RACing ahead with Oracle on VMware Series - Part 7 - Page 2

February 2, 2006

Installing VMware tools

To switch from GUI to command line mode click "Ctrl+Alt+F6"

Log in:

Click to install VMware tools:

Mount the CDROM, change to /tmp directory and unzip the files:

Do the following after unzipping the files:

After a series of "Enter" clicks:

You reach here: (Note: VMware tools might have problems with compiler if you did not choose to install the Development tools during installation).

I chose "4" for my resolution and you are done with VMware-tools installation. You will notice that your mouse response is a LOT better! Another good thing is, if you are monitoring your machines via Virtual Center, your VC's heartbeat is good, as well.

Preparing VNC Server, Putty and Testing Connection

With virtualization becoming commonplace in the business world, we will be working on systems that are thousands of miles away from home. We already do. On Linux, VNC Server or Free NX (I did mention it in my first article) works excellently when working remotely on the servers.

Download and install putty (for your Windows client Machine. On Linux client, you can just invoke ssh command).

Log on to your Virtual Machine:

Start vncserver:

Edit xstartup in the .vnc (It's a hidden directory) directory: You can also do it directly on the OS. Add the highlighted lines. (Last one is helpful if you use gnome session).

Restart VNC server, remove old *.pid files and login from the VNC viewer:

I use the default port 5901 but you can always pick another port number.

Network Configuration:

Nothing is more frustrating than a network issue that you cannot fix during installation. Let's do this in steps. We will take one node, and edit the network settings there. NOTE: Repeat this step on all nodes!

Step 1: Open Network Do system-config-network & OR open it from GUI:

Step 2: Devices:

Step 3: DNS entry:

Step 4: Hosts (This is nothing but your /etc/hosts file.

NOTES for NIC Cards on VMware: Do this on all nodes as a last check.

• Don't use DHCP addresses (that is why we gave all our NICs static addresses)

• Double Check your hosts file. It should look like this (pay special attention to the loopback address 127.0.0.1)

  

• Do ifconfig –a, I did this from putty:

  

• You will NOT get a ping on your VIP address as there is no physical machine behind it; this address is used to Fail Over in case of a node failure in a RAC environment. You CAN however ping it when you have configured your RAC.

• Ping ALL IP addresses NODES from ALL NODES!

• Perform all the above checks on ALL nodes!

• vmxnet type Virtual NICs are not yet supported for RHEL4. They must be vlance. vmxnet offers greater performance if you have Gigabit physical NICs. Stay tuned to the VMTN Discussion Forums for such news.

Conclusion:

We have gone into details of setting up our RHEL 4.2 or Centos 4.2 OS. Although some of these issues may sound repetitive, from our Windows setup, remember that good preparation means that all your tools are in place before proceeding with the rest of the installation. In our next edition of this series we will work towards our goal by configuring our Network and Linux Server for Oracle readiness, creating an Oracle user and more.

» See All Articles by Columnist Tarry Singh