Oracle 10g Tutorials : Oracle Net Services

Oracle 10g Tutorials : Oracle Net Services

In this tutorial you will learn Oracle Net Services - An Overview, Using Oracle Net Manager, Creating Listeners, Choosing General Parameters , enable the tracing and logging for the database transactions. We will also learn how to use TNSPING to test Oracle Net connectivity.

Document Summary

This document gives the overview of the oracle net services. It also explains the uses of oracle net manager.

Oracle Net Services Overview

Oracle Net Services provides enterprise-wide connectivity solutions in distributed, heterogeneous computing environments. Oracle Net Services eases the complexities of network configuration and management, maximizes performance, and improves network diagnostic capabilities. Oracle Net, a component of Oracle Net Services, enables a network session from client application to an Oracle database server. Once a network session is established, Oracle Net acts as a data courier for the client application and the database server. It is responsible for establishing and maintaining the connection between the client application and database server, as well as exchanging messages between them. Oracle Net is able to perform these jobs because it is located on each computer in the network. Network sessions are established with the help of a listener. The listener is a separate process that resides on the database server. The listener receives incoming client connection requests and manages the traffic of these requests to the server. The listener brokers the client request, handing off the request to the server. Every time a client requests a network session with a server, a listener receives the actual request. If the client's information matches the listener's information, the listener grants a connection to the server.

Use Oracle Net Manager to create and configure listeners

Navigation – Start->Programs->Oracle-Oracle Client10g Home->Configuration and Migration Tools->Net Manager

Once you click on the Net Manager link on the above Navigation Path, following screen will appear in front of you.

Click on the Local link in the above screen and following screen will appear in front of you.

Click on the Listeners tab to see the list of existing listeners.

Please enter the name of the listener you want to create in the following pop up screen. You can choose any user friendly name.

You will see the LISTENER1 created in the following screen. Click on Add Address button to add the Listening location’s address.

Choose General Parameters from the drop down and you will see following screen.

Let the default values in this screen.

Click on ‘Logging & Tracing’ tab and you will see following screen.

You can enable the tracing and logging for the database transactions and would be required to provide the files to store the logs or traces.

Click on ‘Authentication’ tab and you will see following screen. You can set the password for listener related operations in this screen.

Choose Database Services from Dropdown and you will see following screen.

Give the Global Database Name , SID and Oracle Home Directory to configure the database service for the Listener. Save the information and your listener is created and configured. You can change any of the listener’s parameters through oracle net manager.

Use TNSPING to test Oracle Net connectivity

You can also use tnsping utility on command prompt to check Oracle Net connectivity. Follow these steps to check the connection to particular SID.

1. Open Command prompt.
2. Write tnsping <>
3. If you get the message “Used TNSNAMES adapter to resolve the alias” then tnsping utility is able to resolve the service name.
4. If you get “TNS-03505: Failed to resolve name” message then tnsping utility is not able to resolve the service name and you need to check the SQLNET.ora and TNSNAMES.ora files on your machine.

Frequently Asked Questions

1. What all tasks can be performed using oracle net manager?

2. What is the use of tnsping utility?

3. How do you enable tracing or logging for a particular listener?

4. What is the significance of “TNS-03505: Failed to resolve name “ message from tnsping utility?