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Working on OVM Implmentation next and then I’ll start the database tree

One of those tools is the amazon website. When you create an account you have the ability to flag books as owned and rate them from 1 to 5 stars. I just love that! What’s even better is that rating those books has a consequence other than giving me a satisfied feeling. Recommendations are bases on these ratings. It’s because of those recommendations that I found the author B.V. Larson. An Indi writer publishing through Amazon.

I was surprised at how well his books were written. I started the Star Force series and the story is something fresh in the scifi genre to me. Swarm, the first book of Star Force series, I read in 24 hours. I could only lay it down to get some food and drinks, seldom has a story captivated me so much. I’m now reading extinction, book 2 of Star Force, and the author keeps adding new and fresh aspects to the story. I’m totally hooked.

I can’t wait to start on his fantasy novels. Check him out on amazon :

http://www.amazon.com/B.-V.-Larson/e/B003MESPVM/ref=ntt_athr_dp_pel_pop_1

And his personal webpage where he talks about online publishing as an indi writer.

http://bvlarson.com/

Don’t forget to leave feedback when you like a book on amazon, it’s the best way to support these indi writers so that they get noticed by a larger audience.

General

• The big advantage over puttycm is that SCP is built into the interface. You can upload and download files with ease without having to start filezilla or scp and open a new connection.

• The Directory that contains all the ssh sessions can be ordered by customer.

• autologin capability is there.
• Connections can be opened in new tab or new window. To get the same effect as puttycm we can open multiple windows next to eachother.
• exposé like display that shows all connections in 1 window to easily switch connections.
• You can scroll back in a connection in a seperate window. Big plus over putty ( no more jumping back down while output is streaming on the screen )
• You can search in the scroll back buffer !!
• Copy paste can be set the same as in putty ( select = copy, paste = right mouse button )
• Paste can automatically ignore the ending newline in the data so that commands aren’t accidentally executed immediately.
• Autoconnect allows you to start a conenction on a server that is rebooting. The program will auto reconenct every x seconds untill it is connected.

Profiles

• In each profile you can select colors, layout, X11 connections, keyboard setup, logging, Quickkeys, terminal setup ( cfr. putty )

• Each profile can get macros bound to a shortcut key or button.

The Negative

• Haven’t found a way yet to send a command to multiple windows or tabs at the same time

** UPDATE 17-06-2011 **

The nice people of emtec have explained me that sending commands to multiple tabs is possible. The tabs don’t even have to be visible ( in contrast to puttycm ). Just enable local typing. You’ll get a command line where you can select the option to send the command to multiple tabs :

I’m having some issues with puttycm in my vm, especially integration between mac en vm.

• puttycm window doesn’t jump to foreground when clicked, my desktop also doesn’t go to correct viewspace.
• Copy pasting from mac to puttycm fails suddenly, have to reboot to make it work again ( could be a Parallel tools problem )

On top of this, I’m still trying to get to a machine without windows vm running in the background. So the search for a replacement started. The keyfeatures i wanted in a replacement are :

• tabbed connections
• easily adjusted profiles for colors, layout, X11 options. ( cfr to putty profiles )
• Some kind of Connection library with folders for each customer.
• Able to send a command to all tabs or visible windows
• Able to logon automatically ( login macro in puttycm )

After a long search I finally found a program that atleast fits a lot of the requirements. Zoc. ( http://www.emtec.com/zoc/ ). 30 days evaluation and 80$ to buy. Not a cheap product but worth it if it does what i need. And it does. Try it out, you’ll see

I’ll post my further experiences with it in this blogpost.

• 17” screen
• Anti-glare option
• 120GB SSD disk

A beautifull device, but can i work with it as Oracle DBA. Collegues in my team were sceptical about being able to find the right tools and predicted I’ll be using my Virtual machine more than the mac OSx. So for the naysayers, a small list of windows Programs with an alternate ( sometimes much better ) application in Mac OSx that I use in my day to day mac usage for work.

• Syncing documents with our main document library
  • win : viceversa pro
  • mac : goodsync

Not much difference between them. Both are doing their job.

• SQLplus 
  • win : Oracle client
  • mac : Oracle client

Yes, Oracle has a mac OSx client, althouth it’s only version 10.2.0.4

• GUI for SQlplus 
  • win : sqltools++
  • mac : sqldeveloper

Sqldeveloper is good, but it isn’ t sqltools++. I often grip back to my sqltools++ in my VM.

• Mails
  • win : outlook 2007
  • max : outlook 2011

Outlook 2011 is the first release on mac OSx and a succesfull one I must say. I must admit that I didn’t try out the standard Mail app.

