Achieving maximum performance for your Oracle database doesn’t just happen—it is usually the result of a lot of hard work, thought, and planning. The rewards, however, are well worth the effort expended: your database runs at peak efficiency, your users are happy, and you look good!

Our approach to maximizing performance is hierarchical in nature. Three distinct areas must be addressed, and they should be addressed in order. These areas are:

These areas are not necessarily independent; in fact, significant changes in one area are likely to require another look at the other areas. They are, however, sequence dependent. That is, you cannot hope to get good performance out of Oracle unless and until you have properly configured and tuned your operating system. Likewise, good query execution depends on a properly configured Oracle environment.

Every Oracle database is different, so we cannot tell you exactly how to accomplish your configuration and tuning goals, or even what those goals should be. What we can do is provide you with an approach we’ve found to be successful.