Datapatch

Patching process changes with MRPs

I blogged about the Monthly Recommended Patches (MRP) several times before. And due to the feedback you and we had given, a few things got changed. The main change is from having the MRP bundled as a system patch making opatchauto a requirement. See below what Patching process changes with MRPs were implemented recently.

Before …

As you could read already in:

the introduction of the MRPs added one major flaw: They’ve been built as system patches which made …

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Virtual Classroom Seminar 16: Release and Patching Strategy for Oracle 19c and 23c

There are just two days left to sign up for our Virtual Classroom Seminar 16: Release and Patching Strategy for Oracle 19c and 23c. We’ll talk to you on Wednesday, May 10 at 16:00h CET.

What’s the topic?

We’ll try to cover everything for your best release and patching strategy with Oracle Database 19c of course, but also moving forward to Oracle Database 23c. Our big focus will be several aspects of patching. You’ll hear us talking not only about standard database patching but especially about patching in RAC environments.

We’ll put together a …

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Datapatch may be slower when Traditional and Unified Auditing are on

I wrote several times especially about Unified Auditing in the past. It is a very efficient and useful way to audit operations in the database. But you need to be a bit careful about what’s on, and what isn’t. Now we recently had a customer case where it was clearly proven that Datapatch may be slower when Traditional and Unified Auditing are on. But how can this happen?

Recapping Traditional Auditing

At first, I am neither a security not an auditing expert. But I played quite a bit with Unified Auditing over the …

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

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.

 

What is the symptom?

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

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Applying the MRP from December 2022 to Oracle 19c

Well, couldn’t there be a nicer pre-Christmas present than the December 2022 Monthly Recommended Patches (MRP)? You know, I’m just kidding. But since I received the first questions from customers – and before I send an email internally – I wanted to try out Applying the MRP from December 2022 to Oracle 19c.

 

Download the December MRP

Actually you need to access MOS Note: 888.1 -Primary Note for Database Proactive Patch Program since the link is not in MOS Note: 555.1 – Oracle Database 19c Important Recommended One-Off Patches even though it …

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Patching all my environments with the October 2022 Bundle Patches

Oh yes, it is patching time (again). And this time I somehow missed the slot since the quarterly critical patch updates got released right during Oracle Cloud World. Since I didn’t want to stretch the hotel WiFi too much – and since I wouldn’t have had enough time to install and write-up this blog post, I do it now with a week of delay. So as usual every quarter, follow me for patching all my environments with the October 2022 Bundle Patches.

As usual, an important annotation upfront: I patch in-place due to …

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Two recent issues you may need one-off patches for

Uh … my blog counter tells me I have 57 unanswered comments in the queue at the moment. Forgive me, but July and August so far were really very busy months with some travel activity as well. And another proof that I’m not used to travel anymore: Last week I forgot the power adapter for my Mac at home and just realized it when I pulled out my Mac to do emails. Anyhow, this is a short Monday-vacation-time-blog post about two recent issues you may need one-off patches for since you otherwise may get trapped by them as well. Both …

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Patching most of my environments with the July 2022 Bundle Patches

It’s brutally hot out there. It must be July. And I sit in my cool basement office and start my quarterly patching journey hoping that you can enjoy the sun and the sea somewhere. It is time to do my usual exercise, this time Patching most of my environments with the July 2022 Patch Bundles.

As usual, an important annotation upfront: I patch in-place due to space issues. But in reality, you please patch always out-of-place with a separate home. Please see this blog post about how to apply the RU directly

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How to speed up datapatch – and much more information

Ok, I promised to write more about patching speed. And this blog post will be just the root post targeting datapatch speed. I will link also to blog posts I’ve written before but also share knowledge which may not be obvious at first stage. The overall topic will be How to speed up datapatch – and much more information.

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What is datapatch

Let me start at the ground level and explain what datapatch is and why it exists.

When you are still on Oracle Database 11g, you may wonder what datapatch …

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How to speed up your database and GI patching

Several of you mailed me already and commented. And I know that I promised this blog post for weeks, if not longer. So let me try to explain How to speed up your database and GI patching. Since this blog post has a longer history, I’d say far over 6 months, it will be a bit longer than the usual posts. At when I started writing it, I decided to split it up into several pieces to make it more digestible but also to allow easier finding of certain topics. I hope it may help easing some recent patching …

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Patching all my environments with the April 2022 Patch Bundles

Easter time is patching time. And since I was hiking and biking every day the last week up in the Northern Italian mountains, this blog post is coming with a slight delay. But better late than never. Time to show you my usual exercise, this time Patching all my environments with the April 2022 Patch Bundles.

As usual, an important annotation upfront: I patch in-place due to space issues. But in reality, you please patch always out-of-place with a separate home. Please see this blog post about how to apply the RU

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What does datapatch do when you have different components in PDBs?

The last weeks, literally weeks, I have spent a lot of time with several patching topics. And in order to clean up my inbox a bit I will dump the learning into several blog posts. This one today will be about an interesting case I came across when a customer ran into problems with the runtime of datapatch in an ExaCC environment. Hence, today’s topic will be: What does datapatch do when you have different components in PDBs?

Annotation

If you are on 19.16.0 or higher, than you can safely ignore this blog post

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Patching all my environments with the January 2022 Patch Bundles

It’s patching time. When I checked an SR and had a quick discussion with a customer yesterday, Peter reminded me that it’s patching day. And at about 20:00h CET the new patch bundles appeared on MOS. So let me show you again Patching all my environments with the January 2022 Patch Bundles for 11.2.0.4, 12.2.0.1, 19c and 21c.

