ORA-00257 archiver error

User reported that they are getting ORA-00257 error, when they trying to access the production database.

ORA-00257 commonly related to Archiver not able to write archive logs into File system/ asm disk.

After checking, I came to find out it is caused by Flash Recovery area run out space. How did I find out

SQL> select space_limit,space_used from v$recovery_file_dest;

SPACE_LIMIT SPACE_USED

-------------- ----------------

10737418240 10737418240

I cleaned up the old archive logs using the famous RMAN command after backing up,

RMAN> crosscheck archivelog all;

Found some old archive logs, which is already backup was there in the Flash recovery area. I used the following command to delete archivelog older than 7 days.

RMAN> delete archivelog completed before 'sysdate -7';

Then users can continue with their work. Another option is, if you have space on the disk, on the fly you can increase the db_recovery_file_dest_size with addition space

sqlplus / as sysdba

SQL> alter system set db_recovery_file_dest_size=20G scope=both;

System altered.