Question about an Oracle SID
I'm a bit confused about what a SID is. I understand that it represents a Database instance. However, as I create my database for the first time, I'm asking myself if I really understand what a SID is?
My impression of a SID is a database instance that can contain/manage serveral databases. Is that correct?
However, I wonder if I'm being miss lead by my thinking. During the database creation process it appears that there is a one-to-one relationship between a database and a SID. Meaning that a SID and database are a unique pair and that a one-to-one relationship exist only.
That being the case when it comes the environment variable for "Oracle_SID" does it support having multiple SID's. What is the maximum number of SID that it can support? When connecting to a database in Oracle do I have to supply both the SID and global database name to make a connection? I plan to connect to my databases using both Java and C++.
Thanks