ORA-16179: incremental changes to "log_archive_dest_1" not allowed with SPFILE

This error comes when you use wrong syntax while setting log archive destination using   log_Archive_dest_n parameter.  I faced this error while trying to set log_archive_dest_1 parameter using ALTER SYSTEM command and the reason of this error was that I missed the keyword “location=” while specifying the destination directory. But this error may also come because of other syntax errors in the command while setting the parameter.     

SQL> archive log list Database log mode              Archive Mode Automatic archival             Enabled Archive destination            %ORACLE_HOME%\RDBMS Oldest online log sequence     989 Next log sequence to archive   989 Current log sequence           991 SQL> alter system set log_archive_dest_1='USE_DB_RECOVERY_FILE_DEST'; alter system set log_archive_dest_1='USE_DB_RECOVERY_FILE_DEST' * ERROR at line 1: ORA-32017: failure in updating SPFILE ORA-16179: incremental changes to "log_archive_dest_1" not allowed with SPFILE

When I specified “location=” keyword, I was able to set parameter perfectly.

SQL> alter system set log_archive_dest_1='location=USE_DB_RECOVERY_FILE_DEST'; System altered. SQL> archive log list Database log mode              Archive Mode Automatic archival             Enabled Archive destination            USE_DB_RECOVERY_FILE_DEST Oldest online log sequence     989 Next log sequence to archive   989 Current log sequence           991 SQL>