2 Installing Oracle Database 11g with Oracle Real Application Clusters

2.1 Reviewing Oracle Application Express Requirements

With the Oracle Database 11g release, Oracle Application Express is provided as an Oracle Database option, rather than as an Oracle Application option. If you intend to install Oracle Database after installing Oracle Clusterware, and you have an existing Oracle Database installation that you are upgrading, then review the following Oracle Application Express requirements:

• Browser Requirements for Oracle Application Express

• Installing with Existing Oracle HTML Server Installations

• Oracle Text Requirement for Oracle Application Express

• Oracle XML DB Requirement for Oracle Application Express

2.2 Selecting a Configuration Option

This section describes OUI features that you should understand before beginning the Oracle RAC installation process.

On the Select Installation Option page, you are given the following options:

• Create and Configure a Database: Provides you with the option to create a database using a preconfigured database template designed for particular system load demands, such as an online transaction processing (OLTP) database, or a decision support or data warehouse database.

• Install database software only: Installs Oracle Database software; you must complete database configuration later.

• Upgrade an existing database: Upgrades an existing database.

If you are installing Oracle Database software, then Oracle recommends that you use one of the preconfigured database options, or select the Advanced option on the Select Configuration page, and configure a custom starter database.

2.3 Oracle Database Vault Installation and Configuration

Review the following information if you want to install Oracle Database Vault:

• Oracle Database Vault Requirements

• Oracle Database Vault Accounts

• Multiple Oracle Database Vault Homes

• Starting the Listener with Oracle Database Vault Installations

• Installing Oracle Database Vault

$ORACLE_HOME/bin/lsnrctl start listener_name
$ORACLE_HOME/bin/srvctl start instance -d database_name -i instance_name

2.4 Oracle Database Configuration Type Descriptions

When you run OUI, you can select the Typical or the Advanced Install type.

The Typical install type installs a default configuration of Oracle Database, with basic configuration choices. Oracle recommends that most users select Typical as their installation type.

The Advanced installation type is for customized installations, and should be used only when you have a specific requirement for it, such as requiring different passwords for the SYS, SYSMAN, SYSTEM and DBSNMP accounts, or using a different database character set than is in use on your servers, changing product languages, or other nonstandard configurations.

2.5 Oracle Configuration Manager Option

During installation, you are prompted to provide information needed to enable Oracle Configuration Manager. This option enables you to associate information about your Oracle RAC configuration with your My Oracle Support (formerly OracleMetalink) account. In the event that you need to place a service request with Oracle Support, that configuration information can help to provide a more rapid resolution to the service issue.

Configuring the OCM tool requires that you have the following information from your service agreement:

• My Oracle Support e-mail address/username

• Password

In addition, you are prompted for server proxy information, if the host system does not have a direct connection to the Internet.

Refer to My Oracle Support (https://metalink.oracle.com) if you encounter registration failures and are uncertain that the correct country code has been specified. You can find the country associated with your My Oracle Support account in the Profile section under the Licenses link.

2.6 Database Security Options

During installation, you are prompted to select database security configuration.The Secure Configuration option configures the database with database auditing options, and password policy and expiration settings.

For new database installations, the default configuration for Oracle Database 11g release 2 (11.2) includes the Secure Configuration option. If you want to disable these enhanced security controls, then you can check the Disable security settings box. Oracle Database is then installed with default options for Oracle Database 10g release 2. After installation, you can change security settings by starting DBCA and modifying security settings. You can enable or disable auditing or password security settings, or revert to a previous security setting.

For database upgrades, the upgraded database retains your existing database security configuration, to ensure compatibility with existing applications. After installation, you can use DBCA to enable or disable the Secure Configuration auditing or password security settings for testing.

To enable or disable secure configuration after installation, you must use command line DBCA options. By design, The DBCA 11g release 2 and later graphic user interface does not have the option to enable or disable secure configuration.

2.7 Selecting Database Passwords

Apply the following guidelines when specifying passwords:

• Passwords must be between 8 and 30 characters long.

• Passwords must not start with a numeral.

• Passwords must not be the same as the user name.

• Passwords must not be Oracle reserved words.

• The SYS account password must not be change_on_install.

• The SYSTEM account password must not be manager.

• The SYSMAN account password must not be sysman.

• The DBSNMP account password must not be dbsnmp.

• If you choose to use the same password for all the accounts, then that password must not be change_on_install, manager, sysman, or dbsnmp.

• Passwords should have at least 1 alphabetic, 1 numeric, and 1 punctuation mark character

• Passwords should not be simple or obvious words, such as welcome, account, database, and user.

