Andreas' Adventures

Hit the following problem: After a manual install of a database the database and its instances were not registered with the CRS. Using srvctl I registered the database and its instances in the CRS. Unfortunately I could not start the database or and instance. Well I could start one instance but none of the other three. Same thing happened when I used another instance (start inst1 but not inst2, inst3 and inst4, then start inst4, but not inst1, inst2, inst3). Then I tried to start one of the other instances manually. See what happened: SQL> startup ORACLE instance started. Total System Global Area 838860800 bytes Fixed Size 2074992 bytes Variable Size 218105488 bytes Database Buffers 612368384 bytes Redo Buffers 6311936 bytes ORA-01102: cannot mount database in EXCLUSIVE mode I found out that the culprit was an nice combination of init parameters. CLUSTER_DATABASE_INSTANCES=4 CLUSTER_DATABASE=NO So my explanation was that the data...

When you cluster two Oracle Application Servers (10.1.3) you will receive a warning that it is not recommended (supported) to have two Application Server Controls in this cluster. This week I had the need to enable the second ASC as the deployment of an application failed if it was carried of from the remote ASC. This is how I did this. Go to the server.xml in j2ee/home/config and change into

Had a problem with the installation of MRCA in a RAC cluster. This can happen when you are installing the MRCA in a RAC environment and the total length of the description string is longer than 239 chars. Found this in the logfile of the MRCA assistant: [SQLPlusAction] Connect string: (DESCRIPTION=(ADDRESS_LIST=(ADDRESS=(PROTOCOL=TCP)(HOST=abcdefghijklmno01)(PORT=1582))(ADDRESS=(PROTOCOL=TCP)(HOST=abcdefghijklmno02)(PORT=1582))(ADDRESS=(PROTOCOL=TCP)(HOST=abcdefghijklmno03)(PORT=1582)))(CONNECT_DATA=(SERVICE_NAME=INFRA))) SQL> string beginning "(DESCRIPTI..." is too long. maximum size is 239 characters. Of course the above hostnames are fake (we have different ones, but just as long). The strange thing is that not all parts fail. So apparently each assistant uses a different method. Solution was to use just one or two of the hostnames in the MRCA assistant. It is a RAC cluster - so even one host would be sufficient.

I encountered another strange thing in the Grid Control. The intention was to secure the communication between the agents on AIX and the OMS. However on one machine this was working, while the other two machines where I installed the agent succeeded in putting the agent in secure mode but did never upload their data. Using emctl status agent -secure I found out that they thought that they were not in secure mode. The solution was pretty simple (and another proof that Oracle has to find some unique way to resolve network addresses).. In my hostfile the hosts that did not work were described as 10.1.2.3 hostname hostname.domain.com I changed this to be 10.1.2.3 hostname.domain.com hostname resecured everything (OMS and agents) and it then it worked.

I will be presenting at the Oracle Open World in San Francisco in September. Session details: Session ID: S300515 Session Title: How to Achieve 99.99 Percent Availability Track: Database More to come ....

Hi folks! I switched to Firefox RC2 and all of a sudden the Google Maps stopped. I found out that the Skype Extension was messing it up. So if you have a similar problem (or switch to Firefox 3 from 17-JUN-2008) just try this to fix the problem. Just wanted to let you know.

When extracting a cpio file with Oracle software from OTN on AIX you might encounter the following problem: oracle@mymachine-app:/install/oracle/MRCA>cpio -idmv cpio: 0511-903 Out of phase! cpio attempting to continue... cpio: 0511-904 skipping 642010 bytes to get back in phase! One or more files lost and the previous file is possibly corrupt! Segmentation fault The solution is to use the option -idcmv oracle@mymachine-app:/install/oracle/MRCA>cpio -idcmv c Reads and writes header information in ASCII character form. If a cpio archive was created using the c flag, it must be extracted with c flag.

Found out that the DBCA does not create a specific ARCH location when you do not use the default one. When you are in the dbca and edit the init parameter So after my nice little database was frozen I created the arch directory in the ASM and voila, everything was back to normal.

As I always forget this (and have to look for it) I will put it into my blog - maybe I will memorize it now ;-) SELECT value$ FROM sys.props$ WHERE name = 'NLS_CHARACTERSET';

Setting up Data Guard with Maximum Protection requires the Data Guard Broker. Having setup Data Guard a couple of times without the broker I thought "how difficult can it be?" and started. After some preparations I started the dgmgrl in order to configure the various sites. To my astonishment no command at all was recognized. I have to admit that I even went back to the manuals to see if it was my fault. And then - shame on me - I tried to use the help function inside the dgmgrl. See what happens then: WHAHAHAHA! Ok, so either I was seriously stupid or there was an error - probably a relink issue. A good friend of mine at Oracle PTS - Robert Pastijn - offered the needed help and pointed out that a bug was introduced on AIX in the upgrade from 10.2.0.1.0 to 10.2.0.2.0 . The patch fixed this problem. So after all Oracle did not (yet) follow the classic Microsoft error: Error - No Error.

