RE: PART II: - Beyond a basic Oracle EXP/IMP shell script: Error Handling & Exit Status?It's the RC's variable value(not the return code, but the entire command output). Look at the second one ... a) $ export_simple_script.sh > /dev/null 2>&1 ; RC=$?; echo $RC 1 b) $ RC=`export_simple_script.sh` > /dev/null 2>&1 ; echo $RC Export: Release 9.0.1.5.0 - Production on Thu Sep 1 23:28:21 2005 (c) Copyright 2001 Oracle Corporation. All rights reserved. EXP-00056: ORACLE error 1034 encountered ORA-01034: ORACLE not available ORA-27101: shared memory realm does not exist SVR4 Error: 2: No such file or directory EXP-00005: all allowable logon attempts failed EXP-00000: Export terminated unsuccessfully RETURN CODE: Set next Return Code - RC: ORACLE EXP RETURN CODE. 1 ORACLE EXPort FAILED!: 1 Cheers, Dimitre Radoulov