Difference between 11i and R12

Whats new in Oracle Apps R12

Key points to Note:

1)Oracle Applications Release 12 is the latest release in the chain of E-Business Suite Releases by Oracle.

2)This release came up with the new file system model

3)Autoconfig will not write anything in APPL_TOP, COMMON_TOP area in R12.

4)All instance specific configurations, log files are written in INST_TOP area. This home provides the ability to share Applications and technology stack.

R12 new features

1)Applications Server 9i is replaced by 10g (10.1.3.X)

2)Forms & Reports Version 6i (8.0.6) are replaced by Forms & Reports Version 10g i.e. 10.1.2.X

3)mod_jserv is replaced by oc4j

4)Java/ JDK version 1.3.X or 1.4.X will be replaced by JDK 1.5.X

Techstack Components Changes

Database (RDBMS_ORACLE_HOME) - 10.2.0.2

FORMS ORACLE_HOME (8.0.6 ORACLE HOME equivalence) - 10.1.2

OC4J_ORACLE_HOME (iAS ORACLE_HOME equivalence) - 10.1.3

File system level changes

A new top INSTANCE_TOP is introduced in Release 12 for configuration and log files along with the other TOP's in existing in 11i.

All instance specific configurations, log files are written in INST_TOP area. This home provides the ability to share Applications and technology stack.

WHAT IS INSTANCE TOP
Instance home is the top-level directory for an Applications Instance which is known as Instance Home and is denoted the environment variable $INST_TOP. This contains all the config files, log files, SSL certificates etc.

Advantages of new INSTANCE HOME
The additional Instance Home makes the middle tier more easy to manage and organized since the data is kept separate from the config files.
The Instance Home also has the ability to share the Applications and Technology stack code across multiple instances.
Another advantage of the Instance Home is that the Autoconfig writes only in INST_TOP so APPL_TOP and ORACLE_HOME can also be made read only file system if required.