I have a couple of questions for you....
I have a couple of questions (three of them at least, make sure to page down!) for you – about Oracle XE. As you may or may not know, Oracle XE is the “free” Oracle. It is close to the end of the beta process for this and we (we being the people monitoring the forum, which is the only venue of support) were wondering about a couple of things. If you have time, I’m hoping you can answer a few questions for me…
If you did not want to sign up for the forum - or had problems signing up, please leave a comment so we know what the issues you had were.
And in closing – if you can suggest any ways we can improve the XE/forum experience – please let me know. Just add a comment to the blog.
Thanks!
If you did not want to sign up for the forum - or had problems signing up, please leave a comment so we know what the issues you had were.
And in closing – if you can suggest any ways we can improve the XE/forum experience – please let me know. Just add a comment to the blog.
Thanks!
posted by Thomas Kyte at 2:24 PM
27 Comments:
never got the email that they said I would
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Thought forum was just another Oracle 'Forum' on the metalink 'Forums' tab and could not find it. Thought it was not yet available, then never went back to it again. Wanted to lurk a little bit to get a feel for issues about product before downloading and trying to use.
It took me awhile to signup for the forum because the darn thing was (maybe still is) hidden. THat is the signup location wasn't clear. Please make it clear -if that hasn't already been done. Sometimes the Oracle web sites are too clever and it is difficult to find the link that you are looking for. (eg Oracle World)
i've said it on the forum, but I think paid support would be a super option to make people consider it more
My issues with the forum:
a) it was hidden. "Please let us know what you think about XE...but ssshhh, its hidden over here".... ugh!
b) When you compare the forums to any rudimentary news reader (for usenet etc), the forums come out a distant second. Slow to display, painful to navigate around...
Primary reason was that it was hidden. Second thing is that, since it was already mentioned it was the same code-base as the other editions, it restricted usage only to XE specific issues like licensing usages (or bugs if any). Interface related questions were answered in the htmldb forum as well. Answers for licensing and stuff are available in FAQ and other sites, so did not feel a specific reason to log into the forums..except to read about other peoples experiences and acceptability.
I tend to avoid the OTN forums. Seems to be a lot of information there, at least in some forums, but the search capabilities are just terrible and makes it hard to find anything.
I've been reading the 'Database - General' forum, and it's pretty clear that the following are consistent issues with signing up for the XE forum:
1) The invitation to sign up does not occur VISIBLY until a sucessful install. A number of downloads do not end up in a successful install;
2) On registration, the registrant is informed that they will receive an EMail within 24 hours. That email NEVER shows up;
3) Many people never logon to the discussion forums. They simply lurk or post anonymously. Those people will never realize that the XE forum exists - because it does not show up until they sign in. And they don't know to sign in until they receive the email (see 2)
I signed up for the forum, but only go to it very occasionally. The reasons are:
I have to use a separate account for the XE forum as a valid email address was needed and since the forum software does not allow you to change the email address, the only way to do this is create a new account. As all my history is linked to my existing account I stick with it and don't mind missing the email. Logging out and logging in with a different account to get to the XE forum is a pain.
The forum is not linked from the forums page so I need a separate bookmark for that forum, I don't see it when I am in the other forums so I never browse to it.
XE is pretty nice otherwise. I am going to be at least playing with the web app features which is not normally my cup of tea.
Since it is not possible to change the email of an account, the confirmation mail arrived at my previous employer. And i do not want to create a complete new account.
I signed up but no confirmation arrived.
I use the forum just occasionaly, because I don't have many problems with XE. As an Opera user, OTN-forums give me the blues.
XE got me started with htmldb and as a DBA I have made some useful internal applications that I would not had the time to make otherwise.
Would use the forum but cant find it.
I did install XE (linux rpm) but it never came any information on where to find the forum.
I have logged in to the forums but can't fins any links there to it.
tried to install it on my
mickysoft xp,
it didn't
(cannot remember the error)
planning next install
when beta stadium is over
SQL> $dir "E:\Oracle Express Beta\"Oraclexe.exe
Volume in Laufwerk E: hat keine Bezeichnung.
Volumeseriennummer: E850-3407
Verzeichnis von E:\Oracle Express Beta
14.11.2005 12:03 157.482.880 OracleXE.exe
forum ?
where can I find it ?
only when installation succeeded ?
The there's the question of whether you are or are not logged in.
