I should have been little more informative. I want to retain SQLNET.AUTHENTICATION_SERVICES = (NONE) in my sqlnet.ora and would want oracle database to authenticate the users. Since SQLNET.AUTHENTICATION_SERVICES = (NONE) is specified, OS authentication is disabled and hence / as sysdba fails with insufficient privileges. But dbstart/dbshut use / as sysdba to start database from /etc/oratab with values 'Y' against the instance names. sys/password@orams works fine while connecting normally but I cannot/donot want to hard code sys password in dbstart/dbshut scripts(No one would do that). TWO_TASK does not work. When set TWO_TASK basically is a replacement for @orams where orams is the tns connection name. It is not set in my environment. I hope I made myself clear here. Please let me know if you need more info. Thanks for your help. version of oracle: 10.1.0.3.0 platorm: OEL 5.3 -- //www.freelists.org/webpage/oracle-l