Although the answer from Oracle Support representative is somewhat confusing ("yes. actually, *standby* is the mode that the database is in" - asterisks added by J.M.), the question is what they actually ment, even if they thought *noarchivelog* instead of *standby*.

How can we determine in which archiving mode the instance is running? One option would be to isue "ARCHIVE LOG LIST" in svrmgrl or in SQL*PLus, or to "SELECT log_mode FROM v$database;". So if someone have standby configuration handy it would be nice to post the results from the above commands on the standby database. I would be surprised if they would report standby to be in noarchivelog mode! If it realy is running in noarchivelog, what happens when you convert standby to "normal" database mode? Does it automatically swith to archivelog (because I'm positive the converted database runs in archivelog mode, just like previous primary did)?

What I suspect the Oracle Support representative realy ment was: standby database is *efectively* running in noarchivelog mode, although it formaly is configured as archivelog. The ARCx process is just sitting there, doing nothing, just like in the normal database in noarchive mode.