BIG TROUBLE!!! Can you help?

Posting this for a friend....

Due to a system error, we lost some of our database files, including the control files, for out development system. Naturally, when we went to retrieve the backup, we discovered problems in the process.

We have the main sysem datafile, the main datafile, and the rollback datafile.
When we rebuild the control file and perform an 'alter database open resetlogs',
we get internal ORACLE errors.

QUESTION: Is there a way to retrieve some of the data from the datafiles without actually opening the database; i.e. are utilities available that will allow us to read the files directly without going through the Oracle processes? The only tables we need to retrieve are those containing SQL*MENU data.

Please send any response to cmpsg03_at_nt.com.

Thanks...

Phil

   Phillip Godwin || Northern Telecom    cmpsg03_at_nt.com || Product Verification    (919) 481-8887 || RTP, NC