RE: Oracle 7.3.4 limitations on NT

We find that ntbackup fails once in a while (once every couple of mon= ths)
on our Internet server with DLT tape backup. Only a reboot solves th= e
problem. NT doesn't put any error entries in the Event Viewer, the b= ackup
entries just never show up and the backups do not take place. I read=  in a
Visual C++ developer book somewhere that the code for Event Viewer is=  really
old, it has its own bizarre set of APIs. That would explain why thir= d-party
vendors have problems latching onto it. Who wants to specialize in E= vent
Viewer programming? Maybe the NT5 / Windows2000 Event Viewer will ha= ve a
more up-to-date API and that will work properly.

When we moved the time back one hour last Fall, two of the NT servers stopped running their AT jobs. No explanation in any of the logs or = in
Event Viewer, they simply didn't run. Rebooting fixed the problem.

In Oracle 7.3. on NT, you can only monitor one instance at a time usi= ng the
Oracle Performance Monitor Counters. To me this renders the tool practically useless if you have five instances on one NT server. Thi= s is a
restriction with the MS Event Viewer, not with Oracle (as far as I understand this), because there can only be one "hook" per applicatio= n on
each server, and well, Oracle is just an application from NT's perspe= ctive.
I would prefer it if it saw each instance as a separate application.

Some parts of Oracle 7.3.4. were ported from UNIX, and I am not convi= nced
that everything was cleaned up properly after the port. e.g. you can=  start
lsnrctl from the DOS prompt and issue the commands that are on the UN= IX
version of lsnrctl, but I was told by Oracle Support never to do this= , that
one has to go through the Services applet. If that's the case, why d= o the
commands still appear to work when you issue them? This is with Orac= le
7.3.4., I don't remember about Oracle8.0 and I don't know about 8.1.

I also noticed that some of the extra TCL procedures that came with t= he OEM
(early version mind you) still had UNIX commands embedded inside them= , to me
that showed they hadn't quite finished porting them. These were the additional procedures and I was really digging around for them before=  I
found them, most people would not have tried to use them, but still..= . In
OEM 2.0.4 they took them all out, all that was left with the free dow= nload
were empty shells wrapped in Java. Sneaky person that I am I didn't = want to
pay for the Performance Packs, you see, I wanted to run all those use= ful
little extra tcl scripts they shipped with the older version, but not possible anymore. This wasn't for production use, it was because I a= m
curious and I wanted to see if it could be done. (I used JDeveloper = to see
that the scripts were just empty shells.)

There are a few little things like that, but overall Oracle 7.3 on NT=  has
been reasonably reliable. Not as reliable as our alpha servers runni= ng
Digital UNIX, but then again there is a price difference between the = two.

For small web sites and small to medium-sized databases, NT performs reasonably well in my opinion.

My biggest beef with NT is that when something goes wrong the OS does= n't
always report it, and if it does, about a third of the time rebooting=  the
machine ends up being the fix. It's kind of silly when you think abo= ut it.
At least in UNIX if something goes wrong you can look at the process = UNIX
goes through, there are none of these hidden layers that only the OS = vendor
can tweak.

Also with NT, there are not that many documented things you can do to=  speed
it up. Microsoft says it is "self-tuning", but on www.arstechnica.co= m
<http://www.arstechnica.com> they point out how to enable UDMA, whic= h
wasn't taken into consideration by Microsoft when the OS was released= ,
because that was years ago now. That one tweak speeds up disk transf= ers by
about 40 percent. I want to be able to go in there and configure the=  OS to
run efficiently and smoothly. Can't do that much with NT. Still hav= en't
found an easily accessible reference anywhere for the whole NT regist= ry,
none of the books go into enough detail. It's because the registry i= s just
like the old system.ini and win.ini files, and the software vendors p= ut in
there whatever they want, but still as a DBA I would have liked to se= e a
central, useful, reference on what changes to make on NT to make it p= erform
as well as possible for Oracle. (I have tips if anybody wants them, = we
could exchange maybe).

Remember though that whenever you read books about MS SQL Server, the= y talk
about how SQL Server is "the" database software to use, because it wi= ll run
your "big" Access databases much better. =20

Their focus is not the same as the UNIX machines, which are more upsc= ale.

