ora-6508 error

From: John Armani <armani_at_eng14.rochny.uspra.abb.com>
Date: Thu, 01 Feb 2001 06:40:36 -0800
Message-ID: <F001.002A73FE.20010201064842@fatcity.com>

We have an installed product that intermittently will raise an ora-6508 error (could not find program unit ...). I have done some investigating through metalink and had some contact with Oracle support.

We have an pro*C executable calling a stored procedure (that resides in a package) that does an insert into a table. It's and HP-UX environment running Oracle 7.3.4. The error seems to occur during heavy system load: when a batch task that does some intense database access is running at the same time the as the task that gets the error. The system having the trouble is at a customer site, so hands-on investigating is difficult.

The error points to an invalid object (package or stored procedure in this case), but I am quite sure that the package, procedure, and table are valid since:

The problem is intermittant.
There are other procedures in the package and they appear to work just fine.
The procedure in question does not depend on any other procedures. It is not complex, and merely inserts a row into a table (that does exist).
The package is created when the system is installed and never modified (code is never changed or recompiled).

My questions are ...
Could there be a resource problem? If the package cannot be loaded into the shared pool could this possibly be the result? I would have expected also getting an ora-4031 (out of shared memory) error, but I have read that the error does not always appear.

Should packages be limited in size? It seems like a package can be "too big", and that this would impact performance if the shared pool gets fragmented. Does anyone have a rule of thumb as to when to break up a very large package into smaller units?

Any ideas on what we can set in init.ora to get a better handle on what's happening? For example, the best way to set up a trace.

Just wondering if anyone on the list had a similar experience. I'm in digest mode, so directly email me any ideas.

John Armani
ABB Industrial Systems, Inc
armani_at_armani.rochny.uspra.abb.com

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Received on Thu Feb 01 2001 - 08:40:36 CST