No quick answer for you on this one but you would be much better off posting your question to dbi-users@perl.org (you don't need to subscribe in order to post) and you won't be automatically subscribed either. Very few people actully use or view this form for dbi or driver support. dbi-users is where you'll get the best support If external Password store is new in 10gR2 I do not see how DBD::Oracle can use it unless it is build directly into OCI. What version of DBI and DBD::Oracle are you using and which OCI client have you compiled against. Cheers