The expire_time may satisfy the firewall timeout issue, if that is the problem. It is supposed to send a probe to the client, which one would think would be considered as traffic. Best to ask the firewall admin on that.
And no, sqlnet.ora changes do not normally require a restart. At least, I've never encountered a situation where changing sqlnet.ora required any kind of restart.
Jared
Im looking into using sqlnet.expire_time for an application that sends batch processing overnight. we have had some issues with large batch files coming over to the database completing, but on the application side not showing as completed. my guess is that the firewall has a time out, so instead of having a code change on the third party app, i wanted to poll the app server for "Still Kicking"
Is this the right approach? more general, do sqlnet.ora changes require severver reboot, instance bounce, listener bounce?
Thanks DBA Wannabe
-- Jared Still Certifiable Oracle DBA and Part Time Perl Evangelist