unable to determine size of shared memory segment

[Former Member]

hi experts

when i try to start my database by using "startup" in the SQL promot i'm getting an error

SQL> startup

ORA-27121: unable to determine size of shared memory segment

Linux Error: 13: Permission denied

SQL>

pls help ASAP

thanks in advance

George

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

hi all

Ralph Ganszky,

could you please tell how is the usage of strace ?

Fidel Vales,

ORACLE HOME belong to dba group , i have full rights to oracle home

Maurice Sens,

the IPCS status is as follows

[root@QTY /]# ipcs

-

---

Shared Memory Segments -

---

key shmid owner perms bytes nattch status

0x00000001 32768 root 600 655360 2

0x00000000 163841 qtyadm 600 393216 2 dest

0x00000000 196610 qtyadm 600 393216 2 dest

0x00000000 229379 qtyadm 600 393216 2 dest

0x00000000 262148 qtyadm 600 393216 2 dest

0x00000000 294917 qtyadm 600 393216 2 dest

0x00000000 327686 qtyadm 600 393216 2 dest

0x00000000 360455 qtyadm 600 393216 2 dest

0x00000000 393224 qtyadm 600 393216 2 dest

0x00000000 425993 qtyadm 600 393216 2 dest

0x00000000 458762 qtyadm 600 393216 2 dest

0x00000000 491531 qtyadm 640 4194304 8

0x00000000 524300 qtyadm 640 33554432 8

0x00000000 557069 qtyadm 640 33554432 8

0x00000000 589838 qtyadm 640 33554432 8

0x00000000 622607 qtyadm 640 33554432 8

0x00000000 655376 qtyadm 640 33554432 8

0x00000000 688145 qtyadm 640 33554432 8

0x00000000 720914 qtyadm 640 33554432 8

0xee19a49c 753683 qtyadm 640 20971520 40

0x00000000 819220 qtyadm 600 393216 2 dest

0x00000000 851989 qtyadm 600 393216 2 dest

0x00000000 1114134 qtyadm 600 393216 2 dest

0x00000000 1146903 qtyadm 600 393216 2 dest

0x00000000 1212440 qtyadm 600 393216 2 dest

-

---

Semaphore Arrays -

---

key semid owner perms nsems

0xf1782a5c 98304 qtyadm 640 84

-

---

Message Queues -

---

key msqid owner perms used-bytes messages

thanks & regards

George

[fidel_vales · Accepted solution]

looking at this I repeat my query:

<b>Check the authorizations of your oracle binary

$ORACLE_HOME/bin/oracle</b>

lets make it a little easier, what is the output for

ls -l $ORACLE_HOME/bin/<b>oracle</b>

More info on the note 583861

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hi George,

please create a file startdb.sql with the content:

connect / as sysdba

startup

exit

the start sqlplus with following command:

strace -f -oTraceFileName.txt sqlplus /nolog @startdb

This will create a file TraceFileName.txt which should contain all system calls of sqlplus and all child processes. In this file you should search for Error 13 or EACCES. You may be start searching from the end of the file. The OS call should be an open call most likely.

Regards

Ralph Ganszky

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hello,

Fidel has right. This problem is a very known problem. Please check the permissions according to the sap note: <b><u>58386</u></b>1 - UNIX: Errors due to Oracle executable

[Former Member]

thanks for all support now i can work around if such situation again arise

cheers

George Varghese

[Former Member]

I guess it's related to shared memory segments. Check with IPCS what the current segments are and who owns them.

[fidel_vales]

Check the authorizations of your oracle binary

$ORACLE_HOME/bin/oracle

Who is trying to start the database?

To which groups it belong?

[Former Member]

Hi George,

the Permission denied probably means that the permissions of one or more files is not correct. You may use strace to find the file in question. You may also try the following without a guarantee for success. Connect as sysdba and execute a shutdown abort, then remove the lk<SID> file in $ORACLE_HOME/dbs directory. After that try again. You may also need reboot the server if this does not help. But to find the root cause of the error message I would prefer strace.

Best regards

Ralph Ganszky