First Early Adopter: Oracle SQL Developer Data Modeling.

I've just put this announcement onto OTN:

The SQL Developer team is pleased to announce their first Early Adopter release of Oracle SQL Developer Data Modeling.

• Review the main data modeling page, with links to initial documentation and supporting collateral.
• Access the Early Adopter Download. This download link walks you through a brief one-time survey, before you can download the product. For future early adopter releases, you will not be required to repeat the survey.
• Provide feedback to the the team through the Feedback application, where you can add all your comments and log issues.
• Read the supporting Release Notes.

The Oracle SQL Developer SIG kicks off at Oracle OpenWorld

I have entered the first post on http://sqldevelopersig.blogspot.com/ "What? Another Blog and you don't update this one regularly!" I hear you say. Yes, you may be right, but the new blog is a shared community blog. Well that's the plan, and it was suggested at the first SIG meeting at the Unconference at OpenWorld in San Francisco. When many of the delegates were turning to airports or having a last day lie-in, a small group of enthusiast joined a few team members to discuss the possibility of have a SQL Developer SIG. All ideas raised were discussed and noted and you'll find those ideas, and some initial feedback on http://sqldevelopersig.blogspot.com

Take a look, we'd love you to get involved. The great thing about a community blog is that you can write up an idea when you want and do not need to feel committed to be a regular contributor. You can, of course add comments at any stage.

Aah, and the team members will continue to update their own blogs in much the same way as we have to date. When we get the time and have something we really want to tell you. Entries are mostly driven by the former, not the latter.

SQL Developer Visits Oracle OpenWorld

Last week the SQL Developer team met in San Francisco for Oracle OpenWorld. We love it as it's a great opportunity to talk to customers and hear what they really like and don't like and to listen to ideas. It's also a great opportunity for the team to get together and catch up as we're scattered across a few countries!

OpenWorld is a huge undertaking for Oracle and many staff are involved on some level or other, whether at the event or behind the scenes before the show. There is a secondary developer focused event that runs simultaneously, this year starting on Sunday, called Oracle Develop. It's a smaller event, a conference-within-a-conference, and is focused on technical talks and hands-on sessions. We had a few talks and a variety of hands-on sessions at Oracle Develop and a few talks and demo pods at OpenWorld. Our talks and hands on sessions were mostly well attended, but it was the news of the new Data Modeling support that stole the show. Everyone was really interested in what the product will offer and of course when it will be available. As ever we can't provide exact release dates, but we're looking at 2009 for production. We're currently running internal preview releases and will move to external preview or early adopter releases within the next month or so. There are a few final things that need to be sorted before we do that. Watch the OTN Forum for an update on that.

SQL Developer SIG
We launched our SQL Developer SIG at OOW. One of the concerns we have is that writing XML extensions is easy and yet we don't hear of many folk doing that. Maybe you all are, but don't share your experiences! We also have a growing set of developers building more complex extensions, mostly java, who are looking for advice and pointers. We have now setup an area on http://wiki.oracle.com for the SQL Developer SDK and will continue to add detail and examples to this.
So the idea was that if we set up a SIG then we'd have a vehicle to talk to those developers regularly. But a SIG is also much more and so we held the initial, kick-off of the SQL Developer SIG the Unconference (at OOW) on Thursday morning early and we discussed options and plans. The SIG is for everyone using SQL Developer, not just those wanting to build extensions. There is so much to discuss and share and as ever it's good to get opinions and input from the community. One of the plans is to have a communal SQL Developer blog. More on that later.

More Conferences
There are still more conferences around, Oracle Develop is on the road and along with other events, SQL Developer is visiting Scotland, South Africa, Switzerland, Germany, UK, China, and India and that's this year!

We're starting to plan our events for next year, if there is a conference near you or a subject area you think we should look into, let me know.

Conference Season

I think the whole of 2008 is conference season! It's starting to feel like it. I think I don't travel much, certainly I know that Oracle Sales Consultants seems to be on the road permanently and I know some of the Oracle Server Tech PMs are really busy on the road. I tend to be desk based, well, that's how I see myself. So here's how a desk-based PM spends her time.

