Oracle Junior Administrator Knowledge

Question

In a few days I will have a interview for a job as Oracle Administrator Junior. Do you have any tips on some specific knowledge on Oracle that would help me? Right know I have studied more in general like: sql: inner query, join query, view,... and database design: entity relationship, object oriented.

Answer 1

Some fairly routine DBA tasks that you should become familiar with:

1. Importing/Exporting databases (Just so you are aware there are two methods - the "old" way, which is normally just referred to as "import or export", and a tool called Data Pump, which is immensely faster for large databases. It is only available on Oracle Database 10g and higher though)
2. Monitoring Instance Performance (Oracle Enterprise Manager helps a ton with this)
3. Familiarize yourself with some of the DBA_XXXXX and V$XXXXXXXX views. These are incredibly helpful in troubleshooting. *I would start with DBA_TABLES, DBA_TAB_COLUMNS and V$SESSION for some basics. Then let your imagination just go. The ALL_SOURCE view is also very handy.*

A question to ask in the interview is "Does your company have an Oracle support contract?". You need a contract with Oracle so you can get access to GOOD support when you need it. There are lots of places on the net to get help, but I've found Oracle Support to be the easiest most of the time when you are completely stuck. (Ha, no I'm not a salesperson for Oracle)

Answer 2

Don't pretend you know everything, if you don't know the answer say so. IMO the most important qualities for a junior DBA are:

1. eagerness to learn
2. not be afraid to ask questions
3. know where to get your information