Database

Oracle Database World in London – THE event in April 2023

Posted on April 5, 2023 by Mike.Dietrich Conference Workshop 7

You may have heard or seen – or even registered already – for the regional Oracle Cloud World in London on April 19, 2023 already. But were you aware that the “event to be at” happens just the next day on April 20? It will be Oracle Database World in London – THE event in April 2023.

When and where will it happen?

April 20, 2023, a Thursday will be the day to mark in your calendar. We’ll meet you at Oracle Database World, the regional database event to be at in London this year at the …

A patch (RU, OJVM, 32-bit) is not available yet – where will I find information?

A longer while ago I wrote a blog post about the topic that a patch (RU, OJVM, 32-bit) is not available yet – where will I find information? But I wrote it too specific. And it is even hard for me to find my older blog post. Since several of you mailed me the past weeks with a variety of questions regarding patch availability I decided to write down my thoughts – but this time in a more generic way. And I hope it is helpful.

Photo by Vasily Koloda on Unsplash

Why are patches missing?

At first, I …

Oracle Optimizer Statistics Advisor in Oracle 19c

Posted on February 28, 2023 by Mike.Dietrich Flaws and Pitfalls Optimizer Patch Recommendation 18

Christian Pfundtner pointed me to the fact that my old blog post about the Statistics Advisor from 2017 may not be up to date anymore. And he further pointed out that some of his clients still suffer from issues with the tool. Hence, let me refresh the topic with Oracle Optimizer Statistics Advisor in Oracle 19c. And thanks to Christian for the pointers.

Oracle Optimizer Statistics Advisor in Oracle 19c

Photo by Tobias Keller on Unsplash

Overview

At first, I won’t rewrite the entire blog post but instead focus on recent findings. Therefore, you may please want to read my previous blog post about the …

ORA-13516 “CATPROC not valid” during datapatch or autoupgrade to 19.18.0

Posted on February 24, 2023 by Mike.Dietrich Flaws and Pitfalls Patch Recommendation 18

I thought I could relax this week using my leftover vacation days from 2022. But this issue is triggering me since some of you mailed me already. Maybe this blog post can prevent others from being trapped by this issue: ORA-13516 “CATPROC not valid” during datapatch or autoupgrade to 19.18.0. And as a prolog, you will NOT see the below issue when you started your database in NORMAL mode for the execution of datapatch.

ORA-13516 "CATPROC not valid" during datapatch or autoupgrade to 19.18.0

Photo by Greg Rosenke on Unsplash

What is the symptom?

Regardless of whether you patch to Oracle Database RU 19.18.0 manually or with …

Hide and Seek with RU 19.18.0

Posted on February 2, 2023 by Mike.Dietrich Flaws and Pitfalls Patch Recommendation 44

One and a half weeks ago we released the Database and Grid Infrastructure Release Updates (RU) 19.18.0. You could read on the blog how to apply it, and you could read also about an alert. So far, all was more or less transparent but apparently sort of an Hide and Seek with RU 19.18.0 has happened. So let me shed some light.

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Heads Up!

I am just the messenger trying to bring some light into the topic. Neither is our team responsible nor do we have any sort of control on this process. I …

RUs contain now all available DST patches

Posted on January 19, 2023 by Mike.Dietrich Patch Recommendation Time Zone - DST 8

At first, Happy New Year everybody. There was silence on the blog for some weeks but I took an extended longer time off. Well, and once you return, there are some emails in your inbox which need some work. You’ll see several new blog posts getting published in the coming days. Back to normal, yesterday night RU 19.18.0 among other patch bundles has been released. And there’s a huge fantastic surprise in it: RUs contain now all available DST patches.

RUs contain now all available DST patches

Photo by Lukas Blazek on Unsplash

What’s the story?

There are some good news. We discussed this internally …

OCW 2022 – Your Upgrade / Migration / Patching Track to Success

Posted on October 11, 2022 by Mike.Dietrich Conference OOW 2

Will you come to Oracle Cloud World (tcfkaOOW = the conference formerly known as Oracle Open World) 2022 in Las Vegas in the week from October 17-20, 2022? Then we hope to see you there. And we certainly hope to meet you. So in case you are looking for our technical talks and sessions at OCW 2022 – Your Upgrade / Migration / Patching Track to Success.

