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Enqueues are locks that coordinate access to database resources. This event indicates that the session is waiting for a lock that is held by another session.

The name of the enqueue is included as part of the wait event name, in the form enq: enqueue_type - related_details. In some cases, the same enqueue type can be held for different purposes, such as the following related TX types:

• enq: TX - allocate ITL entry

Waits for TX in mode 4 can occur if the session is waiting for an ITL (interested transaction list) slot in a block. This happens when the session wants to lock a row in the block but one or more other sessions have rows locked in the same block, and there is no free ITL slot in the block. Usually, Oracle dynamically adds another ITL slot. This may not be possible if there is insufficient free space in the block to add an ITL. If so, the session waits for a slot with a TX enqueue in mode 4. This type of TX enqueue wait corresponds to the wait event enq: TX - allocate ITL entry.

The solution is to increase the number of ITLs available, either by changing the INITRANS or MAXTRANS for the table (either by using an ALTER statement, or by re-creating the table with the higher values).

Here is an example that visualizes a serious problem: