Oracle Drivers

[Stanley Tan]

What is the difference between the Oracle Thin and OCI drivers?
On the Oracle site, there is only the JDBC drivers for JDK1.1.1 for Oracle8. Is this the latest?

[Adam Hardy]

They have the JDBC drivers for Oracle 8.1.7 for JDK 1.2.x
http://otn.oracle.com/software/tech/java/sqlj_jdbc/content.html

[Stanley Tan]

I've been trying to get it to work for the past many days now and nothing seems to be working.
How can I work with Oracle Server 8.05 and JDK1.3? I mean, how do I configure Oracle to work with JDK1.3 instead of the JRE it came with (v1.1.1)? What drivers should I use with JDK1.3?
I always get a make_c_state error running the sample application.

[Jamie Robertson]

1. JRE - uninstall the old one, install the new jre.
2. decide on whether you want the thin or OCI drivers (thin recommended in most cases) - http://otn.oracle.com/tech/java/sqlj_jdbc/htdocs/jdbc_faq.htm#_59_
3. download the drivers for Oracle version 8.1.7(because the drivers are backward compatible to 8.0.x) for the jdk 1.2.x for Windows(assuming your running your clients from windows - http://otn.oracle.com/software/tech/java/sqlj_jdbc/htdocs/winsoft.html )
This link should help you the rest of the way (client configuration to trouble shooting) http://www.javaranch.com/ubb/Forum55/HTML/000010.html
hope this helps,
if you can post the error number(ORA-XXXXX) of your SQLExceptions it is sometimes easier to investigate the problem(if you are using the oracle drivers)
Jamie

3.
[This message has been edited by Jamie Robertson (edited December 14, 2001).]

[Stanley Tan]

Thanks a lot. I tried downloading the 8.1.7 drivers but it looks for a DLL that I assume is specific to 8.1.7, so I guess it's not really backwards compatible with 8.05.
The thin driver is working. The OCI driver doesn't. I'm using it for a servlet/jsp 3-tier architecture. I guess using the thin driver would be recommended, right?

[Jamie Robertson]

I believe that the OCI driver(v.8.1.7) is compatible, but you are missing the DLL for the driver to work, or it can't find the DLL. This is a very common (and annoying!) error that can be frustrating to get right. It took me a couple of days to get mine working...This is one of the advantages of the thin drivers
If you want to trouble shoot this problem, you can start here: http://otn.oracle.com/tech/java/sqlj_jdbc/htdocs/jdbc_faq.htm#_39_ (assuming it is the "Unsatisfied link error with OCI driver"
but I would stick with the thin drivers anyway.
Jamie
[This message has been edited by Jamie Robertson (edited December 15, 2001).]

[Stanley Tan]

Thanks, yeah, I won't trouble myself anymore and I'll just use the thin drivers.
I don't think there's an advantage to using the OCI drivers, are there?