I haven't installed Oracle database software on my laptop for many years now. Instead, if I need a DB locally, I install it inside a local VM (which is usually Linux). That way, I can snapshot the VM (which includes the DB), then play with whatever I want, then just restore the snapshot to erase whatever mess/test I made.
I also have some extra hard drive space on a drive at home where I keep a small library of VMs on the virtual "shelf" with 9iR2, 10g R2, various patchsets, etc. to make it easier to test things without having to do installs, deinstalls, patching, etc.
I definitely keep an Oracle client installed on my laptop OS, but for server-type things, I use VMs. On Windows, I find that it keeps the registry a lot cleaner (which seems safer to me) and most of my customer databases run on Linux or Unix-like platforms, so using a Linux VM is closer to their configuration than my local DB being on Windows.
Just my $0.02. VMWare Server is free, so it doesn't even cost you any additional licensing, just a little time and some extra disk space.
Dan John Smith wrote:
Ok, this is semi-off topic. I need a laptop that will run an Oracle database, and at the same time do regular word processing, etc. I am looking at the dell xps, which will take 8G ram, and can take a 256G SSD drive. I need to run Oracle to try things out without messing up production DB's. Does anyone have input on this, or is it too far off topic?
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