A few basic notes on Oracle Database Administration.

Thursday, June 19, 2008

Q.E.D.

User on test DB, "Response time is terrible."

DBA, "You are the only user on the DB, but you have a dozen sessions open. Can you close some sessions?"

User, "I can't see my sessions through the application. Bounce the database"

DBA, " I can see the sessions just fine. I'll kill your excess sessions."

User, "No, don't kill my sessions. Bounce the database. I'm bouncing the database."


We don't need no stinking controls around here.
Everyone can do everything.

He bounced the database.

User, "I bounced the database. My [one] session is running just fine."

Q.E.D. - bouncing the database improves performance.




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An update to the post above:

The same user has informed me that I should always shutdown the database with "Shutdown abort" . "It works much better."

I have always assumed that everyone else knows more than I do.

Maybe that isn't true. Maybe I do understand more than some people...

Monday, June 16, 2008

Lessons Learned after a Hell Weekend

  1. A necessary part of any database project plan is a fall back plan. What is planned if there is a failure at any particular step.
  2. Backup - this includes enough space allocated for additional backups as needed.
  3. Part of any upgrade script should be rollback scripts.


I should have know that I was in trouble when on Friday afternoon when I was given a time line which was called 'optimistic' with no what-if forseen.