I hear it is possible to cluster NT, I haven't tried that. It could = be more
stable than standalone versions of NT.

All the problems I encountered were minor.

My 2 cents' worth, personal opinion not necessarily the opinion of my employer (or of Microsoft or Oracle for that matter). =20

Regards,
Patrice Boivin
Systems Analyst (Oracle Certified DBA)

Systems Admin & Operations | Admin. et Exploit. des syst=E8mes
Technology Services        | Services technologiques
Informatics Branch         | Direction de l'informatique=20
Maritimes Region, DFO      | R=E9gion des Maritimes, MPO

E-Mail: boivinp_at_mar.dfo-mpo.gc.ca <mailto:boivinp_at_mar.dfo-mpo.gc.ca>=
=20

=09-----Original Message-----
=09From:=09guy ruth hammond [SMTP:grh_at_agency.com]
=09Sent:=09Thursday, June 15, 2000 4:54 AM
=09To:=09Multiple recipients of list ORACLE-L
=09Subject:=09Re: Oracle 7.3.4 limitations on NT

=09"Cale, Rick T (Richard)" wrote:
=09>=20
=09> Not necessarily. I'll be the first to agree that UNIX,etc is a
better OS.
=09> Depending on your needs,etc NT
=09> can work quite well. I have been running on NT for about 5 yrs
supporting 7
=09> different Oracle NT shops in
=09> that 5 years and probably bad luck to say this but I have not ha=
d
even 1
=09> crash because of the OS. I have been running 7.3 up to 8.0.5. I
know a lot
=09> of folks on this list use NT successfully. =20

=09My $0.02

=09When NT4 crashes it is almost always either a third party driver, =
or
=09a problem with the hardware. I've been using it in production
(altho'
=09not always with Oracle) for almost 5 years now. The problem is
simply
=09that Microsoft, unlike say Sun, have almost no control over the
hardware
=09that you run their OS on. Sun can test every driver on every piece
of
=09kit they make, whereas Microsoft's ISVs and IHVs are far too
numerous
=09for this to happen, particularly in combinations with each other. =
So
=09faulty drivers get loaded into kernel space, where they can trash
the
=09kernel data structures when they fail.=20

=09This is a fundamental flaw in the NT4 architecture, but it can be
avoided
=09if you stick to first tier hardware vendors, and ensure that you
only
=09use drivers and hardware that they approve or recommend (even if i=
t
costs
=09a bit more). VMS people (I know 'cos I was one once, mmm, FORTRAN
:0) )
=09will laugh at me for saying this, but 6 month uptimes are easily=
=20
=09obtainable on NT, and I like to schedule a Just In Case reboot rou=
nd
about
=09that sort of time.=20

=09Way back when, y'see, Microsoft architected NT 3.51 quite sensibly
to
=09avoid this sort of problem. Running SQL 4.2, if the display fell
over
=09it wasn't such a problem, the database kept on going, altho' if yo=
u
=09wanted the display back you'd have to reboot (!) but at least it
=09meant that your application stayed up. But the problem was, on x86=
,
=09you pay a speed penalty for working like this, and in those days,
the
=09overhead was quite serious, hence the change in NT4. Personally, I
would
=09have liked to have a switch in a control panel or something, so I=
=20
=09could tell NT4 (and now Win2000) where to run drivers, because I
would
=09be willing to drop some performance for the stability.

=09One more thing: Oracle 8 and upwards run very well on NT, great
price/
=09performance ratio. 7.3.4 is definitely less reliable.

=09Cheers,

=09g

=09(who is *not* the SA :0) )

=09--=20
=09guy ruth hammond <grh_at_agency.com> | One is punished for being
=09Technology Analysis & Consulting | weak, not for being cruel.
=0907879607148 http://www.agency.com | -- Baudelaire

=09--=20
=09Author: guy ruth hammond
=09 INET: grh_at_agency.com

=09Fat City Network Services -- (858) 538-5051 FAX: (858) 538-505=
1
=09San Diego, California -- Public Internet access / Mailing
Lists
=09------------------------------------------------------------------=

--


=09To REMOVE yourself from this mailing list, send an E-Mail message

=09to: ListGuru_at_fatcity.com (note EXACT spelling of 'ListGuru') and i=