As usual, an important annotation upfront: I patch in-place due to space issues. But in reality, you please patch always out-of-place with a separate home. Please see this blog post about how to apply the

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Patching all my environments with the October 2021 Patch Bundles

My calendar has no error or NLS conversion issue – I was just way to busy the past two months with seminars. But today a colleague asked me whether my 21.4 install reports a 21.3 Build Label in the trace files. And this reminded me that I should now finally apply the patch bundles from October 2021 to our Hands-On Lab environment. So again, another blog post about Patching all my environments with the October 2021 Patch Bundles.

Patching all my environments with the October 2021 Patch Bundles

Photo by NCI on Unsplash

As usual, an important annotation upfront: I patch in-place due to space issues. But in reality, you …

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Patching all my environments with the July 2021 Patch Bundles

It’s patching day again. Hurray! Or not. I realize that at patching day, the 19c bundles are all missing. So wrote this blog post a bit after the usual release day. In my case this will include Oracle 19.12.0 RU and the July 2021 RU for Oracle 12.2.0.1. Please find the details about Patching all my environments with the July 2021 Patch Bundles below.

As usual, an important annotation upfront: I patch in-place due to space issues. But in reality, you please patch always out-of-place with a separate home. Please see this blog post

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

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.

What happens?

Take …

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Important Recommended Patches for Oracle Database 19c

It took a while – but now you can find a new MyOracle Support (MOS) Note with a list of Important Recommended Patches for Oracle Database 19c. It is actually a must-read, regardless whether you are upgrading or migration to 19c, or in case you are already on 19c.

What do you get?

Please check MOS Note: 2720807.1 – Oracle Database 19c Important Recommended One-off Patches. It gives you a list of important fixes for Oracle Database 19c. In the initial version of the note you could select for each available Release …

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Patching all my environments with the January 2021 Patch Bundles

Groundhog day on the upgrade blog. It’s time for my quaterly Patching all my environments with the January 2021 Patch Bundles blog post. And still no RAC and ASM. Sorry for that … too many virtual events and other tasks since months unfortunately.

Patching all my environments with the January 2021 Patch Bundles

Photo by Bofu Shaw on Unsplash

As usual, an important annotation upfront: I patch in-place due to space issues. But in reality, you please patch always out-of-place with a separate home. Please see this blog post about how to apply the RU directly when you provision a new home with OUI.

Security Alert January 2021

Find …

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Patching all my environments with the October 2020 Patch Bundles

I have to confess: Time didn’t allow to rearrange my lab yet to have GI and ASM. Hence, this will be another blog post about Patching all my environments with the October 2020 Patch Bundles with only non-RAC patching. But it is in the works …

As usual, an important annotation upfront: I patch in-place due to space issues. But in reality, you please patch always out-of-place with a separate home. Please see this blog post about how to apply the RU directly when you provision a new home with OUI.

Security Alert

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Upgrade fails with ORA-20001 during datapatch run

I encountered this issue now multiple times in my own environment. And I searched MOS and tried different things. But I couldn’t solve it yet. My Upgrade fails with ORA-20001 during datapatch run – and I’d like to show you how to bring the upgrade to an successful end.

Upgrade fails with ORA-20001 during datapatch run

Photo by chuttersnap on Unsplash

It all starts with an upgrade

In my lab environment I upgrade two databases often in parallel. An 11.2.0.4 database and a 12.2.0.1. The 11.2.0.4 upgrades always flawless. But the 12.2.0.1 occasionally fails. This is the screen AutoUpgrade is showing me – but this is not …

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datapatch and OPatch documentation and MOS note

Did you ever ask yourself whether there is documentation available for OPatch and for datapatch? It is not easy to find. And you won’t find it under “Database” in the Oracle Bookshelf. So today I would like to guide you in this short blog post to the datapatch and OPatch documentation and MOS note.

OPatch? Datapatch?

Just to recap: You use OPatch (or opatchauto) to apply the binaries to an Oracle installation. As a result, you change the second or the third number of the release from Oracle 19.5.0 to Oracle 19.8.0. But …

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Patching all my environments with the July 2020 Patch Bundles

Quarterly routine: When the new security alert get published, then it is patching time again. I’ll show you as usual how Patching all my environments with the July 2020 Patch Bundles works. And I heard your comments – in the next round in October, I will do this for GI and OJVM most likely, too. If not earlier …

And just an important annotation upfront: I patch in-place due to space issues. But in reality, you please patch always out-of-place with a separate home.

Security Alert July 2020

This is the Security Alert for

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Do you need STARTUP UPGRADE for OJVM?

Actually I carry around this topic with me since the October 2019 workshop in Dubai. We’ve had one of these OJVM Patching discussions I’d like to escape usually. Anyhow, during this session, it dawned me that the STARTUP UPGRADE requirement in the OJVM readme may be not correct anymore. So the question will be: Do you need STARTUP UPGRADE for OJVM?

Do you need STARTUP UPGRADE for OJVM?

Photo by Nik Shuliahin on Unsplash

A little bit of history

You will find a good amount of blog posts about OJVM here. OJVM stands for Oracle Java Virtual Machine. It is a very powerful thing and allows you …

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Patching all my environments with the Oct 2019 Patch Bundles

Yesterday I blogged about the Oct 2019 Patch Bundles being available for download. And while I wrote this blog post, I downloaded all of them for my environments. Here I’d like to share with you the most simple path to apply them. As I have no cluster or ASM, I don’t have to patch Grid Infrastructure. And I don’t even have OJVM in any of my databases right now. Due to space constraints in my lab environment I will apply the patches in-place. You shouldn’t do this but instead use always a new home you patch. This allows you …

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