Oracle Pro Tips, Trends & Technology eNewsletter Pinnacle Publishing http://www.pinnaclepublishing.com Issue 2.22 November 1, 2001 TABLE OF CONTENTS 1) Pop Quiz (answer at the end) 2) This Issue's URLs 3) Industry News 4) Oracle News 5) Oracle Tip: Oracle9i Installation 6) Answer to the Pop Quiz --------------------------------------------------------- 1) POP QUIZ (answer at the end) --------------------------------------------------------- Which data dictionary view displays the Oracle options enabled for your database? --------------------------------------------------------- 2) THIS ISSUE'S URLs --------------------------------------------------------- Did you know that you could subscribe to O'Reilly's publications online? Check it out at the following link: http://safari.oreilly.com/mainhom.asp?home --------------------------------------------------------- 3) INDUSTRY NEWS --------------------------------------------------------- Venture capital funding in the San Francisco Bay Area fell 27 percent in the third quarter compared to the previous quarter, with firms investing a total of $2.4 billion in Bay Area startups. This was a severe drop from $9.3 billion invested in Q2, 2000. The VCs seem to have shifted their focus to supporting existing companies, instead of investing in new ones. Santa Clara's Metro- Optix, an optical networking company, received the biggest investment in the third quarter, followed by Web- server company Archway Digital in Mountain View, and Fremont network-storage company Rhapsody Networks. Find out more at the following link: http://www.siliconvalley.com/docs/news/depth/vcdown103001.htm. --------------------------------------------------------- 4) ORACLE NEWS --------------------------------------------------------- If you are an Oracle fan and if you're into figures and benchmarks, you might be interested in knowing that Oracle has recently claimed that Oracle9i AS -- the application server product -- is much faster than IBM's WebSphere and BEA WebLogic. Find out more at the following link: http://www.oracle.com/features/9i/index.html?ad_9xfaster.html. --------------------------------------------------------- 5) ORACLE TIP: Oracle9i Installation --------------------------------------------------------- In the last article, we talked about preparing for Oracle9i installation. Once again, many thanks to my colleague Lev Moltyaner (mailto:lmoltyaner@procaseconsulting.com) who put together this installation checklist. A. Oracle9i Pre-Installation Activities We had discussed this last week. B. Installing Oracle 9i server software - Run the Oracle Installer from the Oracle 9i Product CD Following values were supplied during the installation for the test install * Oracle Home Name: OraHome90 * Oracle Home Path: c:\oracle\ora90 * Product to Install: Oracle9i Database 9.0.1 * Type of Installation: Oracle Standard Edition * Select database: General Purpose (installs a database) Other options: Transaction Processing, Software Only * Database Name: test * Oracle System Identifier (SID): test * Directory for Database Files: c:\oracle\oradata * Character Set: Use the default character set - Oracle 9i Database is shipped on 3 CDs, you will be prompted for the next two CDs For the test install, it took 30 minutes to install the Oracle software C. Creating a Database - The installer automatically invokes the Oracle Database Configuration Assistant (ODCA) to create the seed database * Note that ODCA is a Java-based frontend that steps you through the steps of creating a database and running the database creation script * Assuming Software Only option was not specified * For this test, it took 15 minutes to create and start the database - Upon completing the database creation, the assistant prompts the user to change the passwords for system accounts * Defaults: SYS = change_on_install, SYSTEM = manager D. Post-Installation Activities - Review the installed files in the file system c:\oracle -> admin -> test (directories for log files) -> ora90 -> doc (Oracle 9i Documentation Library) -> bin (Oracle executables such as SQL*Plus) -> database (parameter file and external password file) -> oradata -> test (database files) - Test the installation by logging into SQL*Plus as system/manager E. Database Configuration Procedures - Although not required, the following additional configuration steps are highly recommended * Create rollback segments * Create additional tablespaces * Establish table storage standards and default storage definitions * Create user profiles and define user quotas * Create users and grant privileges * Define memory allocation * Set additional parameters in the parameter file * Configure the database control file and online redo logs to be maintained on multiple disks * Establish backup and recovery procedures * Enable archiving to ensure up to the minute recovery Let me know if you've any stories to share regarding your Oracle9i installation activities. --------------------------------------------------------- 6) ANSWER TO THE POP QUIZ --------------------------------------------------------- SQL> select * from v$option; The result consists of multiple lines, each representing an Oracle option. A value of TRUE indicates that option is enabled. The following is a list of main options available for Oracle 8.1.7: Oracle Advanced Security option provides network security features in distributed networks, with special emphasis on encryption and authentication. Oracle interMedia option enables Oracle to manage text, documents, image, audio, and video in an integrated fashion. Oracle Internet Directory option is an LDAP (Lightweight Directory Access Protocol) server that maintains hierarchically organized information. Oracle Internet File System (iFS) option is an Oracle document repository, making it possible for a user to treat an Oracle8i database like a shared network drive. This means that users can store and retrieve files managed by the database as if they were files managed by a file server. Oracle8i JVM option includes an integrated Java Virtual Machine (Java VM) within Oracle8i. Oracle8i Lite option is a small footprint Java-enabled database that brings enterprise applications to mobile devices such as laptops, handheld computers, and PDAs. Oracle Parallel Server option enables all the nodes of the system to access all the data, typically in a shared disk configuration. Oracle Partitioning option enables large tables to be broken into individually managed smaller pieces, called partitions, while retaining a single application-level view of the data. Oracle Programmer option provides interfaces for accessing Oracle databases, including precompilers for C, C++, Java, etc. Oracle Spatial allows users and application developers to integrate spatial data into an Oracle application. This is useful for building geographical information systems. Go to http://technet.oracle.com/ for detailed information about specific options. --------------------------------------------------------- Well, that's it for this week. I welcome your feedback, input, tips, suggestions, Web sites, and other Oracle- related news. If you send me something, please let me know whether I can use your name with your comments. I apologize in advance if I don't respond personally to each of your questions or suggestions, but I'll get to as many as I can in the eNewsletter if not personally. Garry Chan, Editor Database Architect mailto:GChan@ProcaseConsulting.com This eNewsletter is brought to you compliments of Pinnacle Publishing, Inc. Copyright(c) 2001 http://www.pinnaclepublishing.com All rights reserved.