Lately I ran into a strange problem. I switched on my Wireless Network on my laptop only to find out that every time it receives a hostname localdomain and an IP address of 192.168.2.174 . Of course I blamed Windows as this is often the problem. However I found out that the problem is the DHCP Server of the VMWare Server. This seems to assign DHCP leases not only for the networks towards the Virtual Machines but also to the host as well. The only remedy is to shutdown the Windows service of the VMWare DHCP Server when requesting a new IP address.

When running the runcluvfy.sh I received the following error: /tmp does not exist and is not writable The reason for this is the fact that during the setup of the user equivalence the ssh to the own host was not performed. This leads to the issue that the commands in the runcluvfy.sh are not issued on the localhost. This leads to the strange error, as the /tmp directory did of course exist.

During the installation of an Oracle Application Server I mistyped the instancename. I was not so keen on re-installing everything. So I tried to change the name of the instance. Mind you - I'm talking about the name that is displayed when issuing an opmnctl status The solution is pretty easy: Edit the ias.properties and the opmn.xml . Change the instancename there and restart the opmn.

Came across the following last week - and I have to admit that this is something which made my eyes hurt. When you are in the Policy Manager of the Oracle Identity Management Suite and you want to add a group you REALLY need to know that there is a hidden link on this page. Try to find it yourself in the next picture: Found it? No? Let me give you a hint. Look in the blue band and search for some blue text :-) I'm not sure if anybody knew about this. I checked the documentation, and nothing about adding a group to such an Authorization Rule for groups is written in there. I wonder if anybody at Oracle knows about this hidden gem. I will log an SR with Support and also mail some people I know at Oracle to discuss this perfect piece of user interface design.

Nowadays you see a lot of those nifty no-nonsense datacenters where everything is ordered and no room is left for human ingenuity. However - once in a while you encounter some good old-fashioned folks, who think that intelligence rules over the chaos. Here is a lovely picture from one of my customers. Well - in order to protect the innocent let me say that their network is ok!

When installing the Oracle Access Manager WebGate and WebPass in different directories on Windows you will encounter some problems when it comes to forms-based authentication. The reason for this lies in the configuration of the IIS (oh - how I like Apache :-) . The redirection to the forms based HTML login and its redirection can easily fail as the IIS is not aware of the different location of the other directory. I solved this by changing the Virtual Directory settings in the IIS. Here is a picture that will give you an idea where and how to do this:

Today during a workshop where we had to setup the Oracle Access Manager we had a very detailed cookbook. Then I reached the following page: I hit next and always received a strange error - stating that the inetOrgPerson could not be found in the LDAP. Well - I have to say for my defense that I suffered from fever, cold, and headache. Just restarting the servers OUTSIDE the browser did the trick! Going to bed and get rid of my fever. cu Andreas

Lately I've been doing some AD-OID synchronization. Should be not that difficult, but as so often the devil is in the detail. The AD admin created a user that is capable of reading the complete AD - as it is described in the documentation. Then I tried to login. And tried, and tried. Password was reset, different password was used, etc. No luck. I tried a very easy ldapsearch and received the follwoing error: 80090308: LdapErr: DSID-0C09030B, comment: AcceptSecurityContext error, data 531, v893 HEX: 0x531 - not permitted to logon from this workstation DEC: 1329 - ERROR_INVALID_WORKSTATION (Logon failure: user not allowed to log on to this computer.) LDAP[userWorkstations: ] NOTE: Returns only when presented with valid username and password/credential. Aha, that gave me a clue. So the username and password seemed to be correct. Some googeling established the problem. The user was created but the AD admin did not allow the user to login to the machine where the AD was running.

Sometimes I wish that there was just one language and therefore just one keyboard. I'm working in Belgium right now and at this customer there is no possibility to use my laptop on the network. Instead they have a thin client concept based on Citrix. That is ok but working with a Belgian keyboard just makes my hands hurt. I have switched the locale to English. But now I have to convince my eyes that there are different keys. Also after locking the PC I mistyped my password too often (the Citrix environment was still on FR) so the helpdesk had to unlock my account. I have not yet done Oracle related work on this machine but I cannot imagine what will happen when doing some interessting stuff with the DB or the Application Server and entering $#@%^& instead of some numbers or terminating each command with an m (that's where they've put the semicolon).

In my previous post http://achatzia.blogspot.com/2007/09/stand-alone-oracle-http-server-vs-as.html I said that there are two separate code trees for the OHS. Now I found at least one difference. If you have a look at the mod_oc4j.conf file you will see that the standalone version includes LoadModule oc4j_module modules/mod_oc4j.so while the AS version does include LoadModule oc4j_module modules/ApacheModuleOc4j.dll This of course is the Windows version. If somebody wants to check if such a difference exists with a Unix version I would like to hear that as well.