Now that you've managed to get Oracle installed, you'll want to try
and use it. Although it's possible to do everything from your server
PC, it's generally best to user the client-server facilities and use
another machine to access your database.
Naturally Oracle have a large collection of, largely, pretty good
client software, however there's not much for Linux at this time. Of
the Oracle software, I recommend getting hold of the following:
Oracle Enterprise Manager. It's much easier not to have to
remember all those obscure ALTER USER and ALTER SYSTEM commands.
Oracle WebDB. It can be quite difficult to install, but it can
allow people to build impressive web-sites without knowing any HTML.
But most of the best software comes from other places...
Tool for Oracle Application Development (T.O.A.D.). This used to
be free but is now owned by
Quest Software. You can download a free version (if you're
prepared to do it every couple of months) or you can pay for it. It's
significantly more expensive than free but is not bad value.
SQLNavigator. Also by
Quest Software. I've not really used it but it's been highly
recommended by all who have.
OraSoft. These guys
produce applications for Oracle that actually run on Linux. I've not
used them in anger, but they look good.
Orac. Another
that I've not used much, but has been described as a nice,
configurable DBA-tool by a number of people.
I seem to get most of my Oracle information from colleagues and
books. I'm not able to give away my colleagues, but the books I
recommend are as follows:
Oracle Essentials,
Rick Greenwald, R. Stackowiak, Jonathan Stern,
O'Reilly and Associates, ISBN 1-56592-708-7.
