I am going to install Oracle 8.1.5 on a new server. My customers want to be with 8.1.5 for the time being and then upgrade later to 8.1.6 or 8.1.7

My question is what needs to be considered when I am installing Oracle. Because this is the first installation on that server, it will be a new Oracle_base and new Oracle_home so there won't be any problem. But I am thinking about future upgrades to 8.1.6, 8.1.7 (or 9i) --

Is there any precation I should use selecting my device paths so that future upgrades don't conflict....for example I can install the "JRE" in the default directory or some other place.

When I upgrade to 8.1.6 in future, can I use the same oracle_home (oracle\ora81) so that it upgrades the underlying files or I must choose a new Home (like \oracle\ora816) and it will create a new set of diretories (like \oracle\ora816\bin etc.)

What kind of standards do you follow while selecting directory structures for Oracle while keeping in mind the future upgrades.

Thanks,

- Rajeev