Which Shutdown Modes Match These ASM Instance Descriptions?
Examine these descriptions of ASM instance shutdown behavior: 1) The ASM instance shuts down immediately without an orderly dismount of disk groups. 2) Active SQL statements are allowed to complete before an orderly dismount of all disk groups occurs and then the ASM instance shuts down without waiting for connected sessions to disconnect. If any ASM clients are connected to the instance, then the shutdown returns an error. 3) Active SQL statements are allowed to complete before an orderly dismount of all of disk groups occurs and then the ASM instance shuts down after waiting for connected sessions to disconnect. If any ASM clients are connected to the instance, then the shutdown returns an error. Which two lists are correct matches for these descriptions? (Choose two.)
Community Votes
75% of anonymous learners picked answer CE. Votes are pick records left by other test-takers — they are not the verified answer.
Community Insight
This item tests whether you can distinguish ABORT, NORMAL, IMMEDIATE and TRANSACTIONAL shutdown behaviour on an ASM instance — the trap is assuming TRANSACTIONAL is a distinct ASM mode rather than an alias for IMMEDIATE.
ASM instance shutdown behaviour separates ABORT (immediate stop with no disk group dismount), NORMAL (orderly dismount after waiting for connected sessions) and the non-waiting variant that maps to IMMEDIATE or TRANSACTIONAL. The correct lists for this Oracle 1Z0-078 item are C and E.
Many candidates pick only B (2 = NORMAL, 3 = IMMEDIATE), inverting the session-waiting behaviour, or pick just one letter because they treat TRANSACTIONAL as a real fourth ASM mode instead of an alias of IMMEDIATE.
Community Discussion (4 comments)
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Expert Analysis
Why the Answer Is Correct
Description 1 is ABORT: the ASM instance shuts down immediately with no orderly dismount of disk groups. Description 3 is NORMAL: ASM lets active SQL statements finish, performs an orderly dismount of every mounted disk group, then shuts down after waiting for connected sessions to disconnect, returning an error while ASM clients are still attached. Description 2 differs only in that it does not wait for connected sessions — that is the TRANSACTIONAL shutdown, which Oracle's ASM documentation explicitly says the ASM instance does not support: if you specify TRANSACTIONAL, ASM performs an IMMEDIATE shutdown instead. Because IMMEDIATE and TRANSACTIONAL are effectively the same behaviour on an ASM instance, both option C (2 = TRANSACTIONAL) and option E (2 = IMMEDIATE) are valid matches, and each keeps 3 = NORMAL and 1 = ABORT intact.
Why the Other Options Are Wrong
Option B reverses descriptions 2 and 3: it maps the "waits for connected sessions" text to IMMEDIATE even though an immediate shutdown never waits for anyone, and it maps the non-waiting text to NORMAL, which is precisely the mode that does wait for sessions to disconnect. Option A keeps 2 = NORMAL and assigns 3 = TRANSACTIONAL, but TRANSACTIONAL is the session-skipping variant, so it cannot describe the third text. Option D collapses the mapping entirely, pairing description 1 with IMMEDIATE even though "no orderly dismount" is ABORT behaviour, and pairing description 2 with ABORT even though that description explicitly includes an orderly dismount. Only C and E preserve both anchors: ABORT performs no disk group dismount, and NORMAL is the mode that waits for connected sessions.
Community Comment Notes
A learner with the handle 217972f resolved the TRANSACTIONAL ambiguity with the observation that "IMMEDIATE = TRANSACTIONAL as in ASM there aren't transactions" and linked Oracle's ASM instance administration page, which is exactly why C and E both count. Test_1 recorded simply "CE correct answer", while krwi1 reasoned that pairing the first description with an immediate shutdown is right because ABORT is the mode that kills the instance without dismounting disk groups. lcoleandro argued instead for B (2 = NORMAL, 3 = IMMEDIATE), but that mapping inverts the session-waiting behaviour Oracle assigns to NORMAL. The 75-to-25 vote split reflects precisely this B-versus-CE confusion among test takers.
Official Reference
Exam Strategy
Anchor the two certainties first: ABORT never performs an orderly dismount, and NORMAL is the ASM mode that waits for connected sessions to disconnect — that alone eliminates A, B and D. Then remember that Oracle states the ASM instance does not support TRANSACTIONAL and performs an IMMEDIATE shutdown instead, so both labels are acceptable for the non-waiting description, giving C and E.
Frequently Asked Questions
Why is 2 = TRANSACTIONAL in option C accepted when ASM does not support TRANSACTIONAL?
Oracle documents that specifying TRANSACTIONAL on an ASM instance performs an IMMEDIATE shutdown, so the same description fits both labels — which is why the question has two valid lists.
Why does the NORMAL shutdown return an error when ASM clients are connected?
NORMAL waits for connected sessions to disconnect before shutting down, so while a database instance is still attached as an ASM client the command errors out and no dismount occurs.