· Directory location where the products are installed
· Corresponding system path setup
· Program groups associated with the products installed in the home (where applicable)
· Services running from the home
Installing an Oracle Product
When you install an Oracle product, an Oracle home is created.To install the product and create the Oracle home, perform the following steps:
1. Run Oracle Universal Installer.
2. In the Specify Home Details page, enter the Oracle home settings for the installation session.
3. Continue with your installation. Oracle Installation Settings for Specify Home Details page
Enter a name for the Oracle home.
This name identifies the program group associated with a particular home and the Oracle services installed on this home. The Oracle home name must be between 1 to 127 characters long, and can include only alphanumeric characters and underscores.
Path
Enter the full path to an Oracle home, or select an Oracle home from the drop-down list of existing Oracle homes. The Oracle home location is the directory where products are installed.
Data files may or may not be installed within an Oracle home. You can use the Browse button to choose a directory to install your product.
For Windows platforms, you must provide a valid path that is not in the Windows directory. Different homes cannot share the same location.
Note:
Oracle recommends that you designate an Oracle home location that is an empty or non-existing directory. If you select a directory for the Oracle home location that is not empty or already exists, you will be warned and asked if you want to proceed.
For silent installations, if a non-empty, existing directory is specified, an error is logged in the console and in the installActions
Removing Oracle Homes
To remove an existing Oracle home, invoke Oracle Universal Installer and click Deinstall Products. At the inventory dialog, select the homes you want to delete and click Remove. You can also use the REMOVE_HOMES variable in the command line or in a response file. The syntax is as follows:
$./runInstaller -deinstall -silent ORACLE_HOME=
Determining the Default Oracle Home
By default, when you start Oracle Universal Installer, the software searches your system to determine the default Oracle home where Oracle software should be installed.
In all cases, the ORACLE_HOME name is taken first from the command line if it is specified, or else from the response file if specified. If not, the following convention is used for the name:
Ora
Where
is the short product marketing name as specified in the oraparam.ini file; for example, "Db11g", and
The ORACLE_HOME path is taken first from the command line if specified, or else from the response file if specified. If not, the ORACLE_HOME environment variable is used. If neither is specified, the following conventions are used for the path:
· If ORACLE_BASE has been specified in the environment:·
$ORACLE_BASE/product/
For example: $ORACLE_BASE/product/11.1.0/Db_1.
· If ORACLE_BASE has not been specified in the environment:· $HOME/product/
Where
The instance-related directory location is accepted first from the response file, if specified. If not, the oradata, flash_recovery_area, admin, and doc directories are created under ORACLE_BASE. If ORACLE_BASE has not been specified, the default is the $ORACLE_HOME/oradata directory.
If the parent directory of the Oracle home is writable, these directories are created in the parent directory of the Oracle home.
Multiple Oracle Homes
Oracle Universal Installer supports the installation of several active Oracle homes on the same host as long as the products support this at run-time. Multiple versions of the same product or different products can run from different Oracle homes concurrently. Products installed in one home do not conflict or interact with products installed on another home. You can update software in any home at any time, assuming all Oracle applications, services, and processes installed on the target home are shut down. Processes from other homes may still be running.
Target Home
The Oracle home currently accessed by Oracle Universal Installer for installation or deinstallation is the target home. To upgrade or remove products from the target homes, these products must be shut down or stopped.
Oracle Universal Installer Inventory
The Oracle Universal Installer inventory stores information about all Oracle software products installed in all Oracle homes on a host, provided the product was installed using Oracle Universal Installer.
Inventory information is stored in Extensible Markup Language (XML) format. The XML format allows for easier diagnosis of problems and faster loading of data. Any secure information is not stored directly in the inventory. As a result, during removal of some products, you may be prompted to enter the required credentials for validation.
Structure of the Oracle Universal Installer Inventory
The Oracle Universal Installer inventory has the following hierarchical structure:
· Central Inventory Pointer Directory
· Central Inventory
· Oracle Home Inventory
Central Inventory Pointer File
Every Oracle software installation has an associated Central Inventory where the details of all the Oracle products installed on a host are registered.
