11
Initialization Parameters

This chapter describes Oracle initialization parameters for Oracle instances, including the primary database and each standby database in a Data Guard configuration.

All initialization parameters are either contained in an initialization file, the name of which is a variation of init.ora depending on your operating system, or a server parameter file (SPFILE). As an alternative to specifying parameters in the initialization file or if you are using an SPFILE, you can modify dynamic parameters at runtime using the ALTER SYSTEM SET or ALTER SESSION SET statements.

See Also: Oracle9i Database Reference and your Oracle operating system-specific documentation for more information about setting initialization parameters

Table 11-1 shows the initialization parameters that affect instances in a Data Guard environment. Some parameters are directly related to Data Guard, while others have additional implications when the instance is part of a Data Guard environment.

Each parameter description indicates whether the parameter applies to the primary database role, the standby database role, or both. For parameters that apply to the standby database role, most of the parameters pertain to both physical and logical standby databases. Any differences are noted in the table descriptions.

Note: You must use a server parameter file (SPFILE) if you use the Data Guard broker.

Table 11-1  Initialization Parameters Specific to the Oracle9i Data Guard Environment

Parameter	Description	For More Information
ARCHIVE_LAG_TARGET	Applies to the primary database role. Limits the amount of data that can be lost and effectively increases the availability of the standby database by forcing a log switch after the amount of time you specify (in seconds) elapses. That way, the standby database will not miss redo logs generated from a time range longer than a value of the ARCHIVE_LAG_TARGET parameter.	See Oracle9i Database Reference
COMPATIBLE	Applies to the primary database and standby database roles. Set to 9.0.0.0.0 or higher to use the Data Guard broker, logical standby databases, and the enhanced features of physical standby databases. Always set this parameter to the same value on the primary database and standby databases. If the values differ, you may not be able to archive the redo logs from your primary database to the standby database.	See Oracle9i Database Reference
CONTROL_FILE_RECORD_KEEP_TIME	Applies to the primary database and standby database roles. Prevents reusing archived redo log control file information for a specified period of time.	See Section 5.5.1.3
CONTROL_FILES	Applies to the primary database and standby database roles. Uniquely names the database control file. Always set this parameter on the standby database to a different value from the CONTROL_FILES parameter for the primary database if on the same system. The filenames you specify with the CONTROL_FILES parameter for the standby database must exist at the standby site.	See Oracle9i Database Reference
DB_FILE_NAME_CONVERT	Applies to the physical standby database role. Set this parameter to distinguish standby datafile filenames from primary datafile filenames. Because the standby database control file is a copy of the primary database control file, you must convert the standby database filenames if the standby database is on the same system as the primary database or on a separate system using different path names. This parameter must be set for all physical standby databases that share the same site as the primary database or use different path names.	See Section 6.3.4
DB_FILES	Applies to the primary database and standby database roles. Specifies the maximum number of database files that can be open for this database.	See Oracle9i Database Reference
DB_NAME	Applies to the primary database and standby database roles. Specifies a database identifier of up to eight characters. For physical standby databases, set it to the same value in the standby and primary database initialization files. For logical standby databases, set it using the DBNEWID (nid) utility, as specified in Section 4.2.	See Oracle9i Database Reference
FAL_CLIENT	Applies to the physical standby database in managed recovery mode. Assigns the FAL (fetch archive log) client name used by the FAL server to refer to the FAL client. This is the Oracle Net service name that the FAL server should use to refer to the standby database. This parameter is set on the standby site. This parameter is not used with logical standby databases.	See Section 6.5
FAL_SERVER	Applies to the physical standby database in managed recovery mode. Assigns the Oracle Net service name that the standby database should use to connect to the FAL server. This parameter is set on the standby site. This parameter is not used with logical standby databases.	See Section 6.5
LOCK_NAME_SPACE	Applies to the primary database and standby database roles. Specifies the name space that the distributed lock manager (DLM) uses to generate lock names. Set this parameter if the standby database has the same name as the primary database and is on the same system or cluster. Note: When multiple (primary or standby) databases with the same database name (DBNAME) are configured on the same system, you must set this initialization parameter to a unique value on each database.	See Oracle9i Database Reference
LOG_ARCHIVE_DEST_n Foot 1	Applies to the primary database and standby database roles. Defines a destination and attributes for the log transport services.	See Section 5.3.1.1
LOG_ARCHIVE_DEST_STATE_n = {ENABLE | DEFER | ALTERNATE | RESET}	Applies to the primary database and standby database roles. Specifies the state of the destination specified by the LOG_ARCHIVE_DEST_n parameter. Possible attributes are: ENABLE specifies that a valid log archive destination can be used for a subsequent archiving operation (automatic or manual). This is the default. DEFER specifies that valid destination information and attributes are preserved, but the destination is excluded from archiving operations until you reenable archiving with the ENABLE option. ALTERNATE specifies that the destination is not enabled, but will become enabled if communication to another destination fails. RESET functions the same as DEFER, but clears any error messages for the destination if it had previously failed.	See Section 5.3.1.2
LOG_ARCHIVE_FORMAT	Applies to the primary database and standby database roles. Indicates the format for log filenames. LOG_ARCHIVE_FORMAT and STANDBY_ARCHIVE_DEST are used to generate standby database log filenames.	See Section 5.5.2.7 and Section 5.8.4.5
