ORA-12154 Oracle Client Error with VirtualBox

Question

This is rather lengthy and I am not sure this is the right forum for this question but it does involve the Oracle Client.
My development environment consists of a single workstation that is not connected to a network. The OS for the database is Linux CentOS (Red Hat Enterprise Linux 3 or 4). The database seems to run fine from the Linux OS - OEM and SQLPlus run as well as all the other utilities (lsnrctl, etc.).
The database front-end has to be Access 2003. This is requiring that I run Windows from VirtualBox so I can do the FE database development.
In addition to this when I try to create a system (or any other) DSN, I get the following behaviors.
- Start up the "Microsoft ODBC Administrator"
- Select the "System DSN" tab
- Click "Add..."
- Select driver: "Oracle in OraClieht11g_home1"
- Enter the following data in the following fields
Data Source Name: "orcl_hr"
TNS Service Name: "orcl"
- Click the "Test Connection" button
This initiates a wait of about 1 minute
- In the "Oracle ODBC Driver Connect" dialog, enter the following data in the fields
Service Name: "orcl"
User Name: "hr"
Password: <the hr password>
This initiates another wait of about 1 minute after which I get an error dialog with the following message:
Unable to connect
SQLState=08004
[oracle][ODBC][Ora]ORA-12154: TNS:could not resolve the connect identifier specified
On the Windows side the ORACLE_SID is defined as "orcl"
On the Linux (db server) side, the following files have the listed contents:
Listener.ora
LISTENER =
  (DESCRIPTION_LIST =
    (DESCRIPTION =
      (ADDRESS = (PROTOCOL = IPC)(KEY = EXTPROC1521))
      (ADDRESS = (PROTOCOL = TCP)(HOST = local.net)(PROT = 1521))
  )sqlnet.ora
NAMES.DIRECTORY_PATH= (TNSNAMES, EZCONNECT)tnsnames.ora
ORCL =
  (DESCRIPTION =
    (ADDRESS = (PROTOCOL = TCP)(HOST = local.net)(PORT = 1521))
    (CONNECT_DATA =
      (SERVER = DEDICATED)
      (SERVICE_NAME = orcl)
  )Another data point: I notice that the client software has a SqlPlus application. When I try to log on to the database through this app I get the error: ORA-12560: TNS:protocol adapter error.
Is there a VirtualBox problem? Can it be fixed?
Edited by: DBelt on Jun 29, 2009 10:19 AM

Answer 1

The OracleClient install does not create either of the sqlnet.ora or tnsnames.ora files. These are created in the ORACLE_HOME/network/admin direcory of the host machine, however -- as well as the listener.ora file.
One question I have before we procede much further is what is the "Instant Client" anyway? As I said earlier, I am not even sure this is the proper forum for my question since it involves the OracleClient software -- I know what the OracleClient is but not the "Instant Client".
That said, I am able to telnet port 1521 from the host if I uset the literal IP address only (using <local.net> does not work). I am completely unable to ping the host at all from VirtualBox (I am operating in NAT mode and this seems to be a documented "feature" of VBox).
The "sqlplus user/pwd@(DESCRIPTION=...)" comment does not work. I have tried several iterations: 1) as provided above with the double-quotes resulting in a display of the proper syntax for invoking sqlplus, 2) without the quotes, and 3) replacing the double-quotes with parentheses. The outcome of experiments 2) and 3) is a syntax error occurring at "(" for the former or at user/pwd for the latter. (I am substituting proper values for the user, pwd, and local.net placeholders.)
I am starting to wonder if my problem may lie in trying to run the client from VirtualBox in NAT mode.
Another question has to do with the ODBC Administrator -- Where does it get its list of "TNS Service Names"?