Re^5: What are DBD::Oracle's dependencies (on Linux)?

I am a junior Oracle DBA and a Perl developer who's been developing against Oracle databases for five years. I am telling you exactly what you need:

You need DBD::Oracle installed on the machine you want to use to talk to an Oracle database.
To install DBD::Oracle, you need the client libraries that come with the Oracle database. (Basically, you need sqlplus installed, plus a few other things.)
To install those libraries, you need the Oracle installer from www.oracle.com, just like I described.
Then, you point the ORACLE_HOME environment variable to wherever you installed Oracle. This is usually /opt/oracle, but not always.

These items are not negotiable. They are at a minimum what is needed to install DBD::Oracle. Period. End of story. ikegami was wrong in what he said in his reply.

Being right, does not endow the right to be rude; politeness costs nothing.
Being unknowing, is not the same as being stupid.
Expressing a contrary opinion, whether to the individual or the group, is more often a sign of deeper thought than of cantankerous belligerence.
Do not mistake your goals as the only goals; your opinion as the only opinion; your confidence as correctness. Saying you know better is not the same as explaining you know better.

Comment on Re^5: What are DBD::Oracle's dependencies (on Linux)?

Replies are listed 'Best First'.
Re^6: What are DBD::Oracle's dependencies (on Linux)? by astroboy (Chaplain) on Oct 01, 2004 at 19:47 UTC
These items are negotiable. E.g. Point 2: You don't need SQL*Plus. Elipsis. The story continues	[reply]
Re^7: What are DBD::Oracle's dependencies (on Linux)? by dragonchild (Archbishop) on Oct 02, 2004 at 00:08 UTC
Let's look at the tape. To install DBD::Oracle, you need the client libraries that come with the Oracle database. (Basically, you need sqlplus installed, plus a few other things.) (Emphasis added) You're absolutely right ... to install DBD::Oracle, you do not need to install SQL*Plus. However, when dealing with someone who is unsure of themselves, it is better to describe what they need in terms they will understand, so long as you get them to where they need to go. Instead of saying "You need this header file and that header file and this .a and that .ora" ... maybe it's better to say "You need to install XYZ", knowing that installing XYZ will get them 90% of the way to where they need to go. You'll note that at the beginning of this thread, I said that it was easiest to install the whole RDBMS, build DBD::Oracle, then delete the RDBMS installation. This is a method I've done before, with good success. I've also built DBD::Oracle by source-diving the Makefile.PL, figuring out exactly what headers I needed to have where, and copying them over one by one from another machine with a full install of Oracle on it. I then copied over each and every .a as the build failed. Can you guess which method I prefer to use and recommend? Being right, does not endow the right to be rude; politeness costs nothing. Being unknowing, is not the same as being stupid. Expressing a contrary opinion, whether to the individual or the group, is more often a sign of deeper thought than of cantankerous belligerence. Do not mistake your goals as the only goals; your opinion as the only opinion; your confidence as correctness. Saying you know better is not the same as explaining you know better.	[reply]