• ssh management
  • win : putty connection manager
  • mac : putty connection manager in VM

One of the few tools I don’t find an alternative for. It’s true, you can ssh from the terminal in Mac OSx and even save sessions but the splitting of screens, sending 1 command to multiple windows, usage of colors, usage of login macro’s is either not possible or hard to do.

• ftp 
  • win : flashfxp + putty scp
  • mac : filezilla

Easy Switch. Filezilla even support sftp.

• remote desktop connection 
  
  • win : built in RDC
  • mac : CoRD

Taking over windows desktops is possible with the RDC installed with office. STAY away from that program. IT causes crashes f your mac OSx and sometimes just hangs. If you quit when its hnging, you’ll have to reboot your mac. RDC also has problems with language and special keys ( f.e. \ and @ ). While CoRD is working as it should

• Word, Excel, … 
  
  • win : office 2007
  • mac : office 2011

One of the big questions, in a windows work team, how is the document exchange done between win and mac. Can it open word docs, can windows open the mac docs?… With office 2011 this question is easily solved.

• VPN 
  • win : all work
  • mac : most of the vpn’s work surprisingly well.

This surprised me. About 80% of all my customers have a vpn that is either supported on mac OSx or they have a workaround to allow macusers to connect to their network. The mac awareness is growing alot in the work place it seems. For the few where it not works, I use my VM to conenct to their network. For these customers I have sqltools++ & Puttycm on my VM. ( although i often use them for other customers aswell as the network is shared between my main machine and my VM. )

• SVN
  
  • win: forgot name.
  • mac : SCplugin + SCtoolbarbutton

Nice expansion to finder, not much difference between win/mac.

List of new Applications

The following is a list of application I discovered on mac OSx and really make my work life much simpler. Although some exist on windows, I only found them on my search for apps.

• Quicksilver : Application Launcher. Really simplifies the delay of having to search the app and click it with a mouse.
• Dropbox : Syncs files between devices ( ipad, iphone, windows, … )
• Evernote : Note taking application that syncs between devices ( ipod, iphone, windows, … )
• Adium : MSN alternative
• Little Snitch : Firewall / network monitoring
• Mars Edit : App to work with blogs ( using it now )
• 1password pro : Password management and syncs between devices ( iPad, Iphone, .. )
• MarcoPolo : Easy switches networks and performs mounts, start of applications, stop of applications when it detects a different workplace.
• Parallels Desktop : VM. In coherence mode really easy to use next to all the mac apps.
• Time Machine : Comes with the mac OSx. Awesome backup/restore tool.

In the end I must say that I’m very happy with my switch to mac. It’s a whole different way of thinking and working. More intuitive although it takes some time to adjust if you worked on windows you’re whole life.

Work related :

• Oracle
• SnapManager for Oracle
• Stepping over from Windows to Mac as Oracle DBA

Private related

• love & relationship
• Dogs
• Go ( Japanese Boardgames )
• Random musings

Hope I can keep it up this time

protection manager

Since 3.0 SMO supports migration of snapshots to a disaster netapp. There is an extra license and software involved though namely Protection Manager. If you are thinking of using it, don’t. To take advantage of these Protection Manager features through SnapDrive, you must have a DFM server with version 3.7 or later, and your storage systems must be running Data ONTAP 7.3 or later. ( 7.3 is currently in Beta )

Scheduling

Scheduling has no pre or post script options. So if you want to manually call something before or after snapshotting ( say for example snapmirror, or a status mail ), you have to go back to full scripting. Scheduling is also NOT possible on command line. I have no idea what the devs were thinking. Every SMO action has a command line option except the scheduling, a pain in the ass if you want to automate creations of profiles, backups and backup schedules.

a third and UNACCEPTABLE “feature” is that SMO scheduling is NOT cluster aware. On creation of the schedule, the hostname gets written in the database ( SMO_30_SCHEDULEDOPERATION ), when you run your database on another host the software forgets the profiles as it is now another host/db combination. Recreating the profiles doesn’t work because the name is already in use.

I felt naughty and updated the tables manually with the virtual IP’s of the databases, but to no avail.

