Oracle’s April 2023 Readiness for Critical Patch Update

Patching is Oracle’s simplest means of introducing new functionality. Patches are inescapable, whether you operate an Oracle E-Business Suite (EBS) on-premises infrastructure or a Cloud application environment.

Every three months, Oracle issues an Oracle Critical Patch Update (CPU), which is a collection of solutions for various security flaws. Because of the patches, Oracle products, including the code and third-party components, could have security issues.

How should you plan for Oracle vulnerabilities each quarter? How can you save testing labor and time while avoiding crucial production defects?

Oracle Critical Patch Update (CPU) Isn’t as Risky as You Think

Patching is not always a top priority in organizations. In reality, due to operational availability, it is usually disregarded. When system architectures are extremely complicated, functionality is highly customized, or users lack awareness of the patching technique, patching may be disregarded.

Oracle’s April 2023 quarterly update includes 433 new security patches and 298 vulnerabilities in a number of Oracle products. They are concerning since they can be remotely exploited without authentication (across a network without the need for user credentials). As a result, Oracle strongly urges customers to prioritize and install CPU updates as soon as feasible.

How to Achieve a Balance Between the Cost, Time, and Risk of Oracle Patch Testing

When considering risk, time, and cost, not all Oracle patch testing requires the same level of attention. Depending on your Oracle environment, a patch may contain hundreds of modified components, but not all of them will be used.

Risk

As a test or release manager, your most critical choice is choosing what needs to be tested. You must also decide who, between IT and the business, needs to test in order to find the most critical flaws. Consider the following if your test management solution does not generate automatic functional test suggestions:

How can you be sure that your testing is focusing on the affected areas?

• Are your business users testing excessively or insufficiently? Are they testing the right things?
• Are you reliant on database administration (DBA) personnel?
• How much time do you waste waiting for a DBA? Are yours up and running?

Time

Here are some time-consuming tasks to perform while installing a new patch:

• Capturing the patch’s new functionality and training the organization
• Identifying the appropriate individuals to validate the impact of a vendor update on existing customizations.
• Recognizing undocumented customizations Understanding and ranking the impact of patches on essential business operations based on usage.
• Identifying integration conflicts between various fixes and customizations (which are frequently integrated in the same version)

Cost

The major issue, as with any project, is releasing faster while minimising unnecessary costs. A large amount of work is spent by business analysts examining the impact and estimating the scope of a patching job. You should not rely just on your functional team to assess the impact on customizations.

Select a Testing Solution Tailored to Oracle Users.

The ideal testing solution should be simple, easy to implement, and provide genuine value to both testers and business clients. Otherwise, expect lengthy delays. Business users and functional analysts can save time and effort by using tools. These tools support you in setting the test scope for each update and significantly reduces the effort of testers in selecting the right tests. Oracle connects your business and information technology processes, automates testing, and speeds up patching and customization while maintaining high quality.