Understanding disk sorting..

From: NetComrade <netcomradeNSPAM_at_bookexchange.net>
Date: Fri, 12 Nov 2004 18:57:46 GMT
Message-ID: <419505fc.332673278@localhost>

I have a query that does the following
insert into table1
as select
select id, sum(col1), sum(col2), sum(col3).... where some_id=:var

some_other_id=:var2
group by id

When i look at the trace file I see:
WAIT #1: nam='db file scattered read' ela= 2 p1=18 p2=141926 p3=128

However, direct path reads and writes are _always_ block by block. Do I just not understand how temp sorts work? Is it the expected behavior? I tried to play with sort_multi_block_read_count .......
We use Oracle 8.1.7.4 on Solaris 2.7 boxes remove NSPAM to email Received on Fri Nov 12 2004 - 12:57:46 CST