OCW 2022 – Your Upgrade / Migration / Patching Track to Success

Your Upgrade / Migration / Patching Track at OCW2022

As usual our promise stands.

Zero marketing. Just pure tech.

And we our proud to have lots of real …

Binary patching is slow because of the inventory

Posted on May 10, 2022 by Mike.Dietrich Patch Recommendation 52

The headline of this blog post may sound a bit cryptic: Binary patching is slow because of the inventory. But actually this seems to be one of the main causes when your binary patching gets slower and slower with every patch you apply.

Photo by Valdemaras D. on Unsplash

The more you patch, the worse it gets

Well, this is a tough headline. But you may have read my blog posts about my quarterly patching experience. It actually started with the July 2021 RU in my 19c environment when I wrote:

At least in my environment, both checks with the

Oracle Database 12.2.0.1 and GI are certified on OL8 and RHEL8

Posted on December 14, 2021 by Mike.Dietrich Operating System 4

No worries, this isn’t a blog post from the vault. And I haven’t accidentally published something from the past just today. It is real. Oracle Database 12.2.0.1 and GI are certified on OL8 and RHEL8.

Oracle Database 12.2.0.1 and GI are certified on OL8 and RHEL8

Photo by Derek Oyen on Unsplash

What has been certified?

Thanks to my colleagues and a large customer in the UK, I received an email asking whether I have seen this information already on MOS. I haven’t. I knew that there were discussions but I had no actual date for the 12.2.0.1 certification on OL8 on my radar.

So in brief, these Linux 8 releases …

Virtual Classroom Seminar 12: Migrating Very Large Databases on Dec 9, 2021

Posted on December 8, 2021 by Mike.Dietrich Workshop 2

It looks to me that every possible event in 2021 happens in October/November/December 2021. No complaint from my side – but just in case you wonder about so little update activity on our blogs since weeks. We are just so busy in delivering virtual seminars. Which is good – but it requires lots of effort on our side as we want to deliver decent quality and real tech content. And now, since the year is almost at its end, it is time for our final Virtual Classroom Seminar 12: Migrating Very Large Databases on Dec 9, 2021 this year.

Virtual Classroom Seminar 12: Migrating Very Large Databases on Dec 9, 2021

Photo

Should you enable _fix_controls with DBMS_OPTIM_BUNDLE?

Posted on August 10, 2021 by Mike.Dietrich Optimizer Patch Recommendation 14

Today, Paul mailed me asking a question we internally discussed many times in the past weeks: Should you enable _fix_controls with DBMS_OPTIM_BUNDLE? And there is no easy simple answer. But I can give a recommendation based on my experience from many projects.

Should you enable _fix_controls with DBMS_OPTIM_BUNDLE?

Photo by paolo candelo on Unsplash

DBMS_OPTIM_BUNDLE – a quick recap

Just in case you haven’t dealt with DBMS_OPTIM_BUNDLE recently, here is a quick recap.

With below procedure, you can list the available potentially behavior changing optimizer fixes in the current patch bundle – and you can turn them on or off at will:

SQL> set serveroutput on;

aioug Webinar Series July 2021: Database Upgrade and Migrations

Posted on June 28, 2021 by Mike.Dietrich Workshop 0

Many people on the northern hemisphere will escape during July into the summer holidays. But we won’t. Instead, thanks to Sai Penumuru, we will give seven webinars for the aioug. And we are looking forward to talk to you soon at the aioug Webinar Series July 2021: Database Upgrade and Migrations.

aioug Webinar Series July 2021: Database Upgrade and Migrations

When will it happen?

This morning I looked into my calendar. And I realized: Wow, July 2021 is just a few days away. Roy will start with the first session on Friday, July 2. And then myself, Rodrigo, Daniel, Fred and Bill will …

Workaround for sdoloadj.sql errors with Datapatch in 19.9.0 and 19.10.0

Posted on March 2, 2021 by Mike.Dietrich Flaws and Pitfalls 6

The other week a customer from my hometown alerted me about an issue they saw when applying the 19.9.0 RU. A long sequence of errors in the datapatch run, all of them signaled from sdoloadj.sql. They opened an SR. And Support had an – understandable – recommendation the customer didn’t want to implement: Install JAVAVM. But thanks to my PM mate, Hans Viehmann (Mr Spatial), here is a simple Workaround for sdoloadj.sql errors with Datapatch in 19.9.0 and 19.10.0. And it may even apply to later releases, too.

