A Brief Pep talk: How does virtualization
change the Oracle ballgame
I keep getting offers all the time–contracts in which I
have to install databases (RAC or Standard) for clients. Every time, I have to
go through the rigmarole of preparing and then installing the database. It is
good, it pays me well per hour, but is it smart? I don’t think so. VMware’s
virtualization with VI3 changes all that.
I know I have mentioned it, but writing this article made me
think about it again. Just imagine I create an Oracle template for Solaris 10,
Redhat, SuSe, Centos, Windows and I am done. All I have to do is to deploy the
template on the client site. I am done in no time. My client saves money, I
save time and have time left to attend to more clients. Saving cash and
improving the cash flow process can change and accelerate the pace of adoption.
Such marketbusting
strategies complemented with breakthrough technologies like those offered
by VMware are especially needed in today’s world.
Getting on with Installing database
The previous article discussed the Clusterware installation. Here we will cover
installing the database only software. This means that we will do the DBCA and
the rest later. Before you run the runInstaller, check the following:
Login as root and run xhost command as root This is to allow for X
Server connections (remote connections). Then make sure to be logged in
as Oracle user with the oracle
user account:
# xhost + access control disabled, clients can connect from any host # su - oracle
Also, go ahead and verify the environment variables on all candidate nodes.
$ env | grep ORA ORACLE_SID=vm01 ORACLE_BASE=/u01/app/oracle ORACLE_TERM=xterm
Similarly, go ahead and do the same on all the nodes.
OK now we are all set, so go to your installation folder. In our case, it
was the orasoft, and do the following.
$ /u01/app/oracle/orasoft/database/runInstaller
You can also flag it with –ignoreSysprereqs if
you have RAM limitations on your physical box. The prerequisites check does
often complain (as you will see later on my installation) if you want to
install your RAC on a laptop with 1G memory, for instance.
Database Only Installation
Welcome, click on next:
Select the installation type–here we go ahead and take the whole Enterprise
Edition. These days its just one cd. I remember back in 7/8 days, it used to be
¾ cds. Click on next:
Specify Home Details. We will pick the default chosen by the installer, but
you can pick anything, especially when you have company specific installation
guidelines.
Specify Hardware Cluster Installation Mode. Here the cluvfy (in the
background) picks up all the available machines. Hoes it do it? You guessed it
right. It was your clusterware (meaning all the clusterware daemons), which was
running. It goes without saying that you need to check that your clusterware is
running before you start with the installer. Check all the machines. Note that
you can also carry out a non-cluster installation. Click on next:
Product-Specific Prerequisite Checks. This is what I mentioned; as you can see,
my swap was the problem. I had little space on my disk as well but never mind,
we will ignore it for installation purposes. Click on next:
Select the Configuration Option. We choose database software only. We will
do the database installation later on. Click on next:
You are presented with a summary. All seems fine. Click on install:
