Best Practice - cloning K460 & Oracle

[Tim Krego_2]

I'm in need of advice.

I have a K460/AutoRAID running Oracle 8.1.6, our production and development databases.

I have another K460 with four 4GB HD's that I want to move our development database to.

My original idea was to do a fresh install of HP/UX 11.0, Oracle 8.1.6, and WebDB 2.2 on the new dev machine. I thought that would be a great way to learn more about HP and Oracle administration. I'm really a MCSE guy switching to HP/UX-Oracle at work.

Now after many weeks of slow progress I'd like to just get the box up and running. We just got a third K460 so I can still do the ground up install, when I find the time. ;)

What I have done so far is use make_tape_recovery to create a backup of the vg00 volume. I used that to the the vg00 on the new dev machine.

I'm thinking I can use fbackup to copy the Oracle software and database files.

My questions
------------

What way should I set up the three 4GB drives to hold files for the vg's other than vg00? Since I don't have an AutoRAID on the new dev this is what I did.

I originally made a vg of 12GB with the three drives. Then I tried to make links to match up my production vg's to the new dev vg's.

I have /p01, /p02, /p03 for the Oracle software, database files, and archive log files on the production machine.

Other than the AutoRAID and a 100Mb lan card in the production machine the machines are identical.

Any help pushing me in the right direction is mucho appreciated.

Thanks,
Tim

[A. Clay Stephenson]

Hi Tim:

If this were me, I