Install Oracle client on Ubuntu

install-oracle-client-ubuntu.md

Reference: https://help.ubuntu.com/community/Oracle%20Instant%20Client

Note

This was last updated for Ubuntu 24.04

1. Decide which version of the Oracle client to install

   • Each version of the client supports certain versions of the database; for example, Oracle client 21 supports Oracle database 12.1 - 26
   • See here for more information: http://support.oracle.com/epmos/faces/DocumentDisplay?id=207303.1

2. Download the Oracle client packages

   • Go here and download the desired RPM package(s): https://www.oracle.com/database/technologies/instant-client/downloads.html
   • At a minimum you'll need either the basiclite package (for English error messages and Western language character sets) or the basic package (to support all languages)
   • Get the sqlplus package if you'd like to use the sqlplus command

3. Install prerequisites

   sudo apt install alien libaio1t64
   

   For older versions of Ubuntu:

   sudo apt install alien libaio1
   

4. Create symlink from libaio.so.1 to libaio.so.1t64

   ⓘ This is only needed if you installed the libaio1t64 package; newer versions of Ubuntu don't have libaio.so.1t64 but the Oracle client looks for libaio.so.1 (source)

   sudo ln -s /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libaio.so.1t64 /usr/lib/x86_64-linux-gnu/libaio.so.1
   

5. Install the Oracle client package(s)

   sudo alien -i oracle-instantclient-basiclite-21.22.0.0.0-1.x86_64.rpm
   

6. Make sure the libraries were installed system-wide, e.g.

   $ ldconfig -p | grep libclntsh
   	libclntshcore.so.21.1 (libc6,x86-64) => /usr/lib/oracle/21/client64/lib/libclntshcore.so.21.1
   	libclntshcore.so (libc6,x86-64) => /usr/lib/oracle/21/client64/lib/libclntshcore.so
   	libclntsh.so.21.1 (libc6,x86-64) => /usr/lib/oracle/21/client64/lib/libclntsh.so.21.1
   	libclntsh.so (libc6,x86-64) => /usr/lib/oracle/21/client64/lib/libclntsh.so
   

7. If the libraries aren't installed, you can update the system library path to include the oracle libraries

   ⓘ This is only necessary if the previous command didn't return anything

   sudo sh -c 'echo /usr/lib/oracle/21/client64/lib/ > /etc/ld.so.conf.d/oracle.conf'
   sudo ldconfig
   

Use alien -i --scripts ... and then you won't need to manually update ld.so.conf.d/*