I'm at HQ this week - nice spot - lovely weather, although deceptively cold. I say that because the sky is the same colour as it was last week and the hotel room temperature is the same as last week, but it all changes when I step outside. Where I was last week might explain why I feel that. Last week was ODTUG in New Orleans!

Great event. Lots of very enthusiastic and experienced developers. Most willing to learn new technologies and excited and positive about the future.
As ever the conference supported 50% new attendees. Each year it does (as so most conferences) and each year we are surprised. "[shocked and amazed] You mean half of these folk have never been before? Where are the oldies?" Anyway, there were enough of "the oldies" about and that's great. Although sometimes I wonder what it feels like for the new folk, as there is something of a family feel about the place as folk catch up on news since last everyone met and lots of name dropping in the various talks as if everyone knows everyone else. I guess most do.

I did 2 talks. One I call my "drill down" talk, where I assume you use the tool or a similar one, and show some of the more in depth things you can do. Typically, I pick 4 features and spend about 15 mins on each topic. My personal favorite is the XML extensibility, which we can all do. No need for Java skills to extend some aspects of SQL Developer and certainly a nifty aspect to the tool. (Most DBAs I know have a collection of utilities or tasks they regularly perform). If you have no idea what I am talking about, search this blog or the OTN pages, there is a tutorial on the SQL Developer pages on just that feature.

My other talk is the SQL Developer overview and as someone pointed out, now requires more than an hour. Next time I'll skip the intro completely. I did a few positioning slides and then dived into a 50 minute demo. By all accounts - well received.

That an hour is a little short is easily illustrated - I was in Denmark a few weeks back, where I spent the day with a group of DBAs and developers, each armed with their laptops, and together we walked our way through SQL Developer, from the APEX support to the Migration, through XML extensions and reporting. It was a great day.

News
We were excited to bring some news of the next release of SQL Developer to ODTUG. You might have seen this in the "twittersphere", on other blogs, or have stumbled across our latest Statement of Direction. The plan is to incorporate data modeling in SQL Developer. This is a much requested feature in a tool already being used by many database developers and architects. We'll publish an FAQ on OTN in due course to address queries about this.

More Conferences
As I submitted abstracts to events and then registered for these events, I've meant to let you know of their existence, but did not get to it. So ODTUG is over for 2008, but I'll remind you now that it'll be there next year and that they'll probably be asking for abstracts in November-ish, so diarise that!

There are quite a few events that you have not missed yet, like Oracle OpenWorld coming up in September. Details of talks are already available and what's great is that the "Develop" part of the event is at the Marriott, so not blocks away from the main event. Easy access between talks and hands on sessions. SQL Developer has 4 different hands on sessions, and 4 different talks, not to mention the demopods, where you can meet the developers and ask questions.

I've submitted abstracts to DOAG (in Germany), Israel, UKOUG (Birmingham) and Scotland (Glasgow) and will be submitting to the New York user group. So if you missed the chance to hear more about SQL Developer, there should be something near you. You'll note there is nothing in APAC and regrettably I can't get to AUSOUG.

Let me know if there is a conference near you. I can add that kind of news to the SQL Developer Exchange News page and keep everyone up-to-date.

Using Oracle Database 11g Hierarchical Profiler in SQL Developer

Oracle SQL Developer 1.5 exposes a few new Oracle 11g database features. These include the Flashback and the PL/SQL Hierarchical Profiler. For details on either of these feature it's best to dive in the the 11g documentation, available online here. The PL/SQL Hierarchical Profiler..."identifies hot spots and performance tuning opportunities... It reports the dynamic execution program profile organized by subprogram calls..."

I have recorded a brief demo to illustrate using the PL/SQL Hierarchical Profiler in SQL Developer.

Not only do you need Oracle 11g, you also need to have access to a set of tables and a new package called DBMS_HPROF. SQL Developer takes control of setting this up and so you need only acknowledge the steps being taken. If you don't want SQL Developer to create the required profiler tables, review the 11g documentation and ensure you set this up before hand.