The Central Inventory is located in the directory that the inventory pointer file specifies. Each Oracle software installation has its own Central Inventory pointer file that is unknown to another Oracle software installation.
For Oracle homes sharing the same Central Inventory, the Oracle Universal Installer components perform all read and write operations on the inventory. The operations on the Central Inventory are performed through a locking mechanism.
This implies that when an operation such as installation, upgrade, or patching occurs on an Oracle home, these operations become blocked on other Oracle homes that share the same Central Inventory.
The following list shows the location of the inventory pointer file for various platforms:
· Solaris — /var/opt/oracle/oraInst.loc
· Linux — /etc/oraInst.loc
· Windows — The pointer is located in the registry key:· \\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\\Software\Oracle\inst.loc
The following string shows an example of the path for the oraInst.loc file: inventory_loc=/home/oracle_db11g/product/11.1.0/db_1inst_group=oracle
In UNIX, if you do not want to use the Central Inventory located in the directory specified by the inventory pointer file, you can use the -invPtrLoc flag to specify another inventory pointer file. The syntax is as follows:
./runInstaller -silent -invPtrLoc
Note:
If the contents of the oraInst.loc file is empty, Oracle Universal Installer prompts you to create a new inventory.
Central Inventory
The Central Inventory contains the information relating to all Oracle products installed on a host. It contains the following files and folders:
· Inventory File
· Logs Directory
Inventory File
This file lists all the Oracle homes installed on the node. For each Oracle home, it also lists the Oracle home name, home index, and nodes on which the home is installed. It also mentions if the home is an Oracle Clusterware home or a removed Oracle home. It can only detect removed Oracle homes created using Oracle Universal Installer version 11.1 and later. This file is present in the following location:
The following code shows a sample inventory.xml file:
Note:
Oracle recommends that you do not remove or manually edit this file as it could affect installation and patching.
Logs Directory
The Central Inventory contains installation logs in the following location:
The logs directory contains the logs corresponding to all installations performed on a particular node. You can also find a copy of the installation log in the $ORACLE_HOME/cfgtoollogs directory.The installation logs for an installation are identified by the timestamp associated with the log files. These files are generally saved in the following format:
For example, consider an attachHome operation performed on 17th, May, 2007 at 6.45AM. The associated log file would be created as follows:AttachHome2007-05-17_06-45-00AM.log
Note:
The installation logs do not contain any errors or failures.
Oracle Home Inventory (Local Inventory)
Oracle home inventory or local inventory is present inside each Oracle home. It only contains information relevant to a particular Oracle home. This file is located in the following location:$ORACLE_HOME/inventory
It contains the following files and folders:
· Components File
· Home Properties File
· Other Folders
Components File
This file contains the details about third-party applications like Java Runtime Environment (JRE) required by different Java-based Oracle tools and components. In addition, it also contains details of all the components as well as patchsets or interim patches installed in the Oracle home. This file is located here:ORACLE_HOME/inventory/ContentsXML/comps.xml
For an example of the components file,
Home Properties File
This file contains the details about the node list, the local node name, and the CRS flag for the Oracle home. In a shared Oracle home, the local node information is not present. This file also contains the following information:
· GUID — Unique global ID for the Oracle home
· ARU ID — Unique platform ID. The patching and patchset application depends on this ID.
· ARU ID DESCRIPTION — Platform description
The information in oraclehomeproperties.xml overrides the information in inventory.xml. This file is located here:$ORACLE_HOME/inventory/ContentsXML/oraclehomeproperties.xml
The following example shows the Oracle home property
file:
NAME="stacg34"/>
Below is the list of the ARU_IDs for some platforms:
ARU_IDs for Platforms Platform ARU_ID
HPUX 64-bit 59
IBM 5L 212
Linux 32-bit 46
Solaris 32-bit 453
Solaris 64-bit 23
Windows XP 912
Other Folders
list of the other folders you can find in the Oracle home inventory:
Other Folders in the Oracle Home Inventory
Folder Name Description
Scripts Contains the scripts used for the cloning operation.
