Upgrade to 9.2.0.7, TZ Problems

[MHabeeb]

Hi to all,
This is a note from the DBA:
We have got to upgrade several of the Oracle environments for the Daylight Savings Time patches, The DST upgrade needs to occur before March 10.
Beginning of 2007 Daylight Saving Time (DST) will start on the second Sunday of March and end at first Sunday of November. This change will affect Oracle Server –Enterprise Edition versions 8.1 to 10.2. Depending on the database version the specific impacts will differ.
In short, a database patch on each affected database and a JVM patch need to be applied.
Details
Based on the initial investigation using Oracle provided tool and documentation, below are the findings.
1. Time Zone (TZ) patching.
According to Oracle database documentation, TZ patch set files for version 9.2.0.7 can be used for any database between 9.2.0.1 and 9.2.0.8. The version 3 patch set is 4689959. For Oracle 10g, separate patch sets are available on each version. There is no database downtime for applying this patch set. However, for databases using TZ data type, data need to be converted into the new TZ format.
2. JAVA Virtual Machine (JVM) patching.
Oracle suggests applying JVM patch only if the database uses the JAVA objects. The current databases are version 10g or 9.2.0.3 and above. Oracle does not provide JVM patching for 9.2.0.3 version instead, Oracle requires higher version upgrade and to apply the JVM patch. We recommend upgrading 9.2.0.3 version to 9.2.0.7 version. This upgrade needs down time on all the databases of server and user testing. Before upgrading to version 9.2.0.7 users need to confirm their application compatibility.
Risks
1. Applying the patches.
Non compatible application code and can pertain to non functional application
components.
2. NOT applying the patches.
Applications using the JAVA/TZ data type will return invalid results.

My questions is regarding the two risks:
Is there a code that can be written to handle if "Risk 1" or "Risk 2" happens.
As the DBA's will do all the upgrade or install patches, but the after effects will be my problem.
Also if someone can please explain in short about how the Time Zone and the JVM works.

Thanks to all,

Habeeb

[cis_groupie]

The 2 risks are for Management to work out: does the risk of applying the patches outweigh the risk of NOT applying the patches?

It's hard to say whether or not code can be written to fix the errors if you don't yet know what the errors are! That said, in my experience all problems can be resolved (eventually ).

The after effects are the DBA's problem, but your responsibility to get resolved - if there's a problem it's the DBA's job to sort it out (that's why he called 'the DBA'). So if there are problems then tell him to do his job & get things working for you.

As for how Time Zone & how JVM work, your best bet is to search on Google until you find an article that explains it in a way that you can understand (I'm not trying to make fun of you - it's just that a technical answer may just confuse you. We could spend all week trying to explain to you in different ways not knowing how much technical knowledge you have, when a few minutes' searching on the internet by you will turn up an article that you will be able to understand).