Netapp Name

Not a real SMO problem but rather a snapdrive problem. When taking snapshots, Snapdrive uses the hostname from the netapp. This means that when you try to mount one of the snapshots and the name you use to talk to your netapps is different then the hostname, Snapdrive gives an error :

for example :

netapp name : stor01 lan network : stor01l storage network : stor01s

mounts are on storage network :

stor1s:/vol/vol_df stor1s:/vol/vol_arch stor1s:/vol/vol_redo1 stor1s:/vol/vol_redo2

When you try to run a verify, restore or mount :

/usr/sbin/snapdrive snap connect -fs /test/DB/oradata/datafiles /opt/NetApp/smo/mnt/-test-DB-oradata-datafiles-20081212141831810_0 -destfv stor1:/vol/vol_df SnapManager_20081212141831851_test_df -snapname stor1:/vol/vol_df:smo_test_20081212_141644_hourly_1_8a809e8a1e2b576f011e2b5778580001_0 -autorename -noreserve 0002-044 Command error: The following Storage System Volume(s) do not exist in the snapshot and cannot be renamed Volumes : stor1:/vol/vol_df

When adding stor1 in /etc/hosts with ip stor1s and changing the mounts to use stor1 instead of stor1s, it works. So you have to mount your volumes with the hostname of your netapp. Something to keep in mind.

Archivelogs Archivelogs are still not cleaned up automatically. You need a separate script to do the cleanup. ( post-script would solve this for a part )

… More to come

• built-in scheduler
• built-in support for snapvault/snapmirror
• new GUI

I expected a lot from this release because, face it, SMO 2.2 was lacking in professionalism. It looked ugly, felt clumsy but it did its job. Some people still are doubting the added value of a tool like SMO, we’ll see if netapp can change their mind with 3.0.

Testsystem

My tests are done on Oracle Enterprise linux 5.2 with latest patches. I’ll snapshot a 11.1.0.7 database. The SMO repository will also exist inside a 11.1.0.7 database.All mounts are done over NFS.

Installing

Right out of the box snapdrive and snapmanager install flawlessly. What could catch you off guard is that snapdrive 4.1 comes with https enabled out of the box. So if your filer doesn’t support https, you need to change the snapdrive.conf file so it uses http to connect.

GUI

Oh i like it already, the JRE is part of the startup process this time and gets downloaded and installed automatically. Still not working with java 6 though. It even works in firefox, finally

Ok, first startup… looks better but still just a sterile look. On unix though, my subwindows are just empty. Could be a problem with my machine, cause i get the same effect with dbca from oracle. so let’s give SMO the benefit of the doubt. Ok, starting my virtual machine to test in windows. All seems fine. Time to create the repository and let’s use the wizard from the gui for once ( normally i’m command line minded, but in this case the gui needs to be tested thoroughly )

ORA-17002 : Ouch, IO exception while connecting with jdbc to the database. Only 1 entry on metalink and talks about hostresolving on RAC, not the case here and hostresolving is set correctly.Seems my tests are temporary to a halt while i figure this out. I hope the 11G repository is not the problem. Tune in later for more

Back after a short intermezzo with a workaround. On command line I have no issues connecting with jdbc and creating the repository

smo repository create -repository -dbname SMO -host ls-alfresco -login -username SMO -port 1521 Enter password for database connection SMO@ls-alfresco:1521/SMO: *** [ INFO] SMO-20019: Set password for repository “SMO@SMO/ls-alfresco:1521″ in user credentials for “root”. [ INFO] SMO-09202: Creating new schema as SMO on jdbc:oracle:thin:@//ls-alfresco:1521/SMO. [ INFO] SMO-09205: Schema generation complete. [ INFO] SMO-09209: Performing repository version INSERT. [ INFO] SMO-09210: Repository created with version: 62 [ INFO] SMO-13048: Repository Create Operation Status: SUCCESS [ INFO] SMO-13049: Elapsed Time: 0:00:09.084

It also works with a colleague on windows, so it seems there is an issue isolated to my machine. I reran netca, tested the connection and now it worked. Later I ran into a problem with SOAP when i tried to create a profile. I should warn you to checkwhich version of java your OS uses to launch the java application. Make sure 1.6 is either not installed or not enabled in the java control panel. My problems were fixed after disabling java 1.6.

The gui now exists out of 3 parts. Monitoring, Scheduling and backups/clones. They are easy accessible using the tabs on top. The monitoring tab looks like the old GUI screen but now we see a reports section in the sidebar where we can see all operations in a certain time range ( last hour, last month, … ). The scheduling tab lets you.. well… schedule things and the backup/clone tab shows a detailled list of backups and clones.