Once you have created a profile you can review the detail. The reports provided include details such as:

• Number of calls to the subprogram
• Time spent in the subprogram itself
• All subprograms that a given subprogram called (children)
  

Have fun!

Oracle SQL Developer 1.5 is Production

You might be linked into the announcements RSS feed on the OTN forum and so will have received the alert from the SQL Developer team announcing that we have released SQL Developer 1.5.

The latest release of SQL Developer expands the file-based support by introducing tight integration with the CVS and Subversion version control systems. In addition to browsing and editing files in the file system, in this release you can now import files into your source control system, check them out, modify them, and commit the changed files back into the source control system.

SQL Developer 1.5 has two new navigators; a File Navigator, available on start up, and a Versioning Navigator. This latter is not opened by default, instead is accessed when needed using the View menu. Once you have created a connection to your version control system, you can use SQL Developer to import files and version files. SQL Developer tracks the history of a file and you can compare recent changes and accept or reject those changes. Once you have accepted changes and committed them back to the version control system, you can generate a patch, based on the differences.

SQL Developer 1.5 is more than version control. This is the release where we wanted to address as many of the community requests as we could. The snag with that is as soon as you respond to one request, a dozen more new ones pop up. We're no daunted by this, just accepted a long list of requests and if you look at the Exchange, you'll see that many made it into 1.5. Requests added include code insight, updated formatter and more connection options. For a full list of new features, you can review the New Feature list on OTN.

For all new supporting documents, please visit SQL Developer on OTN

An Update from Five and a Half Hours East of ‘Normal’

Even though I’m not a regular blogger, here’s an update about why things are quiet now. As a rule I keep this blog for SQL Developer related comment or features. I plan to continue in that vein, but sometimes it’s nice to talk about or read something slightly different. I was pinged a few times in January by various friends and colleagues to add a list of “8 Things …” At the time I thought this was quite a fun activity and despite the various mumbles and grumbles on a few sites, planned to add a short list to my blog, thinking it would be a great way to get blogging in 2008 and to break my ever-sporadic habit. You are welcome to stop reading at this point, I should just add that this is not a list of 8 things…just one. For those who pinged me, this would have been on the list of ‘8 things you don’t know about me’

If you are a regular reader or know me, you’ll know that I live and work in London. This month I am living and working in New Delhi, India. I’m working for an Indian based charity called Asha. Dr Kiran Martin, a paediatrician, established Asha some 18 years ago, when she started to treat the slum dwellers during a cholera outbreak. Asha is now active in about 40 slums in Delhi, working with over 200 000 people, with a programme that encompasses community and individual development, working on environmental improvements and providing health care. Asha uses volunteers to help, with many hundred from the slum communities. The slum volunteers are trained by Asha staff and then become part of the team working together with professional health care workers. Last year I came out with a team for 10 days from the UK, during a break from Oracle, to help paint a clinic in one of the slums. I documented my trip during that time on this separate blog. http://delhiminimission.blogspot.com
While we were there, we were told about their plans to start English and Computer Literacy programmes and to call for volunteers to get involved. They were hoping for TEFL or TESOL trained volunteers who could spare 2 – 3 months. I am here for a month, as one of the volunteers, teaching children English in one of the slums.

I do have access to the Internet sporadically and so you might see me pop up on the forum from time to time, but I’m officially on leave, so if you think I’m quieter than normal, you might find me chatting here, http://delhiminimission.blogspot.com or maybe even here, http://sueharper.visualblogging.com

I’ll be back in April.

SQL Developer EA2 is out now

Oracle SQL Developer1.5 Early Adopter's Release 2 (EA2) is out now. We made it available last night and already the forum is buzzing with EA2 feedback and the developers are focusing on the next phase.
Did you know you can build a gauge into a report or a data grid query in SQL Developer 1.5? Take a look at this quick demo. Below is a preview screen shot.

New Year, New Features, New Release and a Few Tips!

I should be blogging! So much to tell you and so little time! I thought when I was first tagged for the "8Things", that I'd use that to start blogging again, and then the second time I was tagged I was sure I would, but even the third time didn't help... Aah well, maybe one day I'll tell you a few things about me that you don't know. I want to tell you I'm going back to India in March (did you know I went last year?) and never got around to that either. All in good time.