Love XE, but the forum (like all other OTN forums) is not the most approachable. Besides the hoops required to find it in the first place the look-and-feel is very 'internal corporate IT dept'ish. The inability to change mail address is bizare, maybe people in Oracle are there for life but the rest of us move around and would like to bring our forum bound history/reputation with us. As for RSS support, "It's RSS Jim, I mean Tom , but not as we know it" :-)
Tom Gleeson aka OTN gleesoto
maybe later, too busy making oRACle / rac work on solaris and RHEL. no need for additional play-thing yet.
I do appreciate the facility though. Excellent way to familiarize current and future users/dbas/developerd with the product.
Regards,
PdV
Tried an XE install but the installer failed and mysteriously disappeared towards the end of the install not once but four times. I knew about the forum but could not access it since I did not have the XE installed ( blurb on XE download page at that time said that access to the forum would be granted on successful install ) and searching on google/oracle.com did not bring up a link.
I got caught in a catch 22 needing the forum to help me get a successful install and needing a successful install to get into the forum. I just gave up, downloaded 10g as I have decent hardware and I have been using it since.
Tom,
How about in query like this..
select *
from SOME_TABLES
where action <> 'LOC'
any tricks to avoid the full table scan? not that FTS is bad ;)
How about in query like this..
strange place for this comment? But, it would have to be assumed that "where actions <> 'LOC'" returns very few rows (eg: an index makes sense) from a larg table.
Then
where actions < 'LOC'
or actions > 'LOC'
might do it for you...
SQL> create table t
2 as
3 select 'LOC' actions, a.*
4 from all_objects a;
Table created.
SQL>
SQL> update t set actions = 'ABC' where rownum <= 5;
5 rows updated.
SQL> create index t_idx on t(actions);
Index created.
SQL>
SQL> exec dbms_stats.gather_table_stats( user, 'T', method_opt=>'for all indexed columns size 254' );
PL/SQL procedure successfully completed.
SQL> set autotrace traceonly explain
SQL> select * from t where actions <> 'LOC';
Execution Plan
----------------------------------------------------------
Plan hash value: 1601196873
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
| Id | Operation | Name | Rows | Bytes | Cost (%CPU)| Time |
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
| 0 | SELECT STATEMENT | | 25 | 2425 | 167 (3)| 00:00:02 |
|* 1 | TABLE ACCESS FULL| T | 25 | 2425 | 167 (3)| 00:00:02 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Predicate Information (identified by operation id):
---------------------------------------------------
1 - filter("ACTIONS"<>'LOC')
SQL> select * from t where actions < 'LOC' or actions > 'LOC';
Execution Plan
----------------------------------------------------------
Plan hash value: 4259936809
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
| Id | Operation | Name | Rows | Bytes | Cost (%CPU)| Time |
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
| 0 | SELECT STATEMENT | | 26 | 2522 | 6 (0)| 00:00:01 |
| 1 | CONCATENATION | | | | | |
| 2 | TABLE ACCESS BY INDEX ROWID| T | 1 | 97 | 3 (0)| 00:00:01 |
|* 3 | INDEX RANGE SCAN | T_IDX | 1 | | 2 (0)| 00:00:01 |
| 4 | TABLE ACCESS BY INDEX ROWID| T | 25 | 2425 | 3 (0)| 00:00:01 |
|* 5 | INDEX RANGE SCAN | T_IDX | 25 | | 2 (0)| 00:00:01 |
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Predicate Information (identified by operation id):
---------------------------------------------------
3 - access("ACTIONS">'LOC')
5 - access("ACTIONS"<'LOC')
filter(LNNVL("ACTIONS">'LOC'))
SQL> set autotrace off
Tom,
Good work as always. Sorry for posting this question here. However, I thought that since you post the " tip" about index maybe I could ;)
LouisNey
Can anyone tell me where to find the address of the forum????
PLEASE ????
http://www.oracle.com/technology/xe/forum
I'm trying to install on a Debian system - and not prepared to wait for a true Debian package!
Unfortunately, you aren't given an opportunity to register for the forum when you _download_. It's easy if you already have the database installed (so I hear), but if you're having any trouble with the installation, joining the Forum is pretty complicated.
Also, once I joined, I got an email with a link to the forum, but I can _still_ only log in through Internet Explorer (ugh!) or Firefox. It doesn't work via konqueror - even though I read _other_ Oracle forums through konqueror
Why I cannot download the installer???
I've tried two machines and the download always interrupts before all bytes of the file is in my hard disk.
It's an annoying thing about a Oracle product.
An alternative location to download the installer will be a good thing to do.
Tom,
I've had XE/HTMLDB installed since November and *love* it! I hadn't bothered to register for the forum though until today. When I went through the registration process, it said that it would send an email to me with more information (url, etc.) but it still hasn't shown up.
I'll be patient but since you asked....
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