oracle 8i installation problem.

[Innila]

Hi vmshenoy,

In Hostname, enter the Machine ID on which the oracle is been installed.

TNSNAMES.ORA is very important for the database connectivity.
A tnsnames.ora file provides the ability to reference oracle databases by a simple alias.
The tnsnames details has given below,

[service_name] =
  (DESCRIPTION =
    (ADDRESS_LIST =
      (ADDRESS = (PROTOCOL = TCP)(HOST = [hostname])(PORT = 1521))
    )
    (CONNECT_DATA =
      (SID = [oracle_SID])
    )
  )

Instead of Hostname, the Server IP can also be given in the HOST value.
As far as to my knowledge, Windows XP does not support Oracle 8i very well.
For Windows XP, its better to go for either Oracle 9i or 10g version.

Probably it will be appreciable if we get comments from others who have used Oracle 8i in Windows XP.