Workaround for sdoloadj.sql errors with Datapatch in 19.9.0 and 19.10.0

Photo by Mael BALLAND on Unsplash

What happens?

Take …

Check your Unified Auditing Policies after upgrading to Oracle 19c

Posted on October 21, 2020 by Mike.Dietrich Auditing Flaws and Pitfalls Oracle Database 19c 11

This may become a longer blog post. One of the customers I work with for many years contacted me a few weeks ago. After upgrade to 19c, it looked like as if some Unified Auditing Policies weren’t correct anymore. It started as a tiny issue, but thanks to the customer who analyzed down to the bones, it seems to be bigger than we thought at the beginning. So you may Check your Unified Auditing Policies after upgrading to Oracle 19c as well.

Photo by Felix Luo on Unsplash

Unified Auditing

Actually a lot of my customers use Unified Auditing these …

Which database version can be used with Grid Infrastructure 19c?

Posted on October 6, 2020 by Mike.Dietrich ASM / RAC / GI 25

This will be a very short blog post today. But a colleague asked me this question just a few minutes ago: Which database version can be used with Grid Infrastructure 19c? And I realized that I neither put it on the blog yet nor did I bookmark it. But I answered this question several times already.

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Which database version can be used with Grid Infrastructure 19c?

There are 4 sources I did check:

MOS Notes on MyOracle Support
Oracle Documentation
Certification Information on MyOracle Support
Database Upgrade Blog

At first, I answered with MOS …

Cloud Migrations: The New Kid on the Blog – DOHDATABASE.com

Posted on August 10, 2020 by Mike.Dietrich Cloud 0

You may have realized that you will find mostly on-prem database upgrade and migration topics covered on my blog. Which doesn’t mean that you can’t use most of these techniques to migrate to the cloud either. But it’s really hard to write about everything in full detail. Hence, today I’d like to introduce you to Cloud Migrations: The New Kid on the Blog – DOHDATABASE.com. And no, I was never a fan of this American boyband from the 80s and 90s 😉

Cloud Migrations: The New Kid on the Blog - DOHDATABASE.com

Find Daniel’s blog at: https://dohdatabase.com

DOHDATABASE … huh?

Daniel Overby Hansen

As you may have read a …

Does your GI RU/RUR patch level has to match your database’s?

Posted on June 11, 2020 by Mike.Dietrich ASM / RAC / GI 2

A long while ago I blogged about whether you should keep your patch versions between Grid Infrastructure and Databases Homes in synch, or not. And today, Daniel dropped me a note mentioning that this old blog post may need an update for 18c/19c. He’s right. And as I’ve had trouble finding my old blog post, I title this one a bit more obvious: Does your GI RU/RUR patch level has to match your database’s?

Does your GI RU/RUR patch level has to match your database's?

Photo by Vincent van Zalinge on Unsplash

Before Oracle Database 18c

Since Oracle 18c we move from a 5-number release schema to a 3-number one. …

Do you need to license Java for AutoUpgrade?

Posted on January 31, 2020 by Mike.Dietrich AutoUpgrade 0

Actually this question came up internally. I did have no doubt that you don’t have to license Java in order to use AutoUpgrade. But a colleague had such doubts. So let’s clarify: Do you need to license Java for AutoUpgrade?

Do you need to license Java for AutoUpgrade?

Photo by nousnou iwasaki on Unsplash

Or phrased in a different way: “Since Java 8 requires a Java subscription now. Does autoupgrade come with a license?”

Do you?

Of course, No!

But where do the doubts come from? Actually this link here does not list the “Oracle Database” as a product. But there is this MOS Note …

Do we offer patched Gold Images already?

Posted on January 28, 2020 by Mike.Dietrich Installation 9

Internally we can use a Gold Image service at Oracle. I can download a zip with 19.6.0 included. But externally for you as customers, the download of 19.6.0 required that you download 19.3.0 at first, then apply 19.6.0 on top of it. But a day ago, a tweet by my Belgium friend Philippe Fierens caught my attention. Do we offer patched Gold Images already?

