php-src/ext/oci8

Installing OCI8
---------------

1. Common requirements.
2. Installing as shared extension.
3. Installing as statically compiled extension.
4. Installing from PECL.
5. Testing OCI8

1. Common requirements
----------------------
In case if you use Oracle Instant Client, you don't have to set ORACLE_HOME and
most of the other environment variables to build PHP with OCI8 support.
The only variables you may have to set are:
LD_LIBRARY_PATH - it must include Instant Client libraries dir
NLS_LANG - in case if you want to change the default encoding used during
interaction with Oracle servers

If you use common Oracle Client installation that comes along with the Oracle
server installation, you MUST set at least ORACLE_HOME environment variable
and make it visible for your web-server BEFORE it starts. Most appropriate
places to add ORACLE_HOME definition are:
- /etc/profile
- /etc/profile.local
- /etc/profile.d
and others.

2. Installing as shared extension
---------------------------------
To install OCI8 as shared extension (i.e. the one you should put into
your php.ini) use the following configure lines to configure PHP:
a) if you use common Oracle Client installation:
./configure --with-oci8=shared,$ORACLE_HOME

b) with Oracle Instant Client:
./configure --with-oci8=shared,instantclient,/path/to/instant/client/lib
If you use rpm-based installation of Oracle Instant Client, your configure
line will look like this:
./configure --with-oci8=shared,instantclient,/usr/lib/oracle/<OIC version>/client/lib

Follow the usual building procedure after that and you'll get OCI8 shared
extension (i.e. oci8.so). Add it into the php.ini file like this:
extension=oci8.so
and don't forget to specify the right extension_dir for PHP to be able
to find shared extensions correctly.

3. Installing as statically compiled extension
----------------------------------------------
To install OCI8 as statically compiled module use the following configure lines:
a) with common Oracle Client installation
./configure --with-oci8=$ORACLE_HOME

b) with Oracle Instant Client
./configure --with-oci8=instantclient,/path/to/instant/client/lib

After successful compile, you don't have to add oci8.so to the php.ini, the module will
be usable without any additional actions.

4. Installing from PECL
-----------------------
TBD

5. Testing OCI8
---------------

OCI8 tests are in ext/oci8/tests.  When OCI8 tests are run this
directory will contain logs of any failures.

5.1. Running OCI8 tests on Linux

5.1.1. Edit ext/oci8/tests/details.inc

  Set the username, password and connection string for the database.
  Most tests have been developed using the SYSTEM account: some tests
  might fail unless the user has permissions to create necessary
  tables, views, procedures etc.

  If the database is on the same machine as PHP, set
  $oracle_on_localhost to TRUE.

  An alternative to editing details.inc is the set the environment
  variables

    PHP_OCI8_TEST_USER
    PHP_OCI8_TEST_PASS
    PHP_OCI8_TEST_DB
    PHP_OCI8_TEST_DB_ON_LOCALHOST

  for example:

    $ export PHP_OCI8_TEST_USER=system
    $ export PHP_OCI8_TEST_PASS=oracle
    $ export PHP_OCI8_TEST_DB=localhost/XE
    $ export PHP_OCI8_TEST_DB_ON_LOCALHOST=TRUE

5.1.2. Set any necessary environment variables for the Oracle
    database.  With Oracle 10g XE do:

    $ . /usr/lib/oracle/xe/app/oracle/product/10.2.0/server/bin/oracle_env.sh

  For other versions of the Oracle database do:

    $ . /usr/local/bin/oraenv

5.1.3. Check your php.ini has E in the variables_order parameter, for
    example:

    variables_order = "EGPCS"

5.1.4. Run the tests:

    $ cd <your php src directory>
    $ make test TESTS=ext/oci8

5.2. The tests execute rapidly.  On fast machines with a local
  database configured for light load (e.g. Oracle 10g XE) you might
  see random tests fail with ORA-12516 or ORA-12520 errors.  To
  prevent this, increase the database PROCESSES parameter using the
  following steps.

5.2.1. Connect as the oracle software owner:

    $ su - oracle

5.2.2. Set the necessary environment variables as in 5.1.2.

5.2.3. Start the SQL*Plus command line tool and increase PROCESSES

    $ sqlplus / as sysdba
    SQL> alter system set processes=100 scope=spfile

5.2.4. Restart the database:

    SQL> startup force

5.2.5. Rerun the tests