Saturday, September 25, 2004

A Tiger Ate Scott While He Was Listening to TNS

The studies are going on erratically but there are results.

After trying to recall what was it that the DBA's at my school at workplace did when they showed me how to connect to the database with the notorious SCOTT account and SELECT * FROM T_EMP;, i finally resorted to "SQL*Plus User's Guide and Reference". The SQL*Plus Quick Start chapter said that i have to unlock the HR user. I have to clarify this confusion between user and schema ASAP! So i unlocked it using the EM, but still couldn't run DESCRIBE HR.COUNTRIES.

I tried it with the SYSTEM account and it worked. I guess that something's wrong with AMIRA's privileges or roles or something in that vein. So i compared AMIRA to SCOTT account, which was also locked. SCOTT had CONNECT and RESOURCE roles, while AMIRA had only CONNECT. AMIRA also had no privileges, while SCOTT had UNLIMITED TABLESPACE. So i granted AMIRA everything SCOTT had, but it still didn't help. Then i looked at SYSTEM privileges, and there were, of course many more, including SELECT ANY TABLE. Maybe that's what it need. Also, SYSTEM had UNLIMITED TABLESPACE checked as "Admin Option", while SCOTT and AMIRA had not. Interesting! I'm still not changing anything; i'd better read chapter 7 of 2 Day DBA -- "Administering Users and Security".

It says that Oracle used SCOTT for training formerly, but now is phasing it out in favor of sample schemas HR, OE etc. I like the concept -- every schema is not only an example of a common relational table structure, but also an example of management concepts (warehouse, multimedia, object-oriented, etc.) What it don't like is the names: While HR is a common English abbreviation for Human Resources, i'm unfamiliar with OE as Order Entry. But maybe i don't know enough about English business writing.

And i go on.

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