I just finished giving a demo for a database class, and I was very happy to do this as soon as I was done:
root@kant:~# dpkg -P oracle-xe-universal
(Reading database … 121041 files and directories currently installed.)
Removing oracle-xe-universal …
Purging configuration files for oracle-xe-universal …
root@kant:~#
When it works, it seems to work fairly well, but there were FAR too many quirks that I had to spend far too long on with oracle. I never quite appreciated how awesome software like SQLite and MySQL really is until I put oracle on here. FSF- and OSI-approved licenses really do make the world a happier place.
Some quirks I can think of off the top of my head:
- having to run ‘/etc/init.d/oracle-xe configure’ after the package installed to get oracle set up.
- funky $PATH
- having to add myself to the ‘dba’ group
- having to fix a broken symlink left by the installer
- an /etc/init.d script that would be magically unresponsive sometimes (would fail /etc/init.d/oracle-xe stop and disable silently)
- a management webapp that sometimes failed to come up when starting with the /etc/init.d script.
Don’t get me wrong: I fully appreciate that oracle provides some powerful features and is happily and successfully deployed in all sorts high-wattage places, but as far as my personal machine is concerned… good riddance. I love you, dear MySQL.
