Originally posted by adewri
No thats not true at all..... Oracle can run even if it cannot write to alert.log file.
hmmm oh really?

Note:1055297.6 Subject: ORA-03113 ON STARTUP NOMOUNT

"If Oracle cannot write to the alert log for any reason, the instance will crash."

Ok maybe the note is dated but I have seen many instances where the db would not open or would crash with a change in permission to where oracle writes the alert log to or perhaps a change in mount point

steve