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Re: How many ORACLE_HOME values are there supposed to be?

From: Karsten Farrell <kfarrell_at_belgariad.com>
Date: Thu, 13 Mar 2003 21:40:08 GMT
Message-ID: <MPG.18da9a942e2b4ebf9896f6@news.la.sbcglobal.net>


For top posters: Comments embedded below...

howardjr2000_at_yahoo.com.au said...
> On Wed, 12 Mar 2003 21:08:18 +0000, Karsten Farrell wrote:
>
> > Oracle is no different than any other software vendor, I suppose.
> > Documentation always seems to get pushed to the back of the development
> > cycle.
>
> It's a bit difficult to put it at the *front* of the development cycle!!
>
> "Here: we're thinking of including some functionality in the next release,
> but we're not sure what it will be, nor how it will work. Start
> documenting it, would you?"
>
> Hmmmm.
>

Of course, you're absolutely correct. However, there are more milestones in the development cycle than the front end and back end. My comment was meant to imply that it would be nice if it was done somewhere in the middle, as each "piece" is finished ... not that it wait until two days before the day when they copy everything to the CD.

And incidently, there are times when the developers tell the documentors that they'll implement a particular feature ... but release dates creep up too quickly and that particular feature gets "cut" from the release. It has happened with Oracle (and other software vendors) in the past ... where the readme makes the correction.

> >A lot of times, changes are made to Oracle software that never
> > make it into the doc set ... or the doc set uses an old name for a
> > feature that has been given a new marketing-oriented name.
>
> A bit harsh. Oracle is one the most extensively documented products I
> know. If bits and pieces get out of synch, I can forgive them that.
>

Of course, you're absolutely correct again. Which makes me wonder what it is that we're debating here. :)

Overall, I've been very happy with Oracle docs. It's when I encounter "new" stuff that's just being released that I see this problem. So I have to agree, my comments were a bit harsh since they were made in a general sense and not specific enuf.

When I first had to install Oracle 9iAS, I tried to read some of the docs that came on the CD. Some of them told me how to setup WebDB, for example, even though 9iAS came with Portal instead (and the WebDB setup was very different). Some of them gave incorrect instructions for configuring Apache.

It was almost as if Oracle one day said: "Okay, folks, time to release 9iAS! Gather up everything on the hard disk and we'll copy it to the CD." Where was the QA group? Were the CM folks on vacation that week?

So to be a bit less harsh, let me change my statement from "a lot of times" to "sometimes" and hopefully the docs got better. I don't know whether or not 9iAS docs improved. In my case, the client who absolutely *had to have* Oracle Reports (which is why we installed 9iAS in the first place) went belly-up and 9iAS is now shelfware.

> Regards
> HJR
>

For bottom posters: Comments embedded above...

-- 
/Karsten
DBA > retired > DBA
Received on Thu Mar 13 2003 - 15:40:08 CST

Original text of this message

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