Re: Oracle client for Mac

From: Bob Bunch (OCP) <bunchb_at_hotmail.com>
Date: Sun, 03 Apr 2005 00:16:52 -0500
Message-Id: <pan.2005.04.03.05.16.51.109000@hotmail.com>

On Fri, 01 Apr 2005
10:23:37 +0100, Ronald Rood wrote:

> On Thu, 31 Mar 2005 23:33:58 +0100, Jay wrote (in article
> <1112308438.909774.184770_at_f14g2000cwb.googlegroups.com>):
>
>

>> Jay wrote:
>>> I'm trying to find the Oracle 9i client for a Mac.  I found the
>>> developer version of the DBMS but I only need the client portion.
>>> Where can I find it and is there anything special about installing
>> it?
>>> 
>>> TIA.
>> 
>> I don't suppose I can use the 10g client to connect to a 9i DB?  What
>> I'm really looking for is the ODBC driver for 9i so I can use the
>> JDBC/ODBC bridge to connect to a 9i database in a java application.  I
>> guess I should have asked for that the first time.  This driver should
>> come with the 9i client software.
>> 
>>

> Could be I am missing something but why don't you use the thin jdbc
> client ? It's available.
>
> With kind regards / met vriendelijke groeten, Ronald
>
> http://ronr.nl/unix-dba
> http://homepage.mac.com/ik_zelf/oracle

OTN has the 10g Instant Client available for Mac OS X. All you should have to do is plop it down in it's own directory, put it in your path, set TNS_ADMIN to the TNSNAMES.ORA file, and run with it. It's pretty much that simple on Windoze, anyway! ;)

FYI, the 10g Instant Client (or any 10g client, AFAIK) will no longer connect to less than 9i. The 10g JDBC (thin) driver, however, still does. I recommend using the JDBC-thin driver, unless you're connecting to RAC (OCI required for transparent failover); you shouldn't need an ODBC/JDBC bridge.

If all you want is just JDBC connectivity, you could always just copy the jdbc*.jar from your server's $ORACLE_HOME/jdbc/lib directory and run w/ that. (ojdbc14_g.jar on 10g, for example) Doesn't matter what platform you need to use it on, after all. :)

If you want to do SQL*Plus (or some other OCI client) from your mac, then you'll definitely need to get the Instant Client.

Off subject -- I recently found a VERY nice "Free TOAD" replacement at http://www.minq.se/products/dbvis -- DBVisualizer. It does ALMOST everything Free TOAD will do for free. It's 100% platform independent, and supports more databases than I've ever heard of. Just feed it a JDBC-thin driver (provided on their site). Awesome relationships view! ;)

Anyway, from the OTN download page:

Instant Client Package - Basic: All files required to run OCI, OCCI, and JDBC-OCI applications instantclient-basic-macosx-10.1.0.3.zip (32,395,622 bytes)

*Instant Client Package - JDBC Supplement: Additional support for XA, Internationalization, and RowSet operations under JDBC instantclient-jdbc-macosx-10.1.0.3.zip (4,571,475 bytes)

*Instant Client Package - SQL*Plus: Additional libraries and executable for running SQL*Plus with Instant Client instantclient-sqlplus-macosx-10.1.0.3.zip (326,740 bytes)

*Instant Client Package - SDK: Additional header files and an example makefile for developing Oracle applications with Instant Client instantclient-sdk-macosx-10.1.0.3.zip (293,913 bytes) Optional packages are marked with a *.

Installation Steps:

Download the appropriate Instant Client packages for your platform. All installations REQUIRE the Basic package.
Unzip the packages into a single directory such as "instantclient".
Set the library loading path in your environment to the directory in Step 2 ("instantclient"). On the Macintosh OSX platform, DYLD_LIBRARY_PATH is the appropriate environment variable.
Start your application and enjoy.

HTH! ;)
Bob Bunch
8i OCP Uber-Nerd Received on Sat Apr 02 2005 - 23:16:52 CST