Problems with file location variables and Oracle 9i

Question

I'm new to Oracle and I'm seeing if I can get Oracle 9i running and do anything useful for me on a Solaris 9 platform.
The installation of Oracle went OK except step three, creating a starter database. The installation wanted to put it on the same file system as {ORACLE_HOME} although I told the installation that I wanted {ORACLE_BASE} on another file system. So of course there wasn't enough room on the file system to make the starter database.
I thought I'd be able to correct this after installation. I tried to make a General Purpose Database with Database Configuration Assistant but DBCA in step 5 of 7, File Location Variables still shows {ORACLE_BASE} to be the same as {ORACLE_HOME}, and no way to change that variable on this screen. Don't I want to change { ORACLE_BASE} to a file system that has enough space to make the data base? How do I change this variable? When logged in as the oracle user, I don't see it listed by setenv.
When I ignored this setting and tried to finish DBCA, it hung.

Answer 1

I looked for the {ORACLE*} environmental variables in the profile and login files of my oracle user, but didn't find that they were added by my Oracle setup. So I didn't think defining them as environmental variables would persist or overrule the global variables set at dbca run time.
In the dbca windows, step 5 displays these global variable settings provocatively in a table, as if Oracle wants me to verify and edit them if necessary, but I keep poking at them with right mouse clicks, left mouse clicks, backspace, and delete, but all I can do is turn them blue.
Currently when I use dbca to try to create a general purpose database, it hangs at 50% done, but not much space is used up on {ORACLE_HOME}. So it doesn't really look like the hang is caused by the disk being full. One of the processes that is hung is jre, so I thought I'd review the Oracle requirements and locations for JRE on my system.