Oracle Upgrade.

Hi !
My shop is planing to do an Oracle Upgrade from 7 to 8I on NT.
I'm a new person in DBA and I need some information on any issues that I might
have during the Upgrade.

Thanks a lot.

[Edited by Vit_R on 01-09-2001 at 02:50 PM]

Before going Production.
Test the upgrade procedure in another similar machine.

Thanks for quick response.
The problem is that I'm not sure waht is the upgrade
procedure would be and how much it will take for
my database.
Could you help me with that?

Thanks.

Actually, going from Oracle 7 to 8i is migrating not upgrading. The Migration Guide will give you all the details for migrating your database.

What needs to be done before actual upgrade ?

The recommendation above is right, Read the Migration Manual first.
With no detail would be:
-Shutdown DB and services
-Backup DB (and machine if you can)
-You can install the new kernel in other ORACLE_HOME (recommended)
-Start the DB with the new kernel.
-Run the appropiate script (u0703040.sql)
-Apply patches to the new release (and run post-patch scripts)

You are allowed to migrate from 7.3.4 only (because that version is supported) If you don't have it you must upgrade first.

You can migrate using export/import but it is slow.
And please, read the manual first and test the procedure in Testing. (The procedure includes testing applications)