Oracle under Windows NT

I have some questions regarding the integration of Oracle in a MS-Windows environment. Lets assume that the Oracle 7.3 Database using SQL*Net V2 runs on a Windows NT 3.51 server and the cliens are Windows 3.x, 95 or NT workstations.

(1) What is the best (non-online) backup strategy on Windows NT?

• How can i savely stop and start the database instances?
• What backup tools to use (EXP and ntbackup, Oracle Tape Backup)?
• How can i best schedule the backup process?

(2) How can i savely startup and especially shutdown oracle?

• What's the most reliable Oracle Tools to start/stop an instance?
• How can i start and stop the services in a batch process?

(3) Should the SQL*Net clients be installed on the local workstations

    or on the Windows NT server to simplify the eventual updates?

• Are there any serious reasons not to have the clients on the server?

(4) How can i configure Oracle to detect dead connections?

• Do i have to modify the server and/or the client SQL*Net configuration files?
• When and why is a connection dead for Oracle?
• Whow long would Oracle keep a connection alive without detection?

(5) What is the best transport protocol to use (TCP/IP, NETBIOS, IPX)?

• I know about the general advantages and dsatvantages but is there anything oracle's SQL*Net V2 likes or dislikes?

(6) What is the best strategy to connect to remote Oracle Server?

• Should i just use RAS to connect to a remove Windows NT server and just use SQL*Net with the RAS protocol?
• Does oarcle have any own remote access services in SQL*Net?
• Does SQL*Net support any network load statistics?

I now that it will be hard to answer all this questions and that some of them have already been discussed but i still hope that this message will start a discussion that might be interesting for a lot of other people using this or a similar environment.

Dieter Oberkofler
Director of Engineering

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