The SQL Developer news is that Oracle SQL Developer 1.5 Early Adopters 1 (EA1) is out. If anything that should have had me straight on the blog, but I am tracking feature issues and feedback on the forum and so didn't. Then one of the team sent me this tip and it was just too good to lose:

You can use alt-shift-# (where # is a number) to create a "editor bookmark", then use alt-# to navigate to it.

So, if you have a number of worksheets open, you can create a bookmark selecting alt-shift-1, which assigns an alt-1 navigator shortcut to the active editor. You'll see a small numbered icon on editor's tab. If you repeat that for each open tab, then you can then navigate between tabs using keyboard strokes, alt-1, alt-2, etc.

A Few Other Keyboard Strokes:

• To use code editor templates you have created (in the preferences) use the keyboard shortcut ctrl+shift+T.
• The keyboard shortcut for the SQL History is crtl +up or ctrl + down. This replaces whatever is in the worksheet with lines from your history.
  
• To create a new, unshared worksheet, use the keystroke ctrl+shift+N. This creates a separate, unshared worksheet. The unshared worksheets are labeled as follows: HR_ _<1>

Did you know that if you open a xxx.trc file in Oracle SQL Developer you'll see a sortable, formatted view of the file?

So it seems there are lots of tips about, which you might like to know about or which you have discovered on your own and wished someone had told you. I'm going to try to tell you more and often as I can. If you have some for me, I'd love to hear about them.

Sue

After the Storm - Oracle Open World and a New Podcast

I've had a week back at the office following Oracle Open World in San Francisco and had some time to reflect on all that went on. If you have been following various blogs and write ups about the event you'll have heard about the various dinners bloggers or Ace's attended, which, while they may seem frivolous, are as an important part of any conference as the sessions themselves, by providing a valuable opportunity of meeting or catching up with folk in person. (See the updates from Mark Rittman on those.) Actually these kinds of events are really good for talking to folk about the products they use, their concerns, dislikes and likes.
This year the Oracle SQL Developer team were busy at the main event on the demo grounds. We had great feedback on the new Migration Workbench extension, which has been a great help to a number of companies. I also heard very positive feedback about the new Times Ten extension, now available in preview. We spent most of the time demonstrating the new features the team are currently working on. I found that SQL*Plus users, DBAs who use the command-line and our existing database developers all liked what they saw.

We also had a number of papers and a hands-on session at the Oracle Develop event. One of our sessions was in a room too small for the crowd and had to be moved to one larger. I was very pleased to see that our hands-on event was a sell out and only wished we had time for a second or even longer session. I'll upload all the hand-on material onto OTN.

I had an opportunity to meet and talk to Tom Haunert, editor of the Oracle Magazine. The brief podcast we recorded is available from the general Oracle Podcasts site on OTN. You'll find it under the Oracle Magazine.
I'd love to hear the kinds of topics you'd be interested in hearing. (Bearing in mind this is audio only and has a max time of about 12 minutes, although most are about 8 to 10 minutes.)

My only regrets not seeing everyone I'd hoped to see and not stopping to talk for longer with some folk I saw along the way, as I dashed to a presentation or back to the demogrounds. Maybe next year.

Gearing up for Oracle OpenWorld

One week to go before Oracle OpenWorld in San Francisco. There is a buzz in the air, with the preparation build-up, whether we are in California right now or not. One of the things they have added this year is "Oracle Connect" an on-line community for the conference, along with all the other information and events on the go. I think you can safely say, there is something for everyone! For those who don't like the formalities of some of the talks, there are 2 areas you might be interested in. The one is the "Unconference" and the other is the "No Slide Zone".

This year Larry is talking on Sunday night too. Take a look at the keynotes scheduled.

Kris and I will both be at the conference again this year, along with other developers from the team. Stop by the stand and introduce yourselves, we'd like to meet you.

