I have experienced situations where the only connection I had to an Oracle database was SQL*PLUS with no OS layer user account access. Thus, I was not sure of the actual OS my database was installed on. Knowing the OS your database resides on is a key factor in successfully administrating of any RDBMS. This article covers the determination of the operating system your Oracle database uses, through SQL*PLUS. This procedure will work regardless of OS.

1. Logon to your database server with SYSDBA privileges from your remote client.

C:\>sqlplus ljcatt/password5@orcl as sysdba

SQL>

2. Execute the following SQL statement: select platform_id, platform_name, edition from DBA_REGISTRY_DATABASE;

SQL> column platform_name format a15
SQL> select platform_id, platform_name, edition from DBA_REGISTRY_DATABASE;

SQL>

That completes determination of OS layer type from within the Oracle database.

Larry J. Catt, OCP 9i, 10g
oracle@allcompute.com
www.allcompute.com