ContentsXML Contains the details of the components and libraries installed.
Templates Contains the template files used for cloning.
oneoffs Contains the details of the one-off patches applied.
Creating the Central Inventory
Oracle Universal Installer enables you to set up the Central Inventory on a clean host or register an existing Oracle home with the Central Inventory when it is lost or corrupted. If the Central Inventory does not already exist, Oracle Universal Installer creates the Central Inventory in the location specified by the oraInst.loc file.
You can set up the Central Inventory by using the -attachHome flag of Oracle Universal Installer. The syntax is as follows:
./runInstaller -silent -attachHome -invPtrLoc ./oraInst.loc ORACLE_HOME="
Using the Session Variables
You can use the following session variables:
· ORACLE_HOME
· ORACLE_HOME_NAME
· CLUSTER_NODES
· REMOTE_NODES
· LOCAL_NODE
In a cluster installation:
· If you do not pass the CLUSTER_NODES session variable, Oracle Universal Installer takes it from the $ORACLE_HOME/inventory/ContentsXML/oraclehomeproperties.xml file.
· If you do not pass the LOCAL_NODE session variable, Oracle Universal Installer takes it from the $ORACLE_HOME/inventory /ContentsXML/oraclehomeproperties.xml file. If it does not find an entry there, it takes it from the Oracle Clusterware stack. If it is not able to find it in the stack, the first node of the CLUSTER_NODES is taken as the LOCAL_NODE.
You can pass the REMOTE_NODES variable if you want to specify the list of remote nodes. If you want to set up the Central Inventory in the local node, you need to pass the -local flag, and the REMOTE_NODES variable is empty.
The syntax is as follows:
./runInstaller -silent -attachHome -invPtrLoc ./oraInst.loc ORACLE_HOME="
Note:
When you use the -local flag, it performs the action on the local node irrespective of the cluster nodes specified.
For a non-Real Application Clusters setup, you do not need to pass the LOCAL_NODE variable, and the CLUSTER_NODES variable is empty.
The syntax is as follows:
./runInstaller -silent -attachHome -invPtrLoc ./oraInst.loc ORACLE_HOME="
You can use the -local flag to attach the local Oracle home. If you are using a shared Oracle home with the -local flag, use the -cfs flag. This ensures that the local node information is not populated inside a shared Oracle home.
Verifying the Operation
After attaching the Oracle home, you can verify the success of the operation by verifying the contents of the log file present in the
Note:
Oracle recommends cloning on Windows operating systems to create the Central Inventory.
Detaching Oracle Homes from the Central Inventory. You can detach an Oracle home from the Central Inventory. When you pass this flag, it updates the inventory.xml file present in the Central Inventory.
The syntax is as follows:
./runInstaller -silent -detachHome -invPtrLoc ./oraInst.loc ORACLE_HOME="
Using Optional Flags
You can use the -local flag to detach the Oracle home from the inventory of the local node. If you are using a shared Oracle home, use the -cfs flag. This ensures that the local node information is not populated inside a shared Oracle home.
./runInstaller -silent -local -cfs -detachHome -invPtrLoc ./oraInst.loc ORACLE_HOME="
./runInstaller -silent -detachHome -invPtrLoc ./oraInst.loc ORACLE_HOME="
You can completely clean the Oracle home and remove the home directory by using the -removeallfiles flag.
The syntax is as follows:
./runInstaller -silent -deinstall -removeallfiles -invPtrLoc ./oraInst.loc ORACLE_HOME="
If you want to disable the warning message that appears when you use the -removeallfiles flag, use the -nowarningonremovefiles flag.
The syntax is as follows:
./runInstaller -silent -deinstall -nowarningonremovefiles -invPtrLoc ./oraInst.loc ORACLE_HOME="
Removing the Central Inventory
Even after all the Oracle homes on a host are removed, you will find traces of the inventory with certain log files. If you do not want to maintain these files and want to remove the Central Inventory, do the following:
Removing the Central Inventory on UNIX Platforms
You can remove the Central Inventory on UNIX by performing the following steps:
1. Locate the oraInst.loc file and get the Central Inventory location (inventory_loc parameter) from this file.
For Solaris, this file is located in the /va/opt/oracle folder.