Oracle's Official WIKI

There is a new place for information about all things Oracle! http://wiki.oracle.com/
While it may feel like there are so many places to find information, I think that having the various formats available suit different people and different styles. The new site that you may or may not be aware of is the Oracle Wiki. It's a place where the Oracle community, internal and external, can contribute and share content. The site already has links to Oracle OpenWorld and the different that attendees can see and do. You can get lost in the wiki content about Oracle World, without going to the main site, although I do recommend you do.

Back to the Wiki. Under the navigation section, there is a Developer Tools node and you'll find SQL Developer nestling there among some of oracle's older (and not so old) tools.

Content for SQL Developer can be found through a chatty forum, or more formally on the OTN technical pages or very formally through the SQL Developer documentation which we link to from the OTN pages listed above. So the wiki allows you add small components, or larger explanations, specific FAQs or links to articles you have written. Adding to the wiki is easy, so have fun and make it your space.

Browse Oracle APEX Applications Using SQL Developer

This is a quick alert that there is now a good article on the Integration of Oracle Application Express (APEX) and Oracle SQL Developer. You may already know that this feature was introduced with SQL Developer 1.2, but unless you had created an Oracle APEX connection you might not have realised the extent of the support that is available. The article provides an overview of all you can do:

"Using SQL Developer, you can perform the following functions:

• Browse your Application Express Applications
• Export and Import Applications
• Drop Applications
• Deploy Applications
• Modify Applications
• Export Pages
• Tune your Queries
• Included Application Express Reports
• Custom Exception Reports"

Have a look. You can also find links to this article from the news section on the Oracle SQL Developer pages on OTN and it's listed with the other technical documents and white papers.

Updates to Training and Online Material

The Oracle SQL Developer Tutorial has been updated to support SQL Developer 1.2 features. This tutorial is packed full of short demonstration viewlets; from installation, creating connections, through using functions, working with collections of data, PL/SQL debugging to creating reports.

The great thing about this tutorial, is that you can dip in and out of it at any point. There is a flow from installation to building reports, as the tutorial follows a scenario, but if you just want to know how to work with constraints you can go straight there.

The brief viewlets are interactive, so you can get a feel for the actions. If you just want to flick through the demonstration you can click the forward control.

If you are new to Oracle, then this tutorial is also great in that it walks you through the basics of SQL and getting to grips with DDL and DML, all the while using SQL Developer.

Other Collateral Updates

You may be aware of our homepage on OTN: http://www.oracle.com/technology/products/database/sql_developer/
The front page has links to documents that are a result of general questions that often come up, for example, Pricing, Support & Licensing Questions. The front page also links to viewlets, white papers, magazine articles and tutorials. Each of these categories contain recently updated material. Some of you have been asking for some material on how to create extensions for SQL Developer. There is now a published article in the latest Oracle magazine on that.

So dip into the tutorial or have a browse around the SQL Developer content. If there is anything you'd like to see added, then drop me a line and we'll see what we can do.

Sue

Multiple Table Quick Export in SQL Developer 1.2

There are a number of ways to export DDL scripts in SQL Developer. Two approaches have been in the product since its inception. The first approach is to select the SQL tab when you invoke the definition tabs for any object in SQL Developer. The second approach is to invoke the Export DDL dialog, using the Tools menu. This dialog allows you to select and filter different object types. You can also filter the data exported, should you choose.

New to SQL Developer 1.2 is a multi-select quick export DDL option:

• Expand any object node in the Navigator, e.g. Tables
  
• [ctrl] select the objects you want to export
• Right-click to invoke the context menu
• Select the option of choice:
  - Save to File
  - Save to Clipboard
  - Save to Worksheet

The syntax format of the DDL created is driven by the parameters set in the Preferences dialog. (Database -> ObjectViewer Parameters)

Magnification and General Font Size in SQL Developer

As a speaker at conferences, it is important that customers can see what I am demonstrating, no matter the size of the room, or how far back they sit. When I was working in the JDeveloper team, I used to change the font settings in JDeveloper so that the text would be clearly visible. For some time now, I have been using a Magnifying Glass instead of changing the font. Mostly becuase of the loss of real estate when making all the fonts much bigger. The magnifier I like is one I got from Source Forge - http://magnifier.sourceforge.net/

Using a magnifier is great for what I need, when speaking and doing demos, because I can show the audience just what I want them to see. It's no good if you need the font on your IDE to be a little bigger while you are working. Also real estate is typically less of problem when working at home or in the office, as most of us are not limited to the small screen of a laptop.

