FLASH Recovery Area, RMAN and FLASHBACK DATABAE

I am using Oracle 10.1..0.4 (but could use Oracle 10.2 - latest version) in future ) on
Windows 2000 Server. I am currently not using flashback database (have not set flash_recover_area). I am doing backup of database using RMAN/ Nebackup on tape.

I want to use flashback database, so need to set flash recovery area. However, I do
not want to put any of RMAN backups in Flash recovery area. I want to continue to use my RMAN backup scripts, which directly write to tape.

1. Can I Use flash_recovery_area only for storing flash back logs and not for RMAN backup. If yes, how?
2. Do I need to backup flash recovery area at all? I will use flashback retention target to limit flashback logs.
3. If I need to backup flash recovery area, how will I backup. Can I use my OS level backup (not RMAN) to backup the folder where flash_recovery_area is.
4. If I loss some data in flash recovery area, will my database continue to work fine except I cannot flashback database?

Really appreciate your response, I did read many articles on metalink on flashback database and flash recovery area but did not find answers to my question. Received on Sun Apr 22 2007 - 13:58:04 CDT