can I copy init.ora in /dbs

[greenpee]

I am new to oracle. I wanted to change the init.ora file. I was afraid about screw anythingup, so I "cp init.ora init.ora_bk". Then i did "vi init.ora". right after I did this, everything act weired and I could not logon to the machine. Do you think my cp init.ora caused this problem? Thanks

 

[SantaMufasa]

Green,

Unless someone "bounced" Oracle (shut it down, then started it up again), then your changes to init.ora should have had no effect.

I am curious...is the Oracle database with which you are working a production database? If so, are you the database administrator? If so, as an Oracle newbie, are you comfortable with the DBA responsibility at this point?

Mufasa
(aka Dave of Sandy, Utah, USA @ 00:29 (03Sep04) UTC (aka "GMT" and "Zulu"), 17:29 (02Sep04) Mountain Time)

 

[KenCunningham]

What changes did you make when you did the vi init.ora? I wonder whether you made a typo or something, or perhaps hit a control character by mistake, which might cause a hiccup in the startup process. As Dave says, unless the database was bounced to pick up the new init.ora file, it wouldn't have any immediate adverse effect. You also say you "cannot log into the machine". Do you mean the actual first logon to the OS or into Oracle? If the former, init.ora probably isn't the culprit. If the latter, and you can get an OS prompt, copy the backup of init.ora back and you should be OK. If not, post back with exact error messages etc and we might be able to help you further. You should also take on board Dave's comments about being comfortable if you are the DBA of a production database. Good luck.