Database corrup, what to expect

[BigMag]

Hello,

A potential cient has a problem. The only information he can give is, that he has a corrupt database and his programs are in oracle. If we can solve the problem we can design their databases.
I'm an expert on IBM DB2 and have normal skills on Microsoft sequal server.
So before I take a look at it, I would like to know what to expect and your opinion if someone (formal progammer cobol and above skills), could fix the database.

I'm sorry I can't give more information, I don't know much about oracle. (They might even work with IBM DB2!)

Thank you in advance,

M. BigMag, The Netherlands.
someone@euronet.nl (no kidding!)

 

[THoey]

BigMag,

With the very limited info, it is kinda hard to tell. How do they know it is corrupted? Did they call Oracle with an error code? Or is it just one of those "it don't work, so it must be corrupted" things? I think that would be my first step. Find out what exactly is wrong.

I have an Oracle 7.3.4 database that is corrupted. Well, a data dictionary index is corrupted. I have worked with Oracle and they suggest that their best advice is to upgrade to at least version 8, rebuild the structures and then reload from a backup / export. I am in the process of moving this to a new server, so I am going to be upgrading, etc.

Good Luck... Terry M. Hoey

 

[carp]

Also, are they talking about logically corrupted (in which case, they've just jacked up their data and you'll have to sort it out) or physically corrupted (in which case you'll be getting well-acquainted with your friendly Oracle support staff soon!).

 

[rcurva]

I had corrupted datafiles (non-system) on my database before, what I did was to drop all objects on those files, resized the files to the smallest possible size (where an object can not possible extend), then recreate the objects.

But if you have the time to drop and recreate the tablespace, that would be even better. An export/import is a must.

Use $ORACLE_HOME/bin/dbv to check for physical corruption. For Unix, no need to shutdown the DB when checking the datafiles but for NT, you must shutdown the db.