From:Steve Adams
Date:11-Apr-2001 15:24
Subject:   Raw v. file system

No, using a logical volume manager and 3rd party backup software you are entirely insulated from these concerns. If for some reason you don't have an LVM or backup product, then sticking with file system based datafiles is reasonable.

Regarding your tip, "Why Raw Datafiles", it's a good article and I agree with all the advantages of raw datafiles, but how about the aspect of management, especially backup?

When using "alter tablespace begin backup", what o/s command can we use to backup the raw datafiles, dd? And we always have to dd the full raw device because from O/S view we don't know the real raw datafile's size! And how about the flexibility of raw datafile allocation and sizing? We can't use a raw device for two or more datafiles as file system does. The flexibility is much poorer. Right?