Forum OpenACS Q&A: Oracle listener

I'm anxious to see how dotLRN works, so I'm installing Oracle now for the first time. Everything went fint, i think, till it was time to stop and start the listener and to check if it works...which it doesn't. (This is on Debian Testing and I'm following Vinod's guide)

The listener says it supports no services and I can't login into the database using the listener naming convention:

debian:/etc/init.d# ./listener8i stop
Oracle 8i listener start/stop
Shutting down Listener for 8i: 
LSNRCTL for Linux: Version 8.1.7.0.0 - Production on 21-JUN-2002 
03:44:10

(c) Copyright 1998 Oracle Corporation.  All rights reserved.

Connecting to (ADDRESS=(PROTOCOL=ipc)(KEY=PNPKEY))
TNS-12541: TNS:no listener
 TNS-12560: TNS:protocol adapter error
  TNS-00511: No listener
   Linux Error: 2: No such file or directory
Connecting to (ADDRESS=(PROTOCOL=tcp)(PORT=1521))
TNS-12541: TNS:no listener
 TNS-12560: TNS:protocol adapter error
  TNS-00511: No listener
   Linux Error: 111: Connection refused

...

debian:/etc/init.d# ./listener8i start
Oracle 8i listener start/stop
Starting the Listener for 8i: 
LSNRCTL for Linux: Version 8.1.7.0.0 - Production on 21-JUN-2002 
03:45:36

(c) Copyright 1998 Oracle Corporation.  All rights reserved.

Starting /ora8/m01/app/oracle/product/8.1.7/bin/tnslsnr: please 
wait...

TNSLSNR for Linux: Version 8.1.7.0.0 - Production
Log messages written to 
/ora8/m01/app/oracle/product/8.1.7/network/log/listener.log
Listening on: (DESCRIPTION=(ADDRESS=(PROTOCOL=ipc)(KEY=PNPKEY)))
Listening on: 
(DESCRIPTION=(ADDRESS=(PROTOCOL=tcp)(HOST=debian)(PORT=1521)))

Connecting to (ADDRESS=(PROTOCOL=ipc)(KEY=PNPKEY))
STATUS of the LISTENER
------------------------
Alias                     LISTENER
Version                   TNSLSNR for Linux: Version 8.1.7.0.0 - 
Production
Start Date                21-JUN-2002 03:45:37
Uptime                    0 days 0 hr. 3 min. 9 sec
Trace Level               off
Security                  OFF
SNMP                      OFF
Listener Log File         
/ora8/m01/app/oracle/product/8.1.7/network/log/listener.log
The listener supports no services
The command completed successfully

debian:/etc/init.d# 


...


oracle@debian:~$ sqlplus system/my_passwd@ora8

SQL*Plus: Release 8.1.7.0.0 - Production on Fri Jun 21 05:02:05 
2002

(c) Copyright 2000 Oracle Corporation.  All rights reserved.

ERROR:
ORA-12154: TNS:could not resolve service name


Enter user-name:

Anyone know how come this happens?

Thanks,

oracle@debian:~$ env | grep ORA
ORACLE_SID=ora8
ORACLE_BASE=/ora8/m01/app/oracle
ORACLE_HOME=/ora8/m01/app/oracle/product/8.1.7
ORACLE_TERM=vt100
ORA_NLS33=/ora8/m01/app/oracle/product/8.1.7/ocommon/nls/admin/data
oracle@debian:~$

oracle@debian:~$ su  
Password: ********
debian:/home/oracle# env | grep ORA
ORACLE_SID=ora8
ORACLE_BASE=/ora8/m01/app/oracle
ORACLE_HOME=/ora8/m01/app/oracle/product/8.1.7
ORACLE_TERM=vt100
ORA_NLS33=/ora8/m01/app/oracle/product/8.1.7/ocommon/nls/admin/data
debian:/home/oracle# /etc/init.d/listener8i start
(didn't work)

Michael, what should that file look like?

I only have one SID; ora8... What about permissions, ownership etc...?

Thanks!

LISTENER =
  (DESCRIPTION_LIST =
    (DESCRIPTION =
      (ADDRESS_LIST =
        (ADDRESS = (PROTOCOL = TCP)(HOST = qfs05)(PORT = 1521))
      )
    )
  )

SID_LIST_LISTENER =
  (SID_LIST =
    (SID_DESC =
      (SID_NAME = PLSExtProc)
      (ORACLE_HOME = /apps/oracle/product/8.1.7)
      (PROGRAM = extproc)
    )
    (SID_DESC =
      (GLOBAL_DBNAME = acs817)
      (ORACLE_HOME = /apps/oracle/product/8.1.7)
      (SID_NAME = acs817)
   )
 )

This file is owned by oracle:dba and the permissions are 664.

oracle installation is generally painful the first couple of times you install on your system.....

The thing with o8i install on RH7.2 is that there are several ways of doing it. I have installed oracle about 20 times (sometimes easier to hose system than to diagnose), with about 4 or five end results. I remember I had problems with one of the methods where the net8 setup would not work. lstnctrl stop would not work and I would have to create the listener.ora manually.

Now, I have a really painless 8i install on RH7.2 ... thanks Janine !!!

1. install stock RH7.2
2. install *all* the compat*.rpm on the second RH7.2 CD ... am too lazy to figure out which ones I need.
3. Follow install instructions in the docs
4. When I set the env in the .bash_profile, add "export LD_ASSUME_KERNEL=2.2.5"
5. At the first linking error, as user oracle, I edit the $ORACLE_HOME/bin/genclntsh, remove "-z defs", and run the script, then click Retry to continue
6. Download and edit the root.sh, changing the ORACLE_HOME twice, from /oracle/u01... to /ora8/m01.... (the root.sh that comes with 8i does not work at all)
7. When you run this script, make sure you su from user oracle and not su -
8. After installation, and before you run the Net8 config, install the glibc patch as user oracle.
9. You also need to make sure that you add "export LD_ASSUME_KERNEL=2.2.5" to the nsadmin .bash_profile, otherwise the openacs installation hangs.
10. One other file you need to change is nsd-oracle which has the ORACLE_HOME set as /ora8/..../8.1.6 instead of /ora8/..../8.1.7

I have never run a debian system, so am not sure where the problem might lie, but I hope something in this installation might give you a pointer.

Try and replace the root.sh script... ... Is there a debian equivalent for the compat*.rpm files that ship with RH???

Samir: Thanks for the tip. However, a "netstat -a | grep 1521" didn't reveal anything...

Nevertheless, thanks for your help!

The problem with 8i on RH7.2 extends beyond the glibc. Unless the LD_ASSUME_KERNEL is set to 2.2.5, the jre won't even launch when you ./runInstall

What you might want to do is have nsadmin assume kernel 2.2.5 only the first time you install openacs on 8i running on RH7.2

Does anyone else know of a better workaround??

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