Windows 7 + Oracle = good times.

Edit: Ok, I think some of the issues I mentioned should go away if you use the 11g 32bit ODAC rather than the 10g client as I was trying at the start.  I no longer have to run toad as administrator, and it also works from c:\program files (x86)\ too, so I think that must have been fixed with 11g?  Good hunting anyway :)

I had a lot of fun in the last couple of days trying to set up my dev work machine with Oracle and Toad.  My work machine is Windows 7 64bit, toad is 32bit and oracle client is just all round terrible - always.

A problem I encountered was that Toad installs to c:\program files (x86)\Quest Software\ which Oracle finds offensive (not sure if it's the spaces or the brackets) and throws weird errors.  Some of these problems include "TNS ..." but these are tricksy red herrings (usually means it can't find tnsnames.ora but in this case it was an actual bug).  See below for my installation instructions:

1. Install your oracle client.  Make sure it's 32 bit (so that toad and oracle can be besties).  I needed the .net Oracle.DataAccess.dll so I installed the 11g 32bit with ODAC package.  It may fail the prerequisites but do a google search to fix that.


2. Copy your tnsnames.ora file somewhere


3. Set up the environment variables: PATH (must include your oracle home and \bin), ORACLE_HOME, TNS_ADMIN (directory containing the tnsnames.ora)


4. Install Toad


5. Copy toad from c:\program files (x86)\Quest Software to c:\toad (or somewhere without spaces!)


6. Run toad from c:\toad\toad for oracle\toad.exe as administrator!  I suggest you pin this shortcut to your taskbar and everytime you run toad, make sure you elevate!


7. Connect to your database

I will update the above instructions with very specific working instructions but I don't want to touch it now that it works because it was just such a chore.

Toad was initially complaining about my 11g oracle home saying it couldn't find oci.dll.  I ended up copying all the files that were in the same directory as oci.dll into bin\ and this worked.  High five ;)

I also had a hellova time getting .net to talk to oracle too.. I think this was mainly because I'd been installing so many different versions of oracle and that makes oracle moody.  I ended up removing anything to do with oracle from the gac (run visual studio command prompt and "gacutil -u " the heebies out of anything with "oracle" in it, including the Policy.Oracle...!).

Hopefully you can glean something from the above to get your setup working.

Azure: where's my blob at?

Currently from a fresh azure project, accessing blob storage fails:

InvalidoperationException: SetConfigurationSettingPublisher needs to be called before FromConfigurationSetting can be used

This is pretty well documented over the net, but for my reference - open your WebRole (it is the class that extends RoleEntryPoint) and insert the following into the OnStart() function:

CloudStorageAccount.SetConfigurationSettingPublisher((configName, configSetter) =>

{

configSetter(RoleEnvironment.GetConfigurationSettingValue(configName));

RoleEnvironment.Changed += (sender, arg) =>

{

if (arg.Changes.OfType<RoleEnvironmentConfigurationSettingChange>().Any((change) => (change.ConfigurationSettingName == configName)))

{

if (!configSetter(RoleEnvironment.GetConfigurationSettingValue(configName)))

{

RoleEnvironment.RequestRecycle();

}

}

};

});

CloudStorageAccount.SetConfigurationSettingPublisher((configName, configSetter) =>

{

configSetter(RoleEnvironment.GetConfigurationSettingValue(configName));

RoleEnvironment.Changed += (sender, arg) =>

{

if (arg.Changes.OfType<RoleEnvironmentConfigurationSettingChange>().Any((change) => (change.ConfigurationSettingName == configName)))

{

if (!configSetter(RoleEnvironment.GetConfigurationSettingValue(configName)))

{

RoleEnvironment.RequestRecycle();

}

}

};

});