About the Oracle Net Client

What's in a Name?

The "Oracle Net client" is the client component of Oracle Net Services. Oracle Net Services is the latest name for what was originally called SQL*Net.

Around the release of Oracle 7, Oracle re-vamped SQL*Net and also re-named it to SQL*Net2. When Oracle 8 was released, SQL*Net2 was re-named to Net8. As of Oracle 9, Net8 became known as the Oracle Net Services.

The client component of Oracle Net Services is known as Oracle Net client.

Do I Need It?

You can install TOYS without having the Oracle Net client installed on your computer. You can even work "off-line". That is, you can open existing snapshots, compare them and generate DDL, etc. however, you will not be able to access any Oracle database until you install the Oracle Net client.

TOYS interfaces with the Oracle Net client in order to connect to Oracle servers.

Please note that many Java applications connect to Oracle servers using the JDBC Thin Driver. These programs do not need the Oracle Net client because the JDBC Thin Driver provides similar functionality.

TOYS is not a Java program and does not use the JDBC Thin Driver. TOYS requires the Oracle Net client to connect to Oracle.

What is the Oracle Instant Client?

With the release of 10g, Oracle have repackaged the Oracle Net client so that it is more easily distributed by ISVs and also more easily installed. For windows based computers the Oracle Instant Client is a ZIP archive [approximately 30MB] which is simply unzipped into a convenient directory. This directory should then be added to your PATH environment variable.

TOYS will happily use the Oracle 10g Instant Client but don't forget to set your PATH environment variable to include the directory where the instant client is unzipped to!

All said, the instant client is a lot quicker and simpler to install than the regular net client.

For more information visit Oracle Technology Network - 10g Instant Client.