Re: How can I fix my control file?

elee3_at_my-deja.com wrote:
>
> Dear Oracle Experts,
>
> I am working on a development database, ORACLE 7.3 on NT server. I went
> to the control files and lined up all the path strings neatly, and then
> pressed SAVE. I didn't think anything of it, but since then my database
> will not start.

The control files are the absolute heart of the database. They contain info on the redo logs, character set, internal tables, status of each datafile, and a host of other critical information. Without an operational control file, the database will not open. So DO NOT TOUCH the control files. Period. You cannot edit them with notepad or any other text editor as they are binary files.

That being said (and I'm sure you've already learned that), you can try to rescue yourself from this problem. If you only toasted one controle file, use the second (still functional one) to overwrite the first and try to reopen the database. If you hosed both control files, but the database is still open, try the 'ALTER DATABASE BACKUP CONTROLFILE TO TRACE' command. This will place a file in USER_DUMP_DEST that you can use to re-create your current control files. Edit this trace file and remove all of the lines except for the 'CREATE CONTROLFILE' statement. If you hosed both control files, and the database is closed and will not open, I hope you have backups. You may want to call Oracle support if the database is critical, but since you mentioned this is a development database, I'm hoping you can take a morning to rebuild it and import the data from the old to the new.

Just glancing back over your post, are you sure you hosed the control files? They are the files named control01.ctl, control02.ctl, etc (depending on how many you created when the database was created) and when I glanced at them in vi, I couldn't find any discernable paths to alter, and you shouldn't have been able to 'get around this problem' by copying the init.ora file over to another location. Are you sure you didn't hose the pfile?

Cheers,
GC Received on Wed Dec 29 1999 - 21:12:32 CST