After several HDDs were replaced in a FCO (Field Change Operation) by Oracle Support on two ODAs, we ran into an unpleasent ORA-600 [kfdJoin3], which resulted in ASM disk groups not mounting, thereby causing the CRS stack to not startup properly. … [Read more...]
Oracle Database Appliance X3-2 Introduced by Oracle
Oracle introduced the new Database Appliance X3-2 March 5, 2013 and it brings some exciting specs and usability that has been greatly anticipated from the community. It further changes the scene from "RAC-in-a-box" to "Virtual Machines in-a-box".. … [Read more...]
10 Things I Love About RMAN
I was looking at an old backup script the other day. We acquired a new client who was stiil using shell scripts to execute hot tablespace backups and it got me thinking about how much I take RMAN for granted these days. Remember how meticulous we used to be about backup shell scripts? In the "old days" you had to manage everything in the scripts … [Read more...]
Jeremiah Wilton published in the latest Oak Table press book!
"Expert Oracle Practices: Oracle Database Administration from the Oak Table" was just released and it features our own Jeremiah Wilton's thoughts on running Oracle on Amazon Elastic Cloud Compute (EC2). As an official Amazon Web Services partner, Blue Gecko has adopted EC2 as a primary database hosting platform, and Jeremiah is leading the charge. … [Read more...]
Oracle Correction to Export/Import
If you don't get alerts regularly from Oracle Support you may have missed this notice: If you conducted an import or export of an Oracle10g Release 2 or 11g Release 1 database prior to September 11, 2009, you should follow the instructions in My Oracle Support Knowledge Document 1055539.1 to verify the privileges in your database. This is because a … [Read more...]
Metalink wget download script
Looking for a simpler way to download from the new Metalink? Oracle has replaced the ftp site with http downloads using wget. If you’re looking for a simple way to use wget without all of that cutting-and-pasting from the web site, you can use a simple script like this: #!/bin/bash # Program: download.sh # Description: Download Oracle … [Read more...]
6 things to do after an Oracle Apps R12 install
OK, so there are a ton of things to do right after a fresh R12 install. And before anyone says anything, I know each of my steps has multiple steps; I though 6 things made a simpler blog title, that's all. Nevertheless, below are the major tasks I think every Apps DBA should do right away before letting anyone log in. I call these out for two … [Read more...]
Disable Flash for Oracle Metalink
If you want to improve certain aspects of Oracle's new Flash-based Metalink, you can do so by disabling Flash. In Firefox or IE you can disable Flash discretely; in Safari, you need to disable all plugins. Once Flash is disabled, log out of and back in to your browser and go to http://metalink.oracle.com. On the right, near the bottom, there … [Read more...]
9 reasons why the new Metalink sucks
I know I’m not alone, and I know I’m not the first to express displeasure, but let me just say: AAAARRRRRRRGHHHH!!!!! I’m going to call the new Metalink “Metaflash.” Seems like a good name for it. It combines “meta” and “flash” which sounds really hip and technical, yet communicates nothing. Kind of like shoving “i” or “e” in front of a … [Read more...]
How to hire a really good Oracle DBA
Many of our customers have internal database administrators. FACT: Any remote DBA organization, and I mean ANY one of them, should be excited to work with a talented on-site person; in fact, part of good remote DBA support should be to help clients hire good DBAs when appropriate. Without fail, collaboration between solid, focused technical … [Read more...]
Converting Hexadecimal Oracle SCNs to Decimal
Oracle serializes transactions and manages concurrency and recovery using an ever-increasing number called a system change number, or SCN. Usually, we see these numbers expressed in decimal, in places like the v$ views and the alert log. Occasionally, however, Oracle's code expresses SCNs in hexadecimal. Unfortunately, you can't just perform a … [Read more...]
ORA-00054: resource busy and acquire with NOWAIT specified
When trying to perform DDL such as truncate, drop or alter on Oracle objects that are in use by other users, you may encounter the error ORA-00054: resource busy and acquire with NOWAIT specified. This occurs even if you acquire an exclusive DML lock on the table using lock table. Locking a table does not guarantee the success of any subsequent DDL … [Read more...]