Oracle’s OPatch utility is used for applying interim CPU patches to maintain the security of your RDBMS. In this article we will cover the error which would be received if you pass an unknown variable to the OPatch utility. This error message will appear regardless of OS you are trying to apply.

1. Logon to your Oracle database server as the Oracle software owner.

2. Change directories to the location of your CPU patch and unzip the file.

unzip p9119226_10204_.zip

3. Change directories into your unzipped patch directory which is named with the CPU number you are applying.

cd 9119226
OPatch napply -skip_subset -skip_duplicate

4. Execute OPatch napply with the wrong tag –skip_subnet instead of –skip_subset.

mylinux:> OPatch napply -skip_subnet -skip_duplicate
Invoking OPatch 11.2.0.1.2

OPatch failed with error code 14
mylinux:>

5. Above the OPatch utility errors out with code 14, “UNKOWN OPTION”. Reviewing the tags used, you can see that skip_subset is misspelled. NOTE: This error will occur if a misspelling is present in the tag or you give the utility a tag which does not exist.

6. Re-execute the OPatch utility with correct tags and the utility will complete successfully.

mylinux:> OPatch napply -skip_subset -skip_duplicate
Invoking OPatch 11.2.0.1.2

OPatch completed without warnings.
mylinux:>

This completes the correction of OPatch utility error code 14.

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