Do we offer patched Gold Images already?

Photo by Sergey Pesterev on Unsplash

What is a Gold Image?

Since Oracle 18c, the installation routine has changed to the better. You download zip file containing the Gold Image, you create a directory and …

AutoUpgrade Tips: Running two (or more) sessions in parallel

Posted on November 28, 2019 by Mike.Dietrich AutoUpgrade 4

Our intention with the AutoUpgrade as the single tool to upgrade your databases was initially: You have one big config file for your databases. And you will use this file to upgrade your databases unattended. Ideally you run an “analyze” at first, then you schedule a “deploy” for overnight or the next weekend or whenever it is convenient for you. But sometimes people have different needs. In this particular case several people asked whether you can run multiple AutoUpgrade tools in parallel on the same server. Hence, I’d like to explain the first of more AutoUpgrade …

Exadata Upgrade to OL7 and to Oracle 19c

Posted on August 29, 2019 by Mike.Dietrich Exadata / ODA 4

This is just a short blog post to ensure I will find the necessary information when somebody asks me again.. In case you plan to do an Exadata upgrade to OL7 and to Oracle 19c, the below links are the most important ones you should start with.

Exadata Upgrade to OL7 and to Oracle 19c

–Mike…

AutoUpgrade: Where do you find all the logfiles?

Posted on July 16, 2019 by Mike.Dietrich AutoUpgrade 16

AutoUpgrade: Where do you find all the logfiles? In the previous blog posts you could read about how to create the configuration file, adjust it and tweak the init parameters for the AutoUpgrade tool. And then I described the different modes of it. In this blog post I’d like to give you some insights into AutoUpgrade: Where do you find all the logfiles?

AutoUpgrade: Where do you find all the logfiles?

AutoUpgrade – Step-by-step

AutoUpgrade: ANALYZE, FIXUPS, UPGRADE and DEPLOY modes

Posted on July 12, 2019 by Mike.Dietrich AutoUpgrade 51

Photo by Debby Hudson on Unsplash

In the previous blog posts I explained mainly how to create, alter and tweak the configuration file for the AutoUpgrade tool. By now you should have your config file set up and adjusted for your environment(s). Let me go a step further and explain the different processing modes of AutoUpgrade: ANALYZE, FIXUPS, UPGRADE and DEPLOY modes. Then you’ll have a precise idea what the tool is actually doing, and how it operates.

AutoUpgrade – Step-by-step

How long can you provision database version X in the Cloud? – NEW

Posted on November 26, 2018 by Mike.Dietrich Cloud Release Schedule 0

A few weeks ago I published a blog post about provisioning dates in Oracle Cloud environments for different databases releases. As we did an important update, I rewrite today: How long can you provision database version X in the Cloud? – NEW.

What has changed since the original post?

The key point in the previous blog post was:

“And by end of this calendar year, the option to provision an Oracle 12.2.0.1 instance will go away. The same will happen in less than 1 year with Oracle 11.2.0.4 instances.”.

With “this calendar year” I pointed to end of 2018. …

July 2018 Update, Revision, BPs, PSUs – delays and other issues

Posted on July 20, 2018 by Mike.Dietrich Patch Recommendation 7

This is a Friday morning blog post. And actually I had no intention to write it. I don’t mean it offensive. But yesterday I received an interesting email from Frits Hoogland from Enkitec/Accenture. Frits asked me about the July RUR and some unlogic things on MOS. Once I had answered his email, the next question came in. Hence, I thought I need to write something about our July 2018 Update, Revision, BPs, PSUs – delays and other issues.

From being on stage at last year’s DOAG Conference for a “Patching Forum” I know that things aren’t as …

Database

When and where will it happen?

Why are patches missing?

Overview

What is the symptom?

Heads Up!

What’s the story?

Your Upgrade / Migration / Patching Track at OCW2022

The more you patch, the worse it gets

What has been certified?

DBMS_OPTIM_BUNDLE – a quick recap

When will it happen?

What happens?

Unified Auditing

Which database version can be used with Grid Infrastructure 19c?

DOHDATABASE … huh?

Before Oracle Database 18c

Do you?

What is a Gold Image?

AutoUpgrade – Step-by-step

AutoUpgrade – Step-by-step

What has changed since the original post?

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