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Thread: Help!! Oracle 7.3.3 need some guidance for recovery

  1. #1
    Join Date
    May 2003
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    Austin, TX
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    Question Help!! Oracle 7.3.3 need some guidance for recovery

    Please can anyone help me.. I've been wracking my brain trying to figure out how to get my database up.. We are on Oracle 7.3.3 and AIX 4.2.1 platform. The database in question is a logging database of transactions and events.. We thought we had a good backup, but the tape drive was rewinding and rewriting over all the files even though rmt0.1 was used.. To make things short, we lost a few dbf files in the process, and now we have all system files, and most of the database files.. There are approximately 4 database files missing.. named LOG22_logdata18.dbf, LOG22_logdata19.dbf and LOG22_logdata20.dbf. My question is this. How can I bring the database up (if it is even possible) with these files missing? Can I create dummy files and attempt, or is there a way for Oracle to ignore the missing dbf files, and bring up the database without those files, or is there any tool in the market that can read these dbf files and make some sense to us so we can recover some of the missing data? I can do a cat or more on these .dbf files, and see data that makes sense, in addition to special characters..
    Any suggestions on what direction I can take is greatly appreciated.

    Thanks!
    Ralph

  2. #2
    Join Date
    Jan 2001
    Posts
    642

    Re: Help!! Oracle 7.3.3 need some guidance for recovery

    Originally posted by javagator
    Please can anyone help me.. I've been wracking my brain trying to figure out how to get my database up.. We are on Oracle 7.3.3 and AIX 4.2.1 platform. The database in question is a logging database of transactions and events.. We thought we had a good backup, but the tape drive was rewinding and rewriting over all the files even though rmt0.1 was used.. To make things short, we lost a few dbf files in the process, and now we have all system files, and most of the database files.. There are approximately 4 database files missing.. named LOG22_logdata18.dbf, LOG22_logdata19.dbf and LOG22_logdata20.dbf. My question is this. How can I bring the database up (if it is even possible) with these files missing? Can I create dummy files and attempt, or is there a way for Oracle to ignore the missing dbf files, and bring up the database without those files, or is there any tool in the market that can read these dbf files and make some sense to us so we can recover some of the missing data? I can do a cat or more on these .dbf files, and see data that makes sense, in addition to special characters..
    Any suggestions on what direction I can take is greatly appreciated.

    Thanks!
    Ralph


    What kind of backups have you taken: Do you have any previous backups:?
    There is always a better way to do the things.

  3. #3
    Join Date
    May 2003
    Location
    Austin, TX
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    The backups we took were unfortunately never verified.. We did direct tar backups of the dbf files, and until our database grew, never had the problem, because the tape never got full.. so we were always able to recover if needed from the tapes.. Consequently, we were able to restore the database from our testbed which was a snapshot of how the database was 2 years ago.. that is allowing us to function temporarily, but we still need to update that to catch up with the transactions that have taken place the past 2 years.. The newer transaction database files are luckily not lost, but need to somehow be "attached" to this database.. Any crude methods to do that? or any tools that can read database files? I've seen tools for dbase database files, but not for oracle database files..

    Thanks

  4. #4
    Join Date
    Jan 2001
    Posts
    642
    Right -) Oracle data files are not plug and play. I assume your way of backup was cold backup(shutting down and then tar coping the datafiles).

    If so then take it to another machine,

    startup mount (mount only the controlfiles)
    alter database datafile 'LogXXXX' offline drop
    alter database open.

    That should work.

    Badrinath
    There is always a better way to do the things.

  5. #5
    Join Date
    May 2003
    Location
    Austin, TX
    Posts
    9
    Thanks Badrinath!
    I will try this out.. Since I know what database files I'm missing, I'll try to drop those before bringing up the database.. I never thought of that option for some reason..

  6. #6
    Join Date
    Nov 2002
    Location
    Geneva Switzerland
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    Originally posted by badrinathn
    Oracle data files are not plug and play.
    I shall frame this quote and hang it on the wall
    "The power of instruction is seldom of much efficacy except in those happy dispositions where it is almost superfluous" - Gibbon, quoted by R.P.Feynman

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