I am trying to connect Excel to my company's Oracle Database. According to the following instructions it should be fairly easy: https://www.wikihow.com/Connect-Excel-to-an-Oracle-Database.
However it has been impossible and quite frustrating so far.
I have followed two different approaches that I've found online.
FIRST APPROACH: installed ODAC from Oracle's Universal Installer
I went to this site https://www.oracle.com/database/technologies/dotnet-odacdev-downloads.html and downloaded the ODAC 12.2.0.1.1 file.
Then, I went through the installation process basically just clicking 'next' on every step.
Note 1: (I don't know if this might be important), in the Database Connection configuration tab I did not fill in any of the information (simply because I didn't know what to put there). It said that if information wasn't filled in, it would not create the TNSNAMES.ORA file.
Note 2: After finishing the installation it says 'run the SQL scripts located in the ... directory after the install'. Which I didn't do, again, because I didn't know how.
After the installation finished a directory was created in the following location: C:\app\client\myUserName\.
The directory goes all the way down to C:\app\client\myUserName\product\12.2.0\client_1, and it contains a bunch of files and folders.
I noticed that no environmental variable was created.
SECOND APPROACH: installed ODBC instant client
I went to this site https://www.oracle.com/database/technologies/instant-client/winx64-64-downloads.html and downloaded both instantclient-basic-windows.x64-19.6.0.0.0dbru.zip and instantclient-odbc-windows.x64-19.6.0.0.0dbru.zip.
Then I created the directory C:\Oracle\instantclient_19_6 and unziped both folders contents into it.
Finally, I ran odbc_install from the command_line, as an administrator, but got Oracle ODBC Driver with same name already exists.
Note: in this case I also noticed that no environmental variable was created.
RESULTS:
When I go to Excel and click on Data\From Database\From Oracle Database I keep getting the same error as before: The recommended provider ('Oracle.DataAccess.Client') is not installed. You can continue with your current provider, however it has been deprecated and may not work properly.".
I was able to solve it by installing the 64 bits version of Oracle's client. Its located at https://www.oracle.com/database/technologies/112010-win64soft.html, file win64_11gR2_client.zip.
Although the message "The recommended provider ('Oracle.DataAccess.Client') is not installed. You can continue with your current provider, however it has been deprecated and may not work properly." remained, I was able to connect after ignoring it.