Question

Can the Oracle 11g Java™ database connectivity (JDBC) driver be used with IBM WebSphere Application Server V6.0.2.x ?

Cause

Oracle 11g drivers are not supported on JDK 1.4.2.

Answer

In this link from Oracle site, JDBC version compatibility issues are listed. You can see from this link that "Oracle Database 11g Release 1 (11.1), Oracle JDBC drivers no longer support JDK 1.4.x or earlier versions." Since WebSphere Application Server V6.0.2 uses Java SDK 1.4.2, Oracle 11g drivers cannot be used.

However, this link also indicates that "Forward Compatibility: Existing and supported JDBC drivers are certified to work with Oracle Database 11g Release 1 (11.1)." So, you can use an Oracle 10g driver to access databases on an Oracle 11g database server from WebSphere Application Server 6.0.2. But the WebSphere Application Server version level must be at 6.0.2.29 or above for this to work, because these contain the fix for APAR PK59679. The datasource custom property 'oracle9iLogTraceLevel' needs to be blank in order to avoid having the Oracle 9i API being called.

So, to summarize:

If you wish to use Oracle 11g with WebSphere Application Server V6.0.2, then you will need to be at V6.0.2.29 or above and use the Oracle 10g JDBC drivers instead of the Oracle 11g drivers. This is because the Oracle 11g drivers do not support Java SDK 1.4.2 shipped with WebSphere V6.0.2.

Click here for details about WebSphere Application Server support for Oracle11g