Tuning approach question

Hi Oracle Gurus,

I am learning DBA work. I went to an interview recently. I was asked how I would a tune a database if it was running slow, also assume that there was no I/O contention. ie, A whole application with multiple users is running slow and I have to tune it. He wanted to know how I would figure out the problem.

Here is my approach to it:

1. Check the SQLs and the Oracle processes running through Enterprise manager or something similar; Look for long running or odd processes. Will any of them make the whole thing slower? If so How do I find out?
2. Check in OS for CPU contention or memory requirements using sar -u or vmstat. They may indicate memory swapping and hence slowing down or CPU contention. It is also possible there is netwrok contention. You can even use commands like ping to check connectivity and speed.
3. Use statspack
4. Use Wait interface views to see what the system is currently waiting on.

Please verify.

I am sure there will be many more to add, depending on if it is RAC, SAN, etc.

Orlando.

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