middleware – Running on premises or in the cloud, these new Oracle Fusion Middleware plugins round out an already extensive set of plugins for OFM. Without FlexDeploy, Oracle BI and WebCenter Portal users struggle with effectively managing changes across environment. With the new plugins, those headaches are eliminated. No more manual tasks or scripting to migrate changes! The plugins provide full automation of the key artifacts which need to be deployed, along with the needed controls, dashboards, and reports which make it easy to implement fast, effective, and controlled changes for BI and WebCenter.
- Oracle Business Intelligence (OBIEE)
- Oracle WebCenter Portal
Oracle Database and Developer Tools – Whether it’s managing schema changes across database environments or deploying artifacts for APEX and Oracle Forms, these new plugins will be a big help. Both developers and admins will find these plugins beneficial as they speed the execution of changes and help users spend more time on higher value and more enjoyable activities.
- Oracle Database
- Oracle APEX
- Oracle Forms
Provisioning and Configuration Management – Managing IT environments can be complex and include everything from provision and configuration management to building, deploying, and testing database, middleware, and application level changes. The new plugins for Docker and Puppet extend FlexDeploy’s support for popular tools which help automate infrastructure management.
- Docker
- Puppet
Extended Platform Support – FlexDeploy can now be installed on the popular open source Apache Tomcat application server. Support for Tomcat helps customers who standardize on Tomcat and for those wishing to reduce cost by using open source options for their FlexDeploy runtime.
Usability – Ease of use is extremely important, so we continue to improve all aspects of usability and user experience. Some enhancements help with the initial implementation of FlexDeploy, while others help with ongoing management and day to day usage of the tool.
- View running and completed tests within the dashboard
- Define security to control who can submit deployments to which environments
- Ability to abort running workflows
- Enhanced visibility to request level detail such as pending approvals and scheduled tasks
- Option to run workflows on out of the box endpoint representing the FlexDeploy server
Extensibility – Our customers use a diverse set of technologies and need a platform which easily integrates with existing tools and technologies and enables the adoption of new technology over time. The new plugin SDK and additional REST APIs in 4.0 are examples of Flexagon’s investment in enabling FlexDeploy for extensibility and integration. These new features help enable end to end automation of the software delivery lifecycle, now and in the future.
- New Plugin Software Development Kit (SDK), allowing customers and partners to create their own FlexDeploy plugins to integrate with virtually any application, middleware platform, or tool
- New REST APIs for external integration into FlexDeploy, such as APIs for updating properties, approving/rejecting tasks, running/cancelling scheduled tasks, and submitting build/deploy requests for partial deployments
- Enhanced metadata around properties and inputs to enhance user experience and drive richer workflow capabilities
- Approve FlexDeploy tasks based on Jira status changes
Extended Support for Oracle EBS – FlexDeploy’s support for E-Business Suite is market leading, and we’ve extended that leadership position with new support for functional setups and improvements based on feedback from our customers. Many customers are looking for an automation platform that supports EBS and other technologies in their ecosystem, which is exactly what FlexDeploy provides.
- Deployment support for Functional Setups
- Download XML publisher and Workflows from EBS development instance during build
- Generate and sign custom production JAR files for OAF
- Usability enhancements based on customer feedback
Plugin Updates – Ongoing improvements to our existing functionality for Oracle Fusion Middleware help customers with advanced support for WebLogic and SOA middleware administration.
- Support for SOA Suite 12.2.x long running processes
- Extended support for WebLogic configuration management
FlexDeploy 4.0 continuous to evolve FlexDeploy as an Enterprise DevOps and Application Release Automation Platform. The driving purpose to create a comprehensive, integrated, and open platform sets FlexDeploy apart as a market leader in this space. Our ongoing investments to support Oracle, open-source, and other commercial tools and technologies expands the value of FlexDeploy for enterprises looking to standardize and automate their software delivery processes.