For Linux, this file is located in the /etc folder.
2. Remove the Central Inventory by executing the following command:
3. rm -rf
4. Remove the oraInst.loc file by executing the following command with root privileges:
Solaris:rm /va/opt/oracle/oraInst.loc
Linux:rm /etc/oraInst.loc
Removing the Central Inventory on Windows Platforms
You can remove the Central Inventory on Windows by performing the following steps:
1. Locate the registry key:
\\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Oracle\inst_loc
2. Get the Central Inventory location from this key.
3. Delete the Central Inventory directory and all its contents.
4. Delete the registry key:
\\HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\Software\Oracle\inst_loc
Consolidating Multiple Central Inventories
The following procedure explains how to consolidate multiple central inventories into a single central inventory. For CRS and RAC homes, perform this procedure for each node.
1. Identify the central inventory to use and ensure that it is the same path on all nodes of the cluster.
2. Go to this central inventory directory and run orainstRoot.sh to ensure that the oraInst.loc file points to this inventory.
3. Identify the other central inventories on the system, then identify the Oracle homes for each central inventory.
4. Do the following for each Oracle home:
a. Enter cd $ORACLE_HOME/oui/bin.
b. Run ./attachhome.sh -silent -local "CLUSTER_NODES={
- }" LOCAL_NODE=
For single instance homes, run ./attachhome.sh -silent.
c. Verify the inventory updates by going to the ORACLE_HOME/OPatch directory and running opatch lsinventory -detail.
d. Verify that the overall inventory is being updated by running ./runInstaller and clicking on 'Installed Products...' to bring up the contents of the central inventory. Ensure that the inventory shows the new home and the nodes.
Upgrading and Patching the Oracle Home
You can apply patchsets and upgrade an existing Oracle home. You can apply patchsets using Oracle Universal Installer. For more information on upgrading or applying patchsets for an Oracle product, refer to the respective Oracle product installation guide of the product that you want to upgrade.
Cloning Oracle Homes
You can clone an Oracle home using Oracle Universal Installer.
Backing up the Inventory
You can back up the Oracle home using your preferred method.
You can use any method such as zip, tar, and cpio to compress the Oracle home.
It is highly recommended to back up the Oracle home before any upgrade or patch operation. You should also back up the Central Inventory when Oracle home is installed or deinstalled.
Example:
Consider a scenario where you have a Database Oracle home called DBHome that is registered with the default Central Inventory in the /product directory. You want to patch this database but decide to back up the database before patching.
1. Enter the following to back up the database:
2. cd /product/DBHome
3. tar cf - * gzip > /product/archive/DBHome.tar.gz
4. If you are using a Win32 system, you could use WinZip to zip up the Oracle home. Do not use the jar command to zip the Oracle home, as this causes the file permissions to become lost.
5. Suppose you apply the patch and something goes wrong. You decide to delete the Oracle home from the Central Inventory and restore the original Oracle home. To delete the Oracle home from the Central Inventory, use the following command:
./runInstaller -silent -detachHome ORACLE_HOME="/product/DBHome"7. ORACLE_HOME_NAME="DBHome"
On Win32 systems, the command would be:setup.exe -silent -detachHome ORACLE_HOME="C:\product\DBHome"ORACLE_HOME_NAME="DBHome"
7. Delete the Oracle home:
cd /product10. rm -rf /product/DBHome
Restore the original Oracle home and update the Central Inventory.
Restore the Oracle home to its original location using the following commands:
mkdir -p /product/DBHome
gunzip < /product/archive/DBHome.tar.gz tar xf -
Attach this Oracle home to the Central Inventory:
./runInstaller -silent -attachHome ORACLE_HOME="/product/DBHome"16. ORACLE_HOME_NAME="DBHome"
On Win32 systems, the command would be:
setup.exe -silent -attachHome ORACLE_HOME="C:\product\DBHome"ORACLE_HOME_NAME="DBHome"
Recovering from Inventory Corruption
The inventory (Central and the Oracle home inventory) is critically important in the Oracle software life-cycle management. The following section explains what you need to do in case of inventory corruption.
