Oracle’s Oracle10g requires more memory than was ever required before. If you utilize any of the new features such as automatic storage management (ASM) and automatic shared memory management (ASMM) then you really need to pay attention to what memory is doing in 10g.

I remember reading “Brave New World” when I was in high school, we needn’t mention the year. I was fascinated by the system described in the book that seemed so logical on the surface but needed so many props underneath to keep it going. It reminds me at times of some of the Oracle management that goes on these days.

What exactly do I mean? Many times Oracle management tools that look good on the surface are actually...

I often see DBAs and developers who don’t know the first thing about tuning SQL. They ask “Why do I need to know that, can’t Oracle tune itself?” The truth of the matter is that Oracle is, for the most part, able to do a pretty decent job of tuning itself if it is given enough information and the queries or tuning tasks aren’t too complex. However, there are times when Johnny must tune.

What do I mean by “enough information”?...

With each new release of a database, be it Oracle or one of their competitors, we hear the cry that this release will make DBAs as we know them obsolete. We hear again and again how this automated feature set or that new GUI interface will automate the DBA job. So far, all of these claims of DBA obsolescence have been for naught, to mis-quote Samual Clements “The reports of the DBAs death are greatly exaggerated.” When...

When I started working with Oracle in 1990 there weren’t many SQL tuning tools available. At most you had the Oracle supplied tools which allowed you to capture an explain plan and minimal tracing. Most SQL tuning consisted of either encouraging the use to a particular index by making sure the column in the index was on the leading edge of the index or, defeating the use of the index through null concatenation to character...