2.8 Actions of OUI, DBCA, and Other Assistants During Installation

After installation, OUI starts the Network Configuration Assistant (NETCA). After NETCA completes its processing, OUI runs DBCA to create your database, in accordance with Optimal Flexible Architecture (OFA) guidelines. An installation created following OFA guidelines means that DBCA creates your database files, including the default server parameter file (SPFILE), using standard file naming and file placement practices.

The primary phases of DBCA processing are the following:

• Create the database.

• Configure the Oracle network services, if necessary.

• Start the listeners and database instances.

You can also use DBCA in standalone mode to create or delete a database, or to switch database management from Oracle Enterprise Manager Database Control to Oracle Enterprise Manager Grid Control.

Note that with Oracle Database release 11.1 and later releases, service management is no longer performed for Oracle RAC databases using DBCA. Use srvctl, Oracle Enterprise Manager DB Control or Grid Control for all administration and monitoring of services.

In Oracle Database 10g and later releases, some database language and territory definition files have been updated to better reflect locale conventions used in associated locales.

If the resulting changes in default NLS parameter values break your existing applications, you can revert the changes by installing Oracle9i compatibility definition files. To install Oracle9i files in place of Oracle11g files, you must run OUI from a command line, as described in "Using Oracle Universal Installer to Install Oracle RAC", and use the following statement to set the b_cr9idata variable to true:

./runInstaller oracle.rsf.nlsrtl_rsf:b_cr9idata=true

2.9 Installing Oracle Database with Other Languages

If you want to use languages other than the default (English), either for the database or for applications running on the database, then you must use the Advanced Installation method.

2.10 Selecting a Database Name

The global database name can be up to 30 characters in length, and must begin with an alphabetic character. The domain portion of the global database name can be no more than 128 characters and can contain only alphabetic and numeric characters, as well as the period (.) character.

The SID prefix must begin with an alphabetic character, and the value in the first eight characters should be unique within the enterprise.

2.11 Using Oracle Universal Installer to Install Oracle RAC

Perform the following procedures to install the Oracle Database software with Oracle RAC using Oracle Universal Installer (OUI):

1. Ensure that you can access other nodes with SSH. OUI requires that the user account running the Oracle RAC installation is permitted to set up passwordless SSH. OUI can set this up for you automatically, or your system administrator can set this up for you before installation is started.

2. Open the terminal from which you intend to run OUI, and log in as the user account that you want to own the Oracle Database installation (for example, oracle).

   If you are not able to turn off stty commands, or have other restrictions that would prevent automatic SSH configuration from within OUI, then you must ensure that SSH is configured and enabled before you proceed to start the Installer.

3. Ensure that you have su or sudo credentials, as you will be prompted to run a script as the root user during installation.

4. Start the runInstaller command from the Disk1 on the Oracle Database 11g release 2 (11.2) installation media or install binary download area. For example, where the software binary download area is /home/oracle/oraclesw, enter the following commands:

   $ cd /home/oracle/oraclesw/Disk1
   $ ./runInstaller
   

5. Provide information or run scripts as root when prompted by OUI. If you need assistance during installation, click Help. Click Details to see the log file.

   Note:

   You must run the root.sh script on the first node and wait for it to finish. You can run root.sh scripts concurrently on all other nodes except for the last node on which you run the script. Like the first node, the root.sh script on the last node must be run separately.

   If you encounter problems during installation, then examine the OUI actions recorded in the installation log file. The log file is located in the Oracle Inventory directory in the following location:

   OraInventory/logs/installActionsdate_time.log
   

   Caution:

   The Oracle home name and path that you provide during database installation must be different from the home that you used during the Oracle grid infrastructure installation in phase one. You must not install Oracle Database 11g with Oracle RAC software into the same home in which you installed the Oracle grid infrastructure for a cluster software.

   If you are upgrading a database, then you must use the same type of Oracle home. For example, you should not change from local Oracle homes to a shared Oracle home.

   Note that because Oracle ASM is part of the Oracle grid infrastructure home, it cannot be upgraded during an Oracle RAC installation.

When you have completed the second and final phase of the installation, proceed to Chapter 4, "Oracle Real Application Clusters Postinstallation Procedures" to perform the postinstallation tasks.

The following is a list of additional information to note about installation:

• On the Select Database Management Option page, if you have already completed the Grid Control Management Agent installation, then you can select either Grid or Local Database control. Otherwise, only Local Database control for database management is supported for Oracle RAC. When you use the local Database Control, you can choose the e-mail option and enter the outgoing SMTP server name and e-mail address.

  If you perform an installation that does not include Oracle Enterprise Manager (for example, a custom software install without Oracle Enterprise Manager, an installation with no Oracle Enterprise Manager configuration, or a database creation with your own scripts), then you can configure Oracle Enterprise Manager later using OUI, DBCA, or the Oracle Enterprise Manager Configuration Assistant (EMCA) utility.