Profiles

I’m glad to see SMO is now working with retention classes and can be configured for both duration and count. One of the major changes is that 1 profile now can have multiple retentions. The defaults are adjustable in smo.conf. No more creating 4 profiles for every database for hourly, daily, weekly, monthly.Also new is that smo checks your database for a valid restore profile and if your database can be restored using fast restore. It not only says if its possible or not, you also get a reason why. For example :

–[ WARN] SMO-05071: Database profile ALFRESCO is not eligible for fast restore:  Restore Plan: Preview: The following files will be restored completely via: storage side file restore /alfresco/DB/oradata/alfresco01.dbf /alfresco/DB/oradata/nagios01.dbf /alfresco/DB/oradata/sysaux01.dbf /alfresco/DB/oradata/system01.dbf /alfresco/DB/oradata/undotbs01.dbf /alfresco/DB/oradata/users01.dbf

 

Analysis: The following reasons prevent certain files from being restored completely via: storage side file system restore Files in file system /alfresco not part of the restore scope will be reverted. Files not in restore scope: /alfresco/DB/flash_recovery/ALFRESCO/archivelog/2008_12_05/o1_mf_1_548_4ml7jmjs_.arc /alfresco/DB/oradata/control02.ctl /alfresco/DB/oradata/redo02b.rdo Files to restore: /alfresco/DB/oradata/alfresco01.dbf /alfresco/DB/oradata/nagios01.dbf /alfresco/DB/oradata/sysaux01.dbf /alfresco/DB/oradata/system01.dbf /alfresco/DB/oradata/undotbs01.dbf /alfresco/DB/oradata/users01.dbf

So let’s bring our database over to the netapp so we can test further.

This concludes part 1

1. My family situation is nothing but simple but I’ll not bore you with details. Parents divorced, 1 brother that is living together with his girlfriend. They have a beautifull daughter together who is also my Godchild.

2. I love my godchild to death. She’s so smart, funny. She’s 3 years old and her name is Amber.

3. I’m a catperson, I had cats my whole life and just love the little critters. I have the scars on my hands to prove it :p ( I love teasing them and that takes its toll )

4. I studied Informatics in Kortrijk and had the opportunity to do my thesis in Spain. Valladolid to be precise, it was a great experience. We had to make a program for teachers that work with people that have Down syndrome. We did the whole thing in C++ Builder and have rewritten the whole windows API for working with pictures… It was awesome But at that time I decided I never wanted a full-time programming job.

5. I’m very passionate about my interests. So passionate that it’s sometimes a bad quality for me. Whenever I’m interested in something, I can’t be slightly interested. I have to know everything about it. The bad thing is that because of the intense research, I’m bored with it after a couple of weeks. This happens both in my professional and private live

6. For some reason, I hate PLSQL. I really hate it. I’m a perl, php man and although I’m always open for new experiences, PLSQL will never warm my heart.

7. I’m a roleplayer. Yeah I’m one of those nerds that loves going to fantasy places in his mind with a fictive character. My favourite character is Corda, a soft-hearted female healertype. ( It is not gay to play a girl, I repeat… :p ) My favourite roleplaysystem is warhammer Fantasy Roleplay. Come to think of it, it has been a long time since I played or DM’d ( dungeon mastered ) a game.

8. Wine, If you want to give me a present, give me a good white wine I don’t drink the red kind, but always willing to try. I used to be into special beers ( Duvel, Leffe, Westmalle, … ) but now it’s winetime.. ( nice word :p )

Ok, that were 8 things about myself, I hope I didn’t bore you ( too much ). My turn to tag and I tag Nobody. That’s right… Nobody. Not that I don’t want to, but I’m apparently last in the line from my friends and don’t really want to tag unknown people.

The client was using grid control for management of the RAC an ASM instances, the point and click interface is really intuitif and makes these actions childplay. HOWEVER, not all clients have grid control and in my case I didn’t have the sys password to connect with the asm instance. A local connection was the only possible solution and that meant… fun

I was glad Grid control didn’t work so I could get to know the command line interface. The folowing is my procedure.

1. detect the group number from the source and Dest group :

SQL> select group_number,name from v$asm_diskgroup;

GROUP_NUMBER NAME
———— ——————————
3 DG_SRC_DF
5 DG_DEST_DF

2. Get an overview of the disks from that diskgroup :

SQL> select DISK_NUMBER, name, failgroup, group_number from v$asm_disk where group_number=3 order by name;

