A snapshot is a copy of a target master table from a single point-in-time. Oracle uses snapshots to deliver data to non-master sites in a replicated environment and caching expensive queries from a data warehouse. Why use snapshots? To ease network loads, for mass deployment, data subsetting, and disconnected computing. Using snapshot you can distribute company databases to other sites; instead
. of the entire company accessing a single database server, user load is distributed across multiple database servers reducing the network load. How do I create an oracle snapshot? Visit the following site for step by step instructions http://www.cs.umbc.edu/help/oracle8/server.815/a67791/mview.htm