How to create a "Disposable/non critical" tablespace ?

Hello,

Running 8.1.7.4 on Solaris 2.6

For testing purpose of a particular application, I need to copy the data from an application on my production database to a development database (A schema). I plan to copy the data to one or two _specific_ tablespaces in my development database.

Unfortunately, this data is quite BIG. It is also disposable, I will have to refresh it from time to time.

The development database is cold backuped (O/S backups) every night and contains other stuff as well. I don't want to create another database just for the purpose of testing this app.

Backuping this "disposable" data is a waste of time and a waste of tape. I we ever lose it, we can easily refresh it from the production database.

I was wondering what would happen if for some reason, I have to restore a cold backup of the development database, and the "disposable" tablespaces datafiles are missing from the backup ?

I presume the database will not start up after the restore.

Is there a way to tell oracle: just ignore the missing datafiles/tablespace and start without it ?

In essence: Is it possible to DROP a tablespace that is missing a datafile ?

Thanks for your comments/suggestions Received on Wed Sep 29 2004 - 09:38:34 CDT