Setting Directory for utl_file

Question

Hi,
We've just installed Oracle 11g on our server, and I'm having trouble determining what the directory name should be so that I can read it. I have tried:
\users\mhoward\temp\
\\servername\users\howardm\temp
s:\servername\users\howard\temp
What I'm doing on the server side is signing on as sys, and doing
create or replace directory tempdir as 'c:\temp';
grant read on directory tempdir to username;
Then I look over at SQL Developer, and I do find the tempdir listed.
Then I attempt to run a program. Here's my program:
create or replace
PROCEDURE proc_load1
IS
user_name VARCHAR2(30) := user;
fhandler utl_file.file_type;
buf varchar2(4000);
BEGIN
fhandler := utl_file.fopen('tempdir','oracletest.txt','R');
utl_file.fclose(fhandler);
exception
when utl_file.invalid_path then
raise_application_error(-20000, 'Invalid path');
end;
But, I keep getting invalid path!
Would someone please tell me what I need to put in as the directory path for Windows on the server? I would like to point it to s:\users\howardm\temp, but I'm not sure how to do that.
-Mary

Answer 1

YES! My system administrator gave me access rights to the directory that Oracle was loaded on. I have create an alias called TEMPDIR that points to this, and was able to get it to work in my program:
Signed on as SYS as SYSDBA:
create or replace directory tempdir as 'D:\app\Administrator\product\11.1.0\temp';
grant read,write on directory tempdir to user;
In SQL Developer signed on as user:
create or replace
PROCEDURE proc_load1
IS
user_name VARCHAR2(30) := user;
fhandler utl_file.file_type;
buf varchar2(4000);
BEGIN
fhandler := utl_file.fopen('TEMPDIR','oracletest.txt','R');
utl_file.get_line(fhandler,buf);
dbms_output.put_line('Data from File:' || buf);
utl_file.fclose(fhandler);
exception
when utl_file.invalid_path then
raise_application_error(-20000, 'Invalid path');
end;
I noticed that even though I created it in lower case, it required it in upper case in the program to work.
Thank you so much!
-Mary