Changing the font size in SQL Developer is an enhancement that a few have asked for. In JDeveloper we just changed the setting in the ide.properties file. As we don't have the property in our ide.properties file, it didn't seem to be something we could control. While working on something quite different today, I came across the ide.properties file in SQL Developer again, and while the font property is not there, it occurred to me that by adding it, it might override the default. It does!

Increasing the Font Size in SQL Developer

• Locate the ide.properties file in your installation in the following folder:
  {your SQL Developer install directory}\sqldeveloper\sqldeveloper\system\oracle.sqldeveloper.1.2.0.2998
  - you'll see I am using SQL Developer 1.2
• Add the line Ide.FontSize=14 or what ever size suits you. The default for the IDE is 11
• Restart SQL Developer

The Code Editors are not affected by this. To update those, you need to change the settings once you have restarted SQL Developer. Select the menu Tools -> Preferences... Expand the Code Editor node and select Fonts to update those. This property affects the SQL Worksheet, along with the Execute script (F5 ) output, and the PL/SQL Editors. My initial review seems to show reasonable dialogs throughout, with the exception of some of the new Migration Workbench dialogs.

Have fun!

Conferences: ODTUG Kaleidoscope and Oracle Develop...

Someone reminded me, yesterday, that I fly to the States this weekend. It's been a while since I've been at a conference, and I hadn't really forgotten, it just that it's suddenly there! Maybe that's happened to you. You know there are a few events on and you've been meaning to sort things out to go to one, but suddenly it's June and you've done nothing about it yet. There is still time. There is an event in the States and a few in Europe.

Next week is Daytona, Florida. It's the ODTUG big annual event and I have been going for years, through various guises, a good many of them as Designer PM and then as the PM for MDA, more specifically database modeling and all things database in JDeveloper and now as PM for SQL Developer. There is a common thread there if you know the tools.

So I have a couple of papers at the event , but also love to hear what others, from around the world, are doing too. and of course catch up. Often at these events, it's an opportunity of putting a face to a name from a forum or new group. If you live in the area, or haven't finally decided, take a look at what's on. http://odtugkaleidoscope.com/
I know that this year the conference is attracting lots of great speakers, and they have pulled in a bigger crowd - that just means more networking. Perhaps I'll see you there.

When I get back, Oracle Develop is on in London. (Next week Develop is on Prague and Munich) This is a two day event, with hands on, parallel streams and words and news about current and new products. Unlike ODTUG, which is a users group with lots of talks from users, Oracle Develop is an Oracle event, where we bring you news about what current in the company. Take a look here: http://www.oracle.com/technology/events/develop2007/index.html

This is the place to come and learn and ask Oracle questions. The event has already been a great success in Asia.

Try to get to one of these, specially if they're just down the road from you.

Sue

More details from other team members..

I said I'd add in the detail about the Export DDL and just how it's done, and I will... I do just want to point out that Kris and Donal have written up more specific details about the 2 main aspects of SQL Developer 1.2. So, if you've not already seen them:

Kris and the APEX updates: SQL Developer 1.2 will support the upcoming Oracle APEX release.

Donal and the New Migration Workbench: Donal walks through the top new features and what you can expect from the new integrated Migration Workbench.

Enjoy!

Oracle SQL Developer 1.2 is Production

You may have forgotten me as it's been sometime since I last updated this site. The reasons are multiple and not important here, but I do want to tell you that Oracle SQL Developer 1.2 has landed!

What, you might ask, is SQL Developer 1.2 and how is it different from 1.1.2 or 1.1.3 for that matter? In our world of numbers, each point in the release number is a point of significance! So 1.1.2 and 1.1.3 are patch releases to the 1.1 production release. This means that 1.2 is more than a patch release and indeed it is. SQL Developer 1.2 is the first release that we're shipping with the new, rewritten Migration Workbench. So, as a feature of SQL Developer, you'll find details about it on the SQL Developer homepages on OTN.

