Basics
Main Toolbar
The main toolbar buttons include buttons to open the major Toad windows such as the SQL Editor, Schema Browser, Procedure Editor, and SQL Modeler. Buttons also include Object Search, Run Script, Commit, Rollback, New connection,
Configure/Execute external tools, Configure options, and more. You can place the mouse pointer over a button to display its title.
Configure Toad Options
You access the multi-tabbed Toad Options window via the Configure Toad
Options button on the main toolbar or from the View | Options menu item.
Many of the options are discussed in later chapters and in Toad Help.
The Search button lets you search the options for specific text. This is useful, for example, if you can't remember which tab contains the option that you are trying to find. A table displays the list of options that contain the search text you type and the corresponding tab titles. Double-click the option, or click the option and press <Enter> to go to that page.
Save Toad Options
The Save Toad Options button saves external files, which are basically your current Toad settings and values.
This is useful if you are about to run a query that could crash or run for a long time. You might want to Save Toad Options before running such a query, just as a precaution. It saves all Toad options to files in your Toad and Toad\User Files folders including settings from the Toad Options dialog, Editor Options settings,
Recall Previous SQL lists, Lists of MRU (Most Recently Used) files, Table Name alias list, etc.
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Toad for Oracle
Offline Text Editor
The Offline Text Editor button opens an Offline Text Editor window. So, you can edit scripts without being connected to an Oracle database.
For example, by modifying the script files that define how the Toad Editor should highlight keywords, you could edit HTML files and have Toad highlight the HTML markup tags in various colors.
The file language types supported are: PL/SQL, HTML, INI, JAVA , and TEXT. You can also open XML files (which will activate the XML Editor).
The View |Options | Parser Scripts dialog is where you set up the file associations for file name extension.
Configure the editor options by loading a file for a language into the offline editor and choosing Edit |Editor Options.
XML Editor
When you load an XML file into the offline text editor, a tree navigator for the
XML displays on the left hand side. You can edit the XML in the text or in the tree.
You can also open the XML Editor on CLOB datatypes that contain the XML page header. Save as works with XML data for some formats. Schema Browser files are stored as XML files.
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Basics
Configure/Execute External Tools
This opens the Tool Options window which lets you add programs that can be launched from Toad. The Add button opens a Tool Properties window that lets you add programs, select icons, pass in parameters to the program, create shortcuts (click in the Shortcut box and enter the new keystroke), and add macros. After you've added programs to the Tool Options window, they are available from the Configure/Execute External Tools dropdown list. The icon of the last program you execute from the dropdown replaces the
Configure/Execute External Tools icon. You can then execute the last program by clicking its icon on the toolbar.
An Auto add button searches the registry for a set of preinstalled programs. You select the programs that you want to add. It finds the program file, an icon, and establishes the working directory as the same directory where the executable resides.
Project Manager
The Project Manager lets you manage your common DB tasks from one central window.
The Settings button opens the Configuration window where you can: specify the command Toad executes when you drag a file onto another file or onto a node, customize double-click operations, and customize the pop-up (right-click) menus. It also lets you configure the external associations and the DDL script inclusions.
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Toad for Oracle
Project nodes let you store links to folders, connection links, and database objects.
To Add a Project Node
• Right-click and select Add| Project.
– OR –
From the Add Item dropdown select Project.
In order to add a folder to your project, it must exist on your hard drive.
To Add a Folder
• Right-click and select Add | Folder.
– OR –
From the Add Item dropdown select Folder.
When you add a folder, Project Manager maps the folder path. By default, double-clicking on the folder will open Windows Explorer to that folder. You can add items contained in the folder to the Project Manger window so that they can be accessed directly. FTP folders represent connections to a remote server and are located as sub-nodes to a project folder that you create. You can add a separate folder for each server directory that you want mapped.
A Copy feature lets you have more than one project open at once with links to the same files, FTP connections, or schemas. The feature applies to second-level nodes: Schemas, Folders, and FTP Folders.
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Basics
To Copy Nodes
1.
Select the node(s) you want to copy (multi-select via <Shift> or
<Ctrl>)
2.
Right-click and select Copy from the menu.
The Destination Projects window displays.
3.
Select the project(s) you want to copy to.
4.
Click Ok.
Different project nodes can contain links to the same items. You can use different schemas or users in each project. Project Manager lets you access your connections, see if you are connected, and connect if the connection is not current. You can combine different Oracle connections and FTP connections into one project. You can configure Project Manger so that it will automatically run a
Schema Compare when you drag one schema node onto another schema node.
For more details about Project Manager refer to Toad Help.
Object Palette
The Object Palette is accessed from the View menu and docks to the main window. It replaces the Table Selector window that was in previous versions of
Toad. It can list tables, views, or synonyms. A toggle button lets you display columns for the selected object. You can also select an object from the list and press F4 to perform a Describe. The Object Palette is required for the SQL
Modeler and the ER Diagram.
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