LOG_ARCHIVE_MAX_PROCESSES	Applies to the primary database and standby database roles. Specifies the number of archiver processes to be invoked. This value is evaluated at instance startup if the LOG_ARCHIVE_START parameter has the value true; otherwise, this parameter is evaluated when the archiver process is invoked.	See Oracle9i Database Reference
LOG_ARCHIVE_MIN_SUCCEED_DEST	Applies to the primary database and standby database roles. Defines the minimum number of destinations that must succeed in order for the online log file on the primary database to be available for reuse.	See Section 5.5.2.4
LOG_ARCHIVE_START	Applies to the primary database and standby database roles. Enables automatic archiving of filled groups when LOG_ARCHIVE_START is set to true. To disable the automatic archiving of filled online redo log groups, set the LOG_ARCHIVE_START initialization parameter of a database's initialization parameter file to false.	See Oracle9i Database Administrator's Guide
LOG_ARCHIVE_TRACE	Applies to the primary database and standby database roles. Optionally, set this parameter to an integer value to see the progression of the archiving of redo logs to the standby site. The Oracle database server writes an audit trail of the redo logs received from the primary database into a trace file. This parameter controls output generated by the ARCn, LGWR, and foreground processes on the primary database, and the RFS and FAL server processes on the standby database.	See Section 6.4.8
LOG_FILE_NAME_CONVERT	Applies to the physical standby database role. Distinguishes the redo log filenames on the standby database from primary database redo log filenames. The parameter value converts the filename of a new log file on the primary database to the filename of a log file on the standby database. Adding a log file to the primary database necessitates adding a corresponding file to the standby database. When the standby database is updated, this parameter is used to convert the log filename from the primary database to the log filename on the standby database. This parameter is necessary if the standby database is on the same system as the primary database or on a separate system that uses different path names.	See Section 6.3.4
LOG_PARALLELISM	Applies to the logical standby database role only. Specifies the level of concurrency for redo allocation. Set this value to 1, which is the default.	See Oracle9i Database Reference
PARALLEL_MAX_SERVERS	Applies to the primary database and logical standby database roles. Log apply services use parallel query processes to perform processing, and use parallel apply algorithms to maintain a high level of database apply performance. A minimum of 5 parallel query processes is required for a logical standby database. Thus, the value of the PARALLEL_MAX_SERVERS parameter must be 5 or greater. This parameter specifies the maximum number of parallel servers working on log apply services on the logical standby database. This parameter is not used with physical standby databases.	See Oracle9i Database Reference
REMOTE_ARCHIVE_ENABLE	Applies to the primary database and standby database roles. Set this parameter to true on the primary database and standby databases in the Data Guard environment to allow the primary database to send redo logs to the standby database and to allow the standby database to receive redo logs for archiving from the primary database. Set this parameter to false to disable both the sending and receiving of redo logs. To independently enable and disable the sending and receiving of remote archived redo logs, use the send and receive values. Send enables the primary database to send redo logs to the standby database. Receive enables the standby database to receive redo logs from the primary database. The send and receive values together are the same as specifying true. Every instance of a multi-instance database must contain the same REMOTE_ARCHIVE_ENABLE value.	See Section 5.5.2
SHARED_POOL_SIZE	Set on the primary database and logical standby databases. Log apply services of logical standby databases use shared pool system global area (SGA) to stage the information read from the redo logs. The more SGA that is available, the more information that can be staged. By default, one quarter of the value set for the SHARED_POOL_SIZE parameter will be used by log apply services. This can be changed using the DBMS_LOGSTDBY.APPLY_SET PL/SQL procedure.	See Oracle9i Database Reference and Oracle9i Supplied PL/SQL Packages and Types Reference
SORT_AREA_SIZE	Applies to the primary database and standby database roles. Set this parameter to execute the SELECT * FROM V$PARAMETER statement when the database is open. This prevents errors when you attempt to sort without temporary tablespaces when the database is not open.	See Section 6.3.6.3
STANDBY_ARCHIVE_DEST	Applies to the standby database role. Used by a standby database to determine the archive location of online redo logs received from the primary database. The RFS process uses this value in conjunction with the LOG_ARCHIVE_FORMAT value to generate the fully qualified standby database log filenames. LOG_ARCHIVE_FORMAT and STANDBY_ARCHIVE_DEST are used to generate standby database log filenames. Note that the generated filename is overridden by the TEMPLATE attribute of the LOG_ARCHIVE_DEST_n parameter.	See Section 5.5.2.7 and Section 5.8.4.5
STANDBY_FILE_MANAGEMENT	Applies to the primary database and standby database roles. When set to auto, this parameter automates the creation and deletion of datafile filenames on the standby site using the same filenames as the primary site. When set to manual, datafile creation and deletion will not be automated and may cause managed recovery to terminate. Use this parameter with the DB_FILE_NAME_CONVERT initialization parameter (if necessary) to automate the process of creating files with identical filenames on the standby database and primary database.	See Section 6.3.4
USER_DUMP_DEST	Applies to the primary database and standby database roles. Determines the location of trace files for a database.	See Oracle9i Database Reference and Section 6.4.8

1 The standby database assumes that the archived log file group is in the location specified by either the LOG_ARCHIVE_DEST or the LOG_ARCHIVE_DEST_n parameter in the standby initialization parameter file; both parameters cannot be specified.