0 asmdiskA17                    FailgroupA                                  3
1 asmdiskA18                    FailgroupA                                  3
2 asmdiskA19                    FailgroupA                                  3
3 asmdiskA22                    FailgroupA                                  3
4 asmdiskA23                    FailgroupA                                  3
5 asmdiskA24                    FailgroupA                                  3
6 asmdiskA25                    FailgroupA                                  3
7 asmdiskA26                    FailgroupA                                  3
8 asmdiskA27                    FailgroupA                                  3
9 asmdiskA28                    FailgroupA                                  3
10 asmdiskB39                    FailgroupB                                  3
11 asmdiskB40                    FailgroupB                                  3
12 asmdiskB41                    FailgroupB                                  3
13 asmdiskB42                    FailgroupB                                  3
14 asmdiskB43                    FailgroupB                                  3
15 asmdiskB44                    FailgroupB                                  3
16 asmdiskB45                    FailgroupB                                  3
17 asmdiskB48                    FailgroupB                                  3
18 asmdiskB49                    FailgroupB                                  3
19 asmdiskB50                    FailgroupB                                  3

3. Remove 7 disks of each failgroup = 14 :

alter diskgroup DG_SRC_DF drop disk asmdiskA28;
alter diskgroup DG_SRC_DF drop disk asmdiskA27;
alter diskgroup DG_SRC_DF drop disk asmdiskA26;
alter diskgroup DG_SRC_DF drop disk asmdiskA25;
alter diskgroup DG_SRC_DF drop disk asmdiskA24;
alter diskgroup DG_SRC_DF drop disk asmdiskA23;
alter diskgroup DG_SRC_DF drop disk asmdiskA22;
alter diskgroup DG_SRC_DF drop disk asmdiskB50;
alter diskgroup DG_SRC_DF drop disk asmdiskB49;
alter diskgroup DG_SRC_DF drop disk asmdiskB48;
alter diskgroup DG_SRC_DF drop disk asmdiskB45;
alter diskgroup DG_SRC_DF drop disk asmdiskB44;
alter diskgroup DG_SRC_DF drop disk asmdiskB43;
alter diskgroup DG_SRC_DF drop disk asmdiskB42;

4. check if the rebalancing is done :

SQL> select * from v$asm_operation;

GROUP_NUMBER OPERA STAT      POWER     ACTUAL      SOFAR   EST_WORK   EST_RATE EST_MINUTES
———— —– —- ———- ———- ———- ———- ———- ———–
3 REBAL RUN           1          1      18652      69864        722          70

5. when done , check if the disks are gone with query from point 2.
6. add the disks to the new diskgroup

alter diskgroup DG_DEST_DF add FAILGROUP FailgroupA disk ‘/asmdisks/asmdiskA28′;
alter diskgroup DG_DEST_DF add FAILGROUP FailgroupA disk ‘/asmdisks/asmdiskA27′;
alter diskgroup DG_DEST_DF add FAILGROUP FailgroupA disk ‘/asmdisks/asmdiskA26′;
alter diskgroup DG_DEST_DF add FAILGROUP FailgroupA disk ‘/asmdisks/asmdiskA25′;
alter diskgroup DG_DEST_DF add FAILGROUP FailgroupA disk ‘/asmdisks/asmdiskA24′;
alter diskgroup DG_DEST_DF add FAILGROUP FailgroupA disk ‘/asmdisks/asmdiskA23′;
alter diskgroup DG_DEST_DF add FAILGROUP FailgroupA disk ‘/asmdisks/asmdiskA22′;
alter diskgroup DG_DEST_DF add FAILGROUP FailgroupB disk ‘/asmdisks/asmdiskB50′;
alter diskgroup DG_DEST_DF add FAILGROUP FailgroupB disk ‘/asmdisks/asmdiskB49′;
alter diskgroup DG_DEST_DF add FAILGROUP FailgroupB disk ‘/asmdisks/asmdiskB48′;
alter diskgroup DG_DEST_DF add FAILGROUP FailgroupB disk ‘/asmdisks/asmdiskB45′;
alter diskgroup DG_DEST_DF add FAILGROUP FailgroupB disk ‘/asmdisks/asmdiskB44′;
alter diskgroup DG_DEST_DF add FAILGROUP FailgroupB disk ‘/asmdisks/asmdiskB43′;
alter diskgroup DG_DEST_DF add FAILGROUP FailgroupB disk ‘/asmdisks/asmdiskB42′;

7. Disks are added and ASM will rebalance the load over al the disks in background  :

SQL> select * from v$asm_operation;

GROUP_NUMBER OPERA STAT      POWER     ACTUAL      SOFAR   EST_WORK   EST_RATE EST_MINUTES
———— —– —- ———- ———- ———- ———- ———- ———–
5 REBAL RUN           1          1      18652      69864        722          70

After  searching and trying  it was really quite a good learning case to get to know ASM a bit better.  And know i can add ASM knowledge to my resumé