title: DriverManager.getConnection() returns null, rather than a connection object
body: <p>I am trying to connect to an Oracle database via JDBC. Using the following code:</p>
  
  <pre><code>Connection c = null;
  try {
       Class.forName("oracle.jdbc.driver.OracleDriver");
       c = DriverManager.getConnection(connURL, userID, password);
   } catch (SQLException se) {
       System.out.println(se.getMessage());
   } catch (Exception e) {
       System.out.println(e.getMessage());
   }
  </code></pre>
  
  <p>For some reason no exception is thrown but <code>c</code> remains null - what does this mean?</p>
  
  <p><strong>Update:</strong></p>
  
  <p>Turns out we were getting an exception - <code>Class not found: "oracle.jdbc.driver.OracleDriver"</code> - we had the odbc classes outside the classpath.</p>