In order to take advantage of maintenance windows to perform the data load, here is some advice for improving load performance and better using the time frame.
When performing a load, do not use logical records, map in one-to-one physical records to logical records.
Use LMT with ASSM, this combination is available from Oracle 9i Rel. 2 onwards.
Use a fixed size field data file format over the variable sized with delimiter characters.
Try to avoid character set conversions, try to use the same character set on the client side and at the server side.
If possible use direct load; this is the fastest way to load data.
When loading data try to have the data preordered at the data file by the most important index, this way when the index is created the clause
NOSORT
can be used. The index will be created faster.If possible, use parallel loads, and parallel index maintenance.
When loading LOBS, use Secondary Data Files(SDF) instead of embedding them in the same datafile...