AutoArchival?

I found this in my alert_ora1.log

Tue May 1 13:09:19 2001
ORACLE Instance ora1 - Can not allocate log, archival required
Tue May 1 13:09:19 2001
ARCH: Connecting to console port...
Thread 1 cannot allocate new log, sequence 584
All online logs needed archiving
Current log# 1 seq# 583 mem# 0: /data1/oradata/ora1/redo01.log

My guess is that I need to archive my redo log files. How do I go about this? Should I turn my AutoArchival to true? If so, how do I do this?

Edit the initSID.ora to
"log_archive_start = true", if its not already there.

This change will be in effect after restarting the instance.

To avoid restart, do the following,

Alter system archive log start ; --will be persistent until restarted

1) force a new archive logfile
ALTER SYSTEM SWITCH LOGFILE;

2) connect internal , to see all desciption for archive

archive log list;

I found these three commented lines in my initSID.ora file and uncommented them

##### For archiving if enabled #####
log_archive_start = true
log_archive_dest = "location=/data1/oradata/angus/arch"
log_archive_format = arch_%t_%s.arc

After I uncommented them, I issued the command SHUTDOWN IMMEDIATE in sever manager. When I tried to STARTUP I received the error

ORA-16032: parameter LOG_ARCHIVE_DEST destination string cannot be translated
ORA-07286: sksagdi: cannot obtain device information.
SVR4 Error: 2: No such file or directory

So I removed the location=/data1/... so that it just has the directory path in quotes. Now when I issued the STARTUP command I get the error message

ORA-03113: end-of-file on communication channel

I even recommented the archive lines in the ora file but still get this error. I tried to find a trace file to look at but there isn't one. Here is what I found in the alert log for today but it seems to be normal to me . . . Any ideas?


Wed May 2 08:55:01 2001
Restarting dead background process EMN0
EMN0 started with pid=15
Wed May 2 08:55:07 2001
Shutting down instance (immediate)
License high water mark = 8
Wed May 2 08:55:12 2001
ALTER DATABASE CLOSE NORMAL
Wed May 2 08:55:12 2001
SMON: disabling tx recovery
SMON: disabling cache recovery
Wed May 2 08:55:12 2001
Thread 1 closed at log sequence 584
Wed May 2 08:55:12 2001
Completed: ALTER DATABASE CLOSE NORMAL
Wed May 2 08:55:12 2001
ALTER DATABASE DISMOUNT
Completed: ALTER DATABASE DISMOUNT
archiving is disabled
Wed May 2 08:59:24 2001
Starting ORACLE instance (normal)
LICENSE_MAX_SESSION = 0
LICENSE_SESSIONS_WARNING = 0
Wed May 2 09:00:37 2001
Starting ORACLE instance (normal)
Wed May 2 09:06:36 2001
Starting ORACLE instance (normal)
Wed May 2 09:08:14 2001
Starting ORACLE instance (normal)

Hi, 2nd May 2001 21:14 hrs chennai

Did you do this in the mount state

alter database archivelog; This does the mode permanent to DB.

Then check up by typing as follows

svrmgr>log archive list

See whether it shows as follows

DATABASE LOG MODE as Acrhive mode and
AUTOMATIC archival as Enabled

Shutdown the DB in normal or immediate

Take a full closed DB bck

Startup and open the DB.

All other 3 parameters is what you have done is ok in init.ora.

I understand the path should be wrong in your case.Dont recomment do the steps as described above i am sure you will get across.


Cheers

Padmam



after this

Yvonne, The cause of the error is at

##### For archiving if enabled #####
log_archive_start = true
log_archive_dest = /data1/oradata/angus/arch

Then, start the instance issue,



SQL>alter system archive log start;

SQL> select * from v$instance;

Here you should see the archiving had been set to yes. Then shutdown the instance and restart the instance and issue

archive log list and see that you get a list. and also do the above select query and confirm that it is in archive mode.


Good luck,
Sam

Thanks very much for your help, I believe I understand now.

I've changed my initSID.ora file to reflect your suggestions. However, I can't seem to get passed the ORA-03113: end-of-file on communication channel error.

Any ideas?

First check whether the path you had specified is a valid one. Then try including the path within double quotes.

BTW, what is your OS and Oracle version.

Sam

The path does exist and it's empty. The oracle owner has write access to the directory. I am using Solaris 8 and Oracle 8i. I changed the ora file to include double quotes around the Archive destination directory. But when I try to issue a command in SVRMGR I get the error:

ORA-12514: TNS:listener could not resolve SERVICE_NAME given in connect descriptor

I haven't changed my listener.ora nor my tnsnames.ora. I started and stop the listeners without problem.

Lets do one by one.

1. I need to know your database version.

2. Comment out the archiving option and start your instance. Does it come up without any problem.

3. Now add the following

# Uncommenting the lines below will cause automatic archiving if archiving has
# been enabled using ALTER DATABASE ARCHIVELOG.
log_archive_start = true
log_archive_dest = oracle_base_path/admin/SID/arch
log_archive_format = arch_%t_%s.arc

start the instance,

If it comes up o.k, then issue

SVRMGR> alter system archive log start;


then issue

SVRMGR> archive log list


IF you have any problem, pl. let me know when it occoured while doing what?

Sam