Oracle Database Discussions

dear friends

i am working on oracle 8i personla oracle not a sever edition

in the paramet file i have enabled the archiving

and when i give the command the archive log list: it show me the details that the archining is enabled but i want to switch to archive mode i gave the command alter system archive log start ;
but then also the arching is not started for the particiular session i want it to happen that as soo as i logon and the database is started it should show me the database mode in archive mode
but i tried almost everything but then also its shwoing me the database mode noarchive log mode
plz tell me how to switch to archive mode in 8i personal oracle
becos as soon as i logon as sys as sysdba the database gets started
then again i have to shutdown the database
and again i have to startup as nomount but thn also it tell me that the database already open

i am totaaly confused with this situtation
can ne one tell me
how to over come from this situation