Diagnosing and Recovering from Central Inventory Corruption
When you execute opatch lsinventory -detail or when you click Installed Products, the Oracle home does not appear.
Cause: The Oracle home may be missing from the Central Inventory, or the Central Inventory could be missing or corrupted.
Action:
Do the following:
· If the Oracle home is missing from the Central Inventory, perform an attach home operation on the missing Oracle home. The Central Inventory will be restored.
· If the Central Inventory is missing or corrupted, restore the Central Inventory. If you have not backed up the Central Inventory, perform an attach home operation.
If multiple entries are in the inventory.xml file for a given Oracle home, Inventory Collection from the Grid Control perspective would have issues. In this event, you should remove these duplicate entries manually.
Here are some examples of the kind of incorrect entries that could be there:
In the above example, the first and third entries are duplicates. The Oracle home name and Oracle home location are identical. In this example, remove the third line.
Note that all duplicate inventory issues are caused by manual updates to the inventory.xml file. Use the OUI APIs to change the inventory.
Diagnosing and Recovering from Oracle Home Inventory Corruption
When you execute opatch lsinventory -detail or when you click Installed Products, the Oracle home appears, but the products and components within the Oracle home are not listed.
Cause: This may result because of a missing or corrupted Oracle home inventory.
Action:
If the Oracle home inventory is missing or corrupted, restore the Oracle home inventory. If you have not backed up the Oracle home inventory, you may have to install the software on a different node with the same platform and install the same patch levels including interim patches. After that, you can simply copy the inventory directory from the patched Oracle home to the location of the affected Oracle home.
Note:
For Oracle Universal Installer version 10.2.0.2.0 and above, you can use the following scripts in Oracle home to recover from Oracle home inventory corruption:
· detachHome.bat / detachHome.sh: Use this script if the Oracle home is corrupted or needs to be updated.
· attachHome.bat / attachHome.sh: Use this script if the Oracle home needs to be added to the inventory.
Real Application Clusters
In a Real Application Clusters environment, the inventory also contains a list of nodes associated with an Oracle home. It is important that during upgrade and patching, the inventory is correctly populated with the list of nodes.
Updating the Nodes of a Cluster
When you use the -updateNodeList flag with the Oracle Universal Installer, it retrieves the list of nodes and updates the inventory.xml file. If the CRS tag is set to TRUE, the Oraclehomeproperties.xml file is updated with the Oracle Clusterware home information. For shared Oracle homes, you need to use this with the -cfs flag. The syntax is as follows:
./runInstaller -updateNodeList "CLUSTER_NODES={Node1,Node2}" ORACLE_HOME="
Note:
You update the nodes of a cluster only under exceptional circumstances. Oracle recommends that you perform this operation with the help of Oracle support.
Diagnosing and Recovering from RAC Oracle Home Inventory Corruption
When you execute opatch lsinventory -detail or when you click Installed Products, the Oracle home appears, but the products and components within the Oracle home are not listed.
Cause: This may result because of a missing or corrupted Oracle home inventory.
Action: Do the following:
1. Back up the Central and Local inventories of both CRS and RDBMS for all nodes.
2. Rename or remove the Central Inventory on all nodes.
3. Copy the Local Inventory from the node that is not corrupted to the node that is corrupted.
4. Recreate the Central Inventory with the attachhome option as in MetaLink note 413939.1, Steps to Recreate the Central Inventory in Real Application Clusters.
5. Verify that opatch lsinventory functions correctly in both the CRS and RDBMS homes.
Note:
Copying the Local Inventory is supported only when patch sets and one-off patches applied are the same across all nodes.
Home Selector (Available on Win32 Platforms)
The following sections describe the Home Selector, which is installed as part of Oracle Universal Installer on Windows computers.
To view the Home Selector, click the Environment tab of the Inventory dialog, which appears when you click the Installed Products button on several Oracle Universal Installer screens.
