MacLochlainns Weblog

It’s funny but Oracle doesn’t want you to enter a trivial password, and about every week I get asked what the standards are for Oracle Database passwords. That’s funny too because it’s in the documentation, the one most experienced and new users never read – Oracle Database Installation Guide (available by platform, the link is for the Windows platform).

Anyway, let me quote the rules:

Oracle recommends that the password you specify:

• Contains at least one lowercase letter.
• Contains at least one uppercase letter.
• Contains at least one digit.
• Is at least 8 characters in length.
• Uses the database character set which can include the underscore (_), dollar ($), and pound sign (#) character.
• If (the password) contains special characters, including beginning the password with a number or symbol, then enclose the password with double-quotation marks.
• Should not be an actual word.

Likewise, you can’t use the old educational passwords:

• The SYS account password cannot be change_on_install (case-insensitive).
• The SYSTEM account password cannot be manager (case-insensitive).
• The SYSMAN account password cannot be sysman (case-insensitive).
• The DBSNMP account password cannot be dbsnmp (case-insensitive).
• If you choose to use the same password for all the accounts, then that password cannot be change_on_install, manager, sysman, or dbsnmp (case-insensitive).

Hope this helps, and by the way reading the documentation never hurts too much! 🙂