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The Home Oracle On Linux Do-It-Yourself Manual General procedure to build a working Oracle server with RedHat Linux OS. Warning: If you have any questions, use common sense. Do NOT e-mail me about this procedure, as it can easily take two months of after hours, at-home work. I have already done all of this at least twice . It was difficult and tedious, but if you fight through the details you'll have a working Oracle database to play with, the books you need to learn from, practice exams from Oracle and so the preparation to go out and get you a good job based on all this hard work. Be sure you meticulously document every detail of the process as you go through it and organize it all in a notebook. If you know nothing about Linux, this is a poor way to start learning - try here instead. Note: RedHat is selling a version of its OS "optimized for Oracle 8i" for $2500! The method described here is cheaper, and works fine. 1. Go buy the cheapest parts you can find that will give you a PC type computer with at least 500MHz CPU with at least a 100 MHz bus (warning - do NOT overclock - Oracle does not like it and will core dump repeatedly until you stop it), at least 20 GB hard drive space (IDE is fine), 128MB RAM (minimum - 256MB or more is better), CDROM of your choice, a network card (and one for your present Windows box, and either a half-twist RJ-45 cable for TP or use 10base2) and a cheap but good video card with enough memory to suit your taste in colors. Get a 56K modem while you're at it. Check each part against the hardware compatibility lists for RedHat 6.2 before you buy. If you can build a whole computer with known compatible parts, get the parts and get Redhat 6.2 (warning: RedHat 7 WILL NOT WORK FOR THIS). You can try looking here or here, but shopping for parts is your responsibility. 2. Assemble the computer, install RH6.2, get on the Internet with the modem, go to the Oracle ftp site I have linked at Information Central, and download Oracle816 for Linux. This will take a long time (at least 10 - 20 or more hrs on a good 56K connection), so see if you can find a CD on RedHat's website, Oracle's Website, or maybe a friend has the tar file on CD. NB: Redhat sent me two copies of Oracle 8.1.5 for FREE. Alternately, if someone you know has a high-bandwidth connection and a CD burner, they might be willing to download the file (several hundred MB) and burn it to a CD for you. 3. Read the following websites (the first listed is the one I used, but I am running Oracle 8.0.5 & 8.1.5 on RedHad 6.1 and I'd rather fight than switch :) Among other indignities, you will have to edit the source code for your kernel and re-compile it, something every Linux user should go through once. A good install page: http://jordan.fortwayne.com/oracle/ Official RedHat6.2 Reference Guide 4. Educate yourself by any means necessary. There are Oracle tutorials for various subject matters, I won't vouch for them as I haven't been through them, but here are the ones I found: Oracle DBA Lessons and U.C.Davis Oracle/SQL Tutorial and Baruch College Rutgers and Kennesaw College and UNC. A search on more detailed subjects might get you a good tutorial on just about any topic. I'll post good ones on this page as I find them. There are also some decent books you can get, although I have yet to see a single book adequate that does it all (ie get you through the exams). 5. Either : Pass the exams or get a job. From what I hear, the certification is less important than the skills. There is a tremendous unfilled market for good Oracle DBAs. That was true in 1987, it is true today. Get into programming as soon as you can, more $$$. Keep adding to your skills until you keel over. Last Updated: 04/01/02 23:06 Have Fun, |
