Mani,
This of course depends on many things; mostly revolving around: what you enjoy most, and what you’re good at.
First, I suggest that you do searches on Monster and Dice for both to see what companies are looking for in both positions. This should also give you an idea of working environments, and some idea of the temperaments that go with each, as well as entry level earning potential if this is a consideration.
As a developer, you will have project deadlines, and you will need to understand business requirements and processes and CASE tools. You will also need to understand system analysis and design methods, not to mention some understanding of the business processes themselves that you are “developing”. This usually comes in time if you stick to learning/working in one industry, like say, telecommunications, healthcare, etc.
As a DBA, you are usually in a mission critical, more stressful environment. You will need to have good troubleshooting skills, understand operating systems (usually some flavor of UNIX), some knowledge of networks, as well as most of the things the Oracle developers know (SQL, PL/SQL) and perhaps some knowledge of the business and applications that the databases are the “back end” of. And the performance tuning of all of the above. As a DBA, you may not need to understand the business and applications as much as a developer, unless you start out as more of a “Developer DBA” (some people do both.) This gives you more leverage to work at a multitude of industries and companies.
You don’t mention if the courses you are looking at are with a college or with a training company. Just be aware that the latest release of Oracle is 11g and not 10g. If you can, get 11g training instead. However, it is not unusual for colleges to be one release behind since it is difficult for them to upgrade their training environment and training materials in a timely fashion. So, 10g is fine if that is your only choice. Although, try to get certified at the 11g level, if you are going to do that as well.
Either way you decide to go, even as a DBA, you should take the beginning SQL class at least. It is the language of Oracle and as a DBA you use it every day. So, take some SQL and then the PL/SQL. If you find you love programming, continue as a developer. If you do not like PL/SQL, take the first DBA class. After these 3 classes; you should have a much better sense of what direction to take.
~Carla, OCP DBA
carlampaton.com