What are PeopleSoft Fixes, Patches, Bundles, Maintenance Packs ?

Here is a refresher of some of the commonly used terms, which you use in your daily life as a PeopleSoft consultant.

Fixes – Smallest unit of maintenance. A fix generally resolves a single specific issue. For example, Oracle may give you a fix for a production down issue.

Patches – Patches are very similar to fixes with the exception that they almost always have pre-requisites that are included in the documentation for that Patch. Patches can be considered as a formal integration of a fix in the Oracle development process.

Bundles – Bundles are accumulations of patches and fixes for a particular application module and are released at specific announced time (usually 4 weeks to 12 weeks apart). When Bundles are applied using Change Assistant, information about the Bundle is recorded in the Maintenance Log table for future reference. Bundles will typically require pre-requisites and occassionally post-requisites.

Maintenance Packs – Maintenance Packs are accumulations of bundles across all modules for a specific time period – usually one or two per year.

Service Packs – Service Packs are complete application releases with all of the latest patched code. Sometimes new functionality is introduced in service packs, but the focus is generally on bug fixes. Service Packs are released not more than once per year depending on the amount of fixes that need to be included.

Some other terms you should be aware of:

Feature Pack – A Feature Pack contains all of the code included in a standard major release plus a roll-up of capabilities and updates previously delivered in Bundles and Maintenance Packs

Update ID & Report ID – This is how an individual Patch/Fix, a Bundle, or a Maintenance Pack is available to customers on the Oracle Support Portal

ICE & Incident & Resolution – All 3 terms are used by Oracle internally. These terms are coming from a system called ICE that Development used to track and resolve issues

Bug – This term is by Oracle internally. Oracle Developer is currently using instead of ICE to track and resolve issues.

Defect – A Defect is a term used in the application used by the Oracle Support Engineer to work on Customer’s Service Requests.

POC – A POC (understand Proof Of Concept) is a Patch/Fix that Oracle provides to the customers in partnership with them and with their understanding that although the Patch/Fix has been unit tested by Development, it has not yet completed the rigorous quality assurance testing that all posted Patches/Fixes pass through.

One-off – A One-off is a Patch/Fix provided by Development in an attempt to resolve a performance issue.