The Migration Workbench team work on a number of migration related products and utilities and so they have a separate Migration Technology Center on OTN. There you'll see the work they have done on migrating Microsoft Access applications to Oracle APEX - but that's another story. The Migration Technology Center links to a section focused on the new Migration Workbench. The documents include Getting Started, a data sheet and a bunch of viewlets, in bite size chunks, covering all aspects of Migrating from MySQL, Microsoft SQL Server and Microsoft Access to Oracle.

While we're talking updates, the SQL Developer pages themselves have had a bit of a revamp, with a number of new or updated articles. Take a look.

Tomorrow, I'll tell you about the new export options available...

How to Add Tabs to SQL Developer

Kris has blogged about this, so you may have solved all your extra tab requirements already, but I have seen a few request for features that will make your lives easier, and that you can add into SQL Developer today, without waiting for us. So if you haven't worked out how to do this yet, then take a read.

Suppose you want to add a new tab to your tables definitions that shows all the column comments, or more partitioned information, or sub-partitined information. Today if you need this information, you might use SQL*Plus or the SQL Developer SQL Worksheet and you'd query the Dictionary Tables. You might might say something like:
SELECT COLUMN_NAME,
COMMENTS
FROM ALL_COL_COMMENTS
WHERE OWNER = :OBJECT_OWNER
AND TABLE_NAME = :OBJECT_NAME;

So let's put this code into an XML file:
Open a blank page in something like Notepad or Wordpad and add the following:

<items>
<item type="editor" node="TableNode" vertical="true">
<title><![CDATA[Column Comments]]></title>
<query>
  <sql><![CDATA[select COLUMN_NAME, COMMENTS
from ALL_COL_COMMENTS
where owner = :OBJECT_OWNER and table_name = :OBJECT_NAME]]></sql>
        </query>
 </item>
</items>

Did you notice that same piece of SQL in the middle of the XML tags? Yup, that's our Column Comments SQL. Save this file to a sensible location. I have an Extensions folder, but you might want to add this to a folder under your Documents and Settings. Now open Oracle SQL Developer 1.1.2.25.79 and navigate to Tools -> Preferences. Expand the Database Node and select User Defined Extensions.
Select Add Row and use the drop-list under type to add a new EDITOR type. For the location, browse to your saved file location and select the file.

Shut down SQL Developer and when you restart it, navigate to a connection, expand your tables node and select a table. The new tab appears after your SQL tab and if your table has comments, you'll see them.

So that's easy, now you can do more: Let's look at the sub-partition request I had.

What do I need to know about Sub Partitions? You might want to start by describing the table to see the kinds of detail you are interested in. You'll see that if you describe all_table_subpartitions that it has table_owner, not just owner, like the previous query. I was interested in these columns:

Select PARTITION_NAME, SUBPARTITION_NAME,
HIGH_VALUE, HIGH_VALUE_LENGTH,
SUBPARTITION_POSITION, TABLESPACE_NAME
from ALL_TAB_SUBPARTITIONS
where table_owner = :OBJECT_OWNER and table_name = :OBJECT_NAME;

I'd suggest you try that in the SQL Worksheet first and then once again add that code into a new empty file.
The XML file would look something like this:

<items>
<item type="editor" node="TableNode" vertical="true">
<title><![CDATA[My Sub Partitions]]></title>
<query>
  <sql><![CDATA[Select PARTITION_NAME, SUBPARTITION_NAME, HIGH_VALUE,
HIGH_VALUE_LENGTH, SUBPARTITION_POSITION, TABLESPACE_NAME
from ALL_TAB_SUBPARTITIONS
where table_owner = :OBJECT_OWNER and table_name = :OBJECT_NAME]]></sql>
        </query>
 </item>
</items>

Once you have saved that file, add a new User Defined Extensions of Type EDITOR as you did before.
You'll need to restart SQL Developer to register the new extension. When you restart you should see the tabs as follows:

Let us know how that goes, what extensions you have added and let's add them to the SQL Developer Exchange!