asked on

Oracle 9i Client vs. 10g Client

I'm a database developer who needs to connect to both Oracle 9i and 10g servers. Which client software would be the best version to use on my development workstation? Are the 9i/10g clients cross-compatible with 9i/10g servers? Would it be possible to have both 9i client and 10g client installed simultaneously and switch between them? If so, how's that done?

Scott.

Guy Hengel [angelIII / a3]

you should always use the most recent client to connect, to ensure full functionality is guaranteed...
hence, use client of 10 version

chedgey

Scott,

I agree with angelIII that you should pick the latest version as backwards compatability (one version) is guarranteed but forwards compatability may cause problems.

To answer your second question: Yes, you can have both 9i and 10g clients installed, just install them under different Oracle homes. When you wish to move between them go into Universal Installer and change the order of the homes which alters your PATH variable. You will have to set up your Oracle Net configuration for both.

Regards

Chedgey

JonahGroup

ASKER

Thanks for the responses. The information I've read seems to agree with both of you -- use the 10g client to connect to new and older versions of Oracle server. However, I've already run into some problems with that strategy. When I attempted to use the "imp" utility on the 10g client to load a 9i server, the tool gagged. Wouldn't do it. When I moved to another machine having the 9i client, it worked fine. So there are hidden compatibility issues, and this is what I want to know about. These issues appear to be undocumented.

Scott.

ASKER CERTIFIED SOLUTION

chedgey

membership

This solution is only available to members.

To access this solution, you must be a member of Experts Exchange.

Start Free Trial