Problem with dblink through ODBC

Question

Hi. Our company are trying to connect to an Oracle 7.3.4 database from Oracle 10g through an ODBC link (using Microsoft Oracle ODBC driver). The database link is working when we test it in SQL Plus, meaning that select * from tablename@dblinkname is working. But, when we are using
Select count(*)
from tablename@dblinkname we get an error:
SQL> select count(*) from address@testlink;
ERROR:
ORA-28500: forbindelse fra ORACLE til ikke-Oracle-system returnerte denne
meldingen:
[Generic Connectivity Using ODBC][Microsoft][ODBC driver for Oracle]Error in
row 1[Microsoft][ODBC driver for Oracle]Error in column 1: Numeric value out of
range (SQL State: 01S01; SQL Code: 0)
ORA-02063: foran 2 lines fra TEST_SID
no rows selected
SQL>
Why is this happening when the tatabase link is working with regular selects?
We think that the problem is centered around the odbc and db link settings. Could it be that we need to specify more in the HS init file? This is our file initTEST_SID.ora:
# HS init parameters
HS_FDS_CONNECT_INFO = odbc_test
HS_AUTOREGISTER = TRUE
HS_FDS_TRACE_LEVEL=OFF
HS_DB_NAME = hsodbc
# Environment variables required for the non-Oracle system
#set <envvar>=<value>
Could it be the ODBC driver version? Our MS ODBC driver is:
Microsoft ODBC for ORacle version 2.575.1022.00, MSORCL32.DLL
Has anybody experienced something like this before?
Ronny

Answer 1

I tried the same thing when we needed to connect a 9i database to a 7.3.4 database, but could not get it to work.
Instead, we used a database link to an 8i database which had a database link to our 7.3.4 database. We had to set up some views on the 8i database to hide the link, but it was only temporary. If you go down this route, check your licensing situation.
Tak