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PassAid OverviewPassAid is designed to simultaneously change account password in multiple Oracle databases and thus help you maintain a single common "synchronized" password for accounts that periodically expire and need to be changed. In one run, PassAid connects to all specified databases with the same user ID and password and changes that account's password to a new one. PassAid can connect to a database and change password when the password has already expired; it cannot however, connect to a locked account. PassAid is installed and runs under Microsoft Windows. It connects to databases remotely using Oracle client software, which requires a user ID and password authentication. PassAid does not use operating system authentication. You have to provide the user ID and the current and new password for all database connections. This is one of the main requirements for using PassAid. Databases to which PassAid connects are identified to the Oracle client by their net service names. These names are often defined in a network configuration file tnsnames.ora. For simplicity, net service names are called "databases" or "database names" here. PassAid is a menu-driven application. Most actions are invoked by entering a one- or two-key menu command from the keyboard at the PassAid prompt followed by pressing the Enter key. Menu commands are grouped together under group headings. You can select an item from the main menu by entering its key, or, alternatively, you can enter a group key which displays only that group's menu commands with expanded descriptions and a command to return to the main menu. Before using PassAid to change account passwords in databases you have to specify an account name (user ID), connection type (normal, as sysdba, or as sysoper) and a set of databases in which the account's password should be changed. User ID defaults to the current Windows user's login ID, and connection type defaults to 'normal'. Optionally, you may want to specify another Oracle client home, with its own executable files (like sqlplus.exe, oci.dll) and network configuration files (tnsnames.ora, etc.) that PassAid will use to connect to different remote databases. You can set up default values for all of these parameters so that when you start PassAid, the values are already set and you can proceed directly to changing passwords. You can select individual databases for password change (menu command CD), or you can select previously created database groups (command CG) which is much simpler and faster. You can adjust the selection by adding (command CD) or excluding (command CX) individual databases. Regardless of the number of times a database is selected individually or in a group, connection to it during password change will be made only once, unless it is among the "excluded" databases, in which case connection to it will not be made. When user ID and database selection are specified, you can proceed with password change (menu command X). At this point, PassAid normally prompts you for the common current and new passwords if the job is configured (menu command CP) to use the same passwords for all selected databases, or a password will need to be entered for each database individually. There is also an option in the Passwords setting (menu command CP) to specify an external custom program that will produce specific current and new passwords and/or user ID for each database. After the current and the new passwords are entered, PassAid connects (sequentially, not simultaneously) to each selected database with Oracle client's SQL*Plus utility and changes the account password. If a connection cannot be established, PassAid will ask you whether you want to cancel password change, provide another current password, or continue changing passwords in the remaining databases. Note that PassAid has no provisions for storing passwords. The current and the new passwords have to be entered every time before PassAid connects to databases. However, as PassAid helps you maintain passwords synchronized, you have much fewer passwords to remember. A report is generated after every run of password change. Reports of previous runs can be accesses by selecting menu command RO. Oracle and
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