Re: HELP - Oracle is kicking my ass!!!!!

Halina,

The very first thing you need to do is get a copy of the Oracle7 Server Concepts Manual and read it from front to back. You have to understand the architecture of Oracle7. It is very different than Informix, or Sybase for that matter.

The issue of 'databases' is one of the most misunderstood. I'm not exactly sure of the Informix architecture, but Sybase has the concept of 'servers' each of which have a master database and one or more other databases that are owned by a special user, dbo.

Oracle has the concept of an 'instance', which is uniquely identified by its SID. An instance, technically speaking, is a set of Oracle processes and the shared memory area that the processes access. Each instance stores its data in datafiles. The datafiles 'belong to' only one instance (except in the special case of Oracle Parallel Server - another story for another day). A tablespace is merely a logical container for datafiles. Database objects (tables, indexes, users, etc) are assigned to tablespaces.

When Oracle users talk about a database, they are *usually* referring to an instance. When Sybase users talk about a database they are usually taking about any database other than the master database for their server. I think Informix is much closer to the Sybase model.

The bottom line is that the terminology is determined by the architecture. The architectures are different. Don't get too hung up on the differences.

Good luck,

Tim Received on Fri Jul 18 1997 - 00:00:00 CDT