Shutdown problem

Hello all !
I'am running Oracle Server 7.2 on a Aix 4.1.4 machine with a package written in
Sql*Forms 3.0.
I would like to change my backup strategy: every night I want to do a cold backup
of all database files and archived redo logs (db is in archive mode). In my backup script before to close the db I check if there are some oracle user process (shadow process): if it is true I kill them. In this way when I shutdown (normal) the db there are the only oracle process
needed to run db (SMON,PMON,DBWR....), so the shutdown go fine. As a matter of fact this is not always true: infact it happens that some processes
(not visible in unix) remains open inside the db (I don't known how) causing the
shutdown hanging (it seems incredible but it's true). To avoid this situation I change the shutdown script in this way:

   alter system checkpoint
   shutdown abort
   startup
   shutdown
So the db will be ALWAYS closed and with the checkpoint I don't lose any data (I hope!).
What do you think about it ? Is there a better way ? (I want to be SURE the shutdown CLOSE the db, so the backup procedure can end rightly). Any suggestion it will be appreciated.

Thanks in advanced.
Gilberto Casiraghi. Received on Sat Jun 20 1998 - 05:00:18 CDT