Home Selector Overview
The Home Selector is a part of the installation software. The Home Selector enables you to easily change your primary Oracle home (the one that appears first in the PATH environment variable). If you need to switch the active home or need to perform batch work which requires a "default home" to be active, you can use the Home Selector to change the Windows NT system settings.
When using the Home Selector to make a specific Oracle home the active one, the software installation in question is moved to the front of the PATH variable, making it the first directory to be scanned for executable and library files.
Use the GUI in the Environment tab of the Inventory dialog to establish the order of Oracle homes in your PATH variable.
How Home Selector Works
When you perform an installation on a system, Oracle Universal Installer runs the selectHome.bat file to register the Oracle home you selected. In silent mode, you perform this outside Oracle Universal Installer. The first Oracle home is named the "DEFAULT_HOME" and registers itself in the Windows NT registry under the key
:HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESoftwareOracle
This is the default Windows NT registry hive which contains all the "generic" Oracle settings. Also the PATH variable is adjusted and the BIN directory of the $ORACLE_HOME is added to the environment variable.
Some additional parameters is also written to the key:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESoftwareOracleKEY_
With Oracle Universal Installer, you can change the "DEFAULT_HOME" name to something else. Also, it registers all Oracle settings in the "KEY_
When an additional Oracle home is added to the system, the PATH variable is adjusted again to add the new BIN directory of the newly installed Oracle software. The registry variables are written to a key named "KEY_
Oracle Home Directory Structure for Windows Platforms
A typical Oracle home on Windows platforms contains the files and directories shown
Oracle Home Directory for Windows Platforms
Oracle Home Directory Contents
\BIN Product executable and DLLs
\LIB DLL files
\JLIB All JAR files
\DBS Common message files
\PROD1 PROD1 product files
\PROD2 PROD2 product files
Optimal Flexible Architecture Directory Structure (on UNIX)
The Optimal Flexible Architecture (OFA) standard is a set of configuration guidelines for fast, reliable Oracle databases that require little maintenance.
OFA is designed to:
· Organize large amounts of complicated software and data on disk to avoid device bottlenecks and poor performance
· Facilitate routine administrative tasks such as software and data backup functions, which are often vulnerable to data corruption
· Alleviate switching among multiple Oracle databases
· Adequately manage and administer database growth
· Help eliminate fragmentation of free space in the data dictionary, isolate other fragmentation, and minimize resource contention
The OFA directory structure is described in the following sections.
ORACLE_BASE Directory
ORACLE_BASE specifies the BASE of the Oracle directory structure for OFA-compliant databases. A typical ORACLE_BASE directory structure is described below.
When installing an OFA-compliant database using Oracle Universal Installer, ORACLE_BASE is set to /pm/app/oracle by default.
Sample ORACLE_BASE Directory Structure and Content
Directory Content
admin Administrative files
doc online documentation
local Sub-tree for local Oracle software
product Oracle software
ORACLE_HOME Directory
Below table shows an example of the Oracle home directory structure and content for an Oracle Server Installation.
If you install an OFA-compliant Oracle Server, the Oracle home directory is
/mount_point/app/oracle/product/release_number.
Under UNIX, the Oracle home directory might contain the following subdirectories, as well as a subdirectory for each Oracle product selected.
Note:
The directory and content information in this table are only samples. The directories that appear in your own Oracle home depend on whether the corresponding products are installed and the version of the Oracle Database you are running.
Sample Oracle Home Directory Structure and Content
Directory Content
assistants configuration Assistants
bin binaries for all products
ctx interMedia Text cartridge
dbs initsid.ora, lksid
install install related files
lib Oracle product libraries
jlib Java classes
md Spatial cartridge
mlx Xerox Stemmer (for interMedia Text cartridge)
network Net8
nlsrtl NLS run-time loadable data
ocommon common files for all products
odg data gatherer
opsm Parallel Server Manager Components
oracore core libraries
ord data cartridges
otrace Oracle TRACE
plsql PL/SQL
precomp precompilers
rdbms server files and libraries required for the database
slax SLAX parser
sqlplus SQL*Plus
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