How can I launch SQL Developer? I recently installed Oracle 11g R2 on a Windows 8.1 machine, but for some reason SQL Developer does not seem to launch easily.  What specific steps do I need to take in order to launch a working SQL Developer instance?  

Here are my steps so far (There are print screens in hyperlinks below because I do not have enough reputation points to embed the print screens in this posting.):  

1.) I searched for SQL Developer in Windows 8 and clicked to launch the resulting entry for the program.    

2.) The resulting dialog box then said it was searching for a named SQLDEVELOPER.bat file, and when it could not find the SQLDEVELOPER.bat file, it gave the following dialog box suggesting that it use a different selecthome.bat file instead:  http://s23.postimg.org/4nr1d1r8b/sql_developer_delete.jpg  

3.) I hesitated to authorize what looks like a hard to un-do setting, so I looked in the windows file system and found the following items in the root directory of Sql Developer:  http://s30.postimg.org/5vtk3k269/sql_developer_directory.jpg  

Note that there is a sqldeveloper.sh file in the directory.  There is also a sqldeveloper.exe file, but clicking on that file does not launch the program.  

So what steps need to be taken in order to successfully launch Sql Developer?



ONGOING EFFORTS:  



I followed the advice of @SoleDBGuy and downloaded and installed a newer version of SQL Developer.  But I am not yet able to make a database connection from it to validate that the new SQL Developer can work with my existing 11G R2 installation.  

I validated that the 11G R2 installation is running and that I know the password by using the windows command line to connect by typing sqlplus system/password, where password is the real password.  

But I am not yet able to connect to the same 11G R2 instance with the same credentials through the new SQL Developer because the xe listener is being rejected.  I looked this up and it seems that the xe listener is associated with the express edition.  This may be the problem as I installed the enterprise edition of Oracle 11G R2.  I did not install the express edition.  

So my next step is to try to determine what listener to use to connect to the enterprise edition, and to try replacing xe with the name of the correct listener for the enterprise edition.  If this works, then I will have validated a solution and resolved this question.  



RESOLUTION:  



I was able to validate @SoleDBGuy's approach by creating a connection using orcl as the SID in the SQL Developer Add New Connection Wizard.  Initially, the connection wizard was not connecting because the default listener is ex, which is for the express edition.  I installed the enterprise edition, so the ex listener did not work and I had to use the orcl edition instead.  

Once I connected to the database, I then validated that it was the correct database by running the query select tablespace_name from users_tablespaces;.  When I saw the correct table spaces, I was able to validate @SoleDBGuy's approach and mark his answer as accepted.
You can download the latest SQL Developer from Oracle and get the specific instructions here on what is required to do the installation.

Once SQL Developer starts, the next obvious step is to connect to a database and this will depend on how Oracle is configured. While I believe this is a separate issue, for sake of completeness I'll add that by default SQL Developer will use xe for the SID in the connection wizard, which is for express edition, and that may not be sufficient to make a connection. Another way is to try orcl instead of xe since that is default for "regular" Oracle.

It is possible this has been customized depending on the installation and if so you will have to find that information from the person/group that installed Oracle if you do not already know it.

If still having problems trying to connect, look at this link to see if any of the information there is helpful: Oracle 11g listener fails with ORA-12514 and ORA-12505 errors