racle continues to let details trickle out about the new features and capabilities of its upcoming Oracle9i database, which is expected to ship around the middle of next month. But the vendor is staying mum on pricing and packaging information, despite the fact that executives reportedly met last week to iron out final details.

The new version of Oracle's flagship product will deliver administration capabilities designed to help lighten the workloads of database administrators. They include memory-management functions such as automatic memory resizing, storage management technology for monitoring data-storage metrics and space allocation, and resource-management features for tasks such as assigning user priorities for database access.

Those details follow earlier disclosures about 9i's capabilities, including its Real Application Clusters parallel-processing technology and built-in business-intelligence and online analytical processing (OLAP) features (see "Back To Data Basics," Oct. 2, 2000, p. 22; ).

About 3,000 curious Oracle users crammed 9i presentations at the International Oracle User Group-Americas meeting in Orlando, Fla., where user group president Rich Niemiec predicted that 9i's availability and recoverability features alone will drive many Oracle database users to upgrade. However, attendees looked in vain for pricing and packaging information about the new release.

Oracle has set June 14 for 9i's formal debut, and Bob Shimp, senior director of server product marketing, says the new database should be ready to ship by then. The software is now being tested at some 400 beta sites. "The stability of the beta is better than any release we've had," Shimp says.

Last year, Oracle took some heat for releases of its E-Business Application Suite that required about 5,000 patches.