Re: Oracle on DOS.

ad041_at_FreeNet.Carleton.CA (Allison Rothmel) writes:

>In a previous article, adrian_at_willen.demon.co.uk (Adrian Parker) says:
 

>>Firstly, I don't know anything whatsoever about Oracle yet, but have to
>>learn about it soon. My boss has asked me to ask these questions.
>>
>>1. What is the minimum spec PC needed to develop a decent size Oracle
>> application ? ( I know this is like "how long is a piece of string",
>> but it is his question :) )
>>
>>2. Is Forms-4 implemented on DOS, and if not what else will do the same job
>> of a GUI front end ?
>>

    Let's not confuse the issues here. The Oracle product line     for Intel based computers has gotten a bit confusing. It helps     to remember that Oracle comes in two basic parts. One part is     the RDBMS. All this does is manage data. The second part would     be the Oracle tools such as SQL*Forms, SQL*Reportwriter, SQL*Plus,     SQL*Menu, etc.

    In terms of a minimal configuration, I have run the Oracle RDBMS     version 6 with SQL*Forms 3.0 and SQL*Menu 5.0 on an 80486 based     machine running MS-DOS. This machine has 8 megs of RAM and a     200 megabyte hard disk. I would have to agree that 12 or even 16     megs of RAM would be more suitable.

    One important issue: SQL*Forms 3.0 and SQL*Menu 5.0 are both character     mode programs.

    If your goal is to develop something using a GUI front end,     using all Oracle tools, then you will not be able to use      MS-DOS as your operating system. Technically you can but it     is very compilicated and not all that satisfying.

    There are two main reasons for this. One is that the GUI version     of SQL*Forms, version 4.0, which runs under MS-Windows, can     only access Oracle RDBMS version 7. The second reason is that     Oracle RDBMS version 7 will not run on MS-DOS.

     You can get these two cooperating now using the following
     set up.  The operating system would have to be OS/2 version 2.1.
     Oracle RDBMS version 7 can run under OS/2.  SQL*Forms 4.0 for
     MS-Windows can run in Windows mode under OS/2 and can 
     communicate with the database using another Oracle product
     called SQL*VDM.

   For this set up, consider a fast 486 with at least 16 or 20 megs     of RAM. Possibly even more.

   I hope this clears some things up. As always, any additional    questions or comments - please e-mail me.

Rich Holowczak
Rutgers University
holowcza_at_andromeda.rutgers.edu Received on Thu Mar 17 1994 - 02:14:03 CET