Diskless export/import - here's a method to do so

Hi, all -

I recently had to figure out how to transfer a 13GB export between boxes. The customary way is to split and compress but I didn't want to do that for reasons irrelevant to this posting. I came up with a technique to tunnel the export stream between servers. It was created on Unix, but can be used in the Windows world if you get the M$ version of the utilities installed. Here we go:

Assumptions:

SOURCE = machine we are exporting from
TARGET = machine we are importing to

Prereqs:

• SSH set up to connect without passwords (RSA or DSA key pair method)
  *If on Solaris, change out 'cat' for GNU version (on Solaris utilities
  disk)
  *Normal Oracle exp and imp issues apply (e.g., catalog issues between
  db versions).

On TARGET machine

1. mknod /tmp/inpipe.dmp p
2. imp xxx/xxx file=inpipe.dmp & (bg is optional; I do it to make sure it blocks)

On SOURCE machine

3. mknod /tmp/outpipe p
4. ssh -C user_at_targethost 'cat > /tmp/inpipe.dmp' < /tmp/outpipe &
5. exp xxx/xxx file=/tmp/outpipe

If you have two xterms up you will be able to see the activity.

I did this yesterday with a 13GB export; today I am going to try a larger one.

I hope you find this useful.

(There - I've contributed back to the community for years of lurking and leaching :-) )

Kind regards,

jh

-- 
Jared Hecker
Data Modeler   Data Architect
Oracle, Sybase, SQL Server DBA
"I like long walks, especially when they are taken by people who annoy
me."
                     - Noel Coward

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