All I'm hearing are good points as to why Oracle sucks and dying. Nothing about other DB alternatives. I'm open for suggestion. I'm looking on some feedback as to which DB is best to get a cert for. I don't want to get a cert that's turning legacy the day after I received it.

@stacksofplates and @scottalanmiller the ranking still shows Oracle as #1. Somebody has to be spending the money on the product if it's still listed as #1. Am I missing something here?
Scott, the reason why I would like to learn DB is to try a different field. I need to build up my certs on my resume. I'm tired of doing contract work here in Ontario. I want to permanent gig.
So what DB certs do any of you gents suggest to go for? I'm curious as to what your thoughts are.

Is there any suggestion as to what field of DB is in the now since Oracle is out?

I guess no one have knowledge on this subject. This is a first. Hmmm.

Greeting Mango Fam. The question I have today is can you install or import OE schema into Oracle 11g XE? Either it's not possible or no one cared to post this scenario online. I'm studying for the for the Associate test. One of the tutorials call for me to work with the OE schema. I learned that it doesn't automatically come with XE.
If I d/l standard to use for my tutorial is there a cost?
If anyone has any valuable resource that they can share to help me prep for this test, I would greatly appreciate it.

In advanced, thank you for any and all the help.

@travisdh1 I'll check right now.
Indeed it does.

@travisdh1 I'm using VM station Workstation 10.

@dafyre that was the first thing I did. However, thank you all the same for your suggestion.

I figured it out. I created another NIC, configured it as a NAT and opened up the port that I needed. @Dashrender thank you for coming to my rescue and offering some suggestions. I really do appreciate it.

@Dashrender
I haven't installed a DB as of yet. I thought I could connect to Oracle DB online. Think I may need to d/l Oracle DB?