What you need for this book

Most examples will run fine with just a database. When the Oracle Scheduler Agent is discussed, you will also need a remote Scheduler Agent installed and running. In this case, the version of the database has to be at least 11.1.0.6 because this is the first release that includes the remote Scheduler Agent support. The installation, upgrade, and configuration of the Oracle Scheduler Agent are explained in the book. The agent can be installed either local to the database or remote to the database, that is, on a different computer than where the database is running. The location of the agent does not make a real difference for working with the book. This book is about a very valuable tool in the database, the Oracle Scheduler. So it is quite understandable that you will need access to a database. It can run on any platform. At the time of writing this book, I used Enterprise Linux, Red Hat Linux, Solaris, and MAC OS X, and even Windows. The Oracle Scheduler Agent can be on a different platform than that of the database. It is helpful if you have access to DB Console or Grid control, but it is not required. All the examples are with the PL/SQL code, which can be used from any tool that we normally use to work with the database.