Re: Why does Oracle 8 seem like such a big mess?

Hi Steve,

    Although they tend to make life more pleasant you really don't need a bunch of different management tools. If you have a good knowledge of the data dictionary, the v$views, the dba_views, etc You can either write your own scripts and queries to do everything the tools will do or find them on the internet.

    I think someone at Oracle has a sense of humor and decided that installing Oracle on Linux should be a test. If you can't get Oracle installed you don't deserve to use it anyway ;-)

    I have to disagree with you about backups. All it takes is a simple script, that you can kick off as a cron job, that builds a SQL that will backup each tablespace in turn. The most complex part of the script is the $6&@ unix syntax to compress the backup on the fly.

    What you are missing is more experience with Oracle. I don't think anyone will argue with the statement that Oracle has a steep learning curve, but once you have learned it most of the things either comes easily or you know where to find out how to do it. Try to read this newsgroup and
comp.databases.oracle.server every day. When you see a technique you don't know save the posting. When you have a problem grep on the directory you saved the postings in. If you don't find the answers hit the net.

regards
jerry gitomer

Steve Bowen wrote in message
<7rb5r7$m5v$1_at_oak.prod.itd.earthlink.net>...
>Over the last few months I've been evaluating various databases
on Linux.
>I've worked with Oracle, Sybase ASE, Informix, MySQL and
PostgreSQL.
>
>I have to admit that Oracle baffles me. A great many things that
should be
>simple and easy seem to be difficult and messy. Working with
Oracle
>databases seems to require opening a multitude of different
management
>tools. The Linux install routines have suffered from a large
number of bugs
>and errors. Making simple backups seem to be incredibly
difficult.
>
>What am I missing? Is it that Oracle is so powerful for large
installations
>that people are willing to live with it's weaknesses and
oddities? Oracle
>skills are much in demand but I find that working with Sybase or
Informix
>much more pleasant and productive.
>
>I'm not trying to be argumentative. Here at work I'm stuck with
MS SQL7. But
>I also have the opportunity to start phasing in a Linux database
and I need
>to decide where to invest my time.
>
>
>
Received on Fri Sep 10 1999 - 13:19:46 CDT