Flashback Data Archive (previously called Total Recall) has been around for a long time now. For those unfamiliar with it, (and by the way, if you are on Enterprise Edition, you should be familiar with it, because its a free feature), here is a very quick primer.
Create a tablespace to hold your history, and create a flashback archive using that space allocation.
SQL> create tablespace SPACE_FOR_ARCHIVE
2 datafile 'C:\ORACLE\DB11\ARCH_SPACE.DBF'
3 size 100M;
Tablespace created.
SQL> CREATE FLASHBACK ARCHIVE longterm
2 TABLESPACE space_for_archive
3 RETENTION 1 YEAR;
Flashback archive created.
Then add your tables to the archive. Some tables will be created automatically to support being able to record all of the changes to that table for as long as the archive duration specifies
SQL> ALTER TABLE EMP FLASHBACK ARCHIVE LONGTERM;
Table altered.
SQL> select table_name
2 from user_tables
3 /
TABLE_NAME
---------------------------
SYS_FBA_HIST_71036
SYS_FBA_TCRV_71036
SYS_FBA_DDL_COLMAP_71036
EMP
And then voila! We can track changes to our table over time, well beyond the typical undo_retention setting for the database.
SQL> select empno, ename, job, sal, comm,
2 nvl(VERSIONS_STARTTIME,LAST_MOD) TS
3 ,nvl(VERSIONS_OPERATION,'I') op
4 from EMP
5 versions between timestamp
6 timestamp '2014-02-11 20:12:00' and
7 systimestamp
8 order by empno;
EMPNO ENAME JOB SAL COMM TS O
---------- ---------- --------- ---------- ---------- ------------ -
7369 SMITH CLERK 806 08.10.51 PM I
7369 SMITH SALES 8060 1000 08.12.10 PM U
7499 ALLEN SALESMAN 1606 300000000 08.10.51 PM I
7521 WARD SALESMAN 1256 500000000 08.10.51 PM I
7566 JONES MANAGER 2981 08.10.51 PM I
...
7900 JAMES CLERK 956 08.10.51 PM I
7902 FORD ANALYST 3006 08.10.51 PM I
7934 MILLER CLERK 1306 08.10.51 PM I
7934 MILLER CLERK 1306 08.12.10 PM D
But sometimes we want to know more about the history. We want to know who did the change, what machine were they on, etc etc. Auditors tend to be a little snippy about those kind of things 
- You: “I can confirm that the SALARY field was updated at 9:01am on January 25th”
- Auditor: “And who did that change?”
- You: “Er….um…..someone”
But it might not be practical to augment all of your tables with WHO, WHEN, WHERE etc columns to capture that information. That might involve a lot of application changes and testing.
If you’re on 12c, you might be in luck. Flashback Data Archive can capture additional information, assuming your application is taking advantage of the myriad of instrumentation facilities offered by the database.
We simply turn on context tracking, which can capture information on a per transaction basis
SQL> begin
2 dbms_flashback_archive.set_context_level(
3 level=> 'ALL');
4 end;
PL/SQL procedure successfully completed.
Now when we perform changes to the table, we can look at the transaction ID (XID) for that change.
SQL> update EMP
2 set sal = sal*10
3 where empno = 7499;
1 row updated.
SQL> commit;
SQL> select XID from SYS_FBA_HIST_510592;
XID
----------------
09000B00C7080000
And using that XID, we can pick up the context information about that transaction
SQL> set serverout on
SQL> begin
2 dbms_output.put_line(
3 dbms_flashback_archive.get_sys_context (
4 '09000B00C7080000', 'USERENV', 'SESSION_USER'));
5
6 dbms_output.put_line(
7 dbms_flashback_archive.get_sys_context (
8 '09000B00C7080000', 'USERENV', 'HOST'));
9
10 dbms_output.put_line(
11 dbms_flashback_archive.get_sys_context (
12 '09000B00C7080000', 'USERENV', 'MODULE'));
13 end;
14 /
SCOTT
WORKGROUP\XPS
SQL*Plus
How much more ? Well, quite a lot actually !
SQL> desc SYS.SYS_FBA_CONTEXT_AUD
Name Null? Type
------------------------- -------- ------------------
XID RAW(8)
ACTION VARCHAR2(256)
AUTHENTICATED_IDENTITY VARCHAR2(256)
CLIENT_IDENTIFIER VARCHAR2(256)
CLIENT_INFO VARCHAR2(256)
CURRENT_EDITION_NAME VARCHAR2(256)
CURRENT_SCHEMA VARCHAR2(256)
CURRENT_USER VARCHAR2(256)
DATABASE_ROLE VARCHAR2(256)
DB_NAME VARCHAR2(256)
GLOBAL_UID VARCHAR2(256)
HOST VARCHAR2(256)
IDENTIFICATION_TYPE VARCHAR2(256)
INSTANCE_NAME VARCHAR2(256)
IP_ADDRESS VARCHAR2(256)
MODULE VARCHAR2(256)
OS_USER VARCHAR2(256)
SERVER_HOST VARCHAR2(256)
SERVICE_NAME VARCHAR2(256)
SESSION_EDITION_NAME VARCHAR2(256)
SESSION_USER VARCHAR2(256)
SESSION_USERID VARCHAR2(256)
SESSIONID VARCHAR2(256)
TERMINAL VARCHAR2(256)
SPARE VARCHAR2(256)
And since we can use our flashback query syntax to pick up all of the transaction ID’s
SQL> select empno, ename, job, sal, comm,
2 VERSIONS_XID
3 from EMP
4 versions between timestamp
5 timestamp '2014-02-11 20:12:00' and
6 systimestamp
7 order by empno;
EMPNO ENAME JOB SAL COMM VERSIONS_XID
---------- ---------- --------- ---------- ---------- ----------------
7369 SMITH CLERK 806
7369 SMITH SALES 8060 1000 09001C00E04A0000
7499 ALLEN CLERK 16060 300000000 0A000A0024080000
7499 ALLEN SALESMAN 16060 300000000 09000B00C7080000
7499 ALLEN SALESMAN 1606 300000000
7521 WARD SALESMAN 1256 500000000
we can also take advantage of that new dictionary view SYS.SYS_FBA_CONTEXT_AUD to get all the context information for each transaction.
SQL> select ...
2 from
3 ( select
4 empno, ename, job,
5 sal, comm, VERSIONS_XID
6 from EMP
7 versions between timestamp
8 timestamp '2014-02-11 20:12:00' and
9 systimestamp
10 ) e, SYS.SYS_FBA_CONTEXT_AUD a
11 where e.VERSIONS_XID = a.XID;
Flashback Data Archive is pretty nifty in 12c.
https://docs.oracle.com/database/121/ADFNS/adfns_flashback.htm#ADFNS01011
