I'm not sure about what you wrote, but in order to put a database in archivelog mode you need to specify the right parameters in your init file, and shutdown the database and then startup in mount mode and enter the following command, "ALTER DATABASE ARCHIVELOG;" Then open the database. I inlcuded a link on putting a database in archivelog mode. Tahiti.oracle.com is always a good place to look for Oracle information.

http://download.oracle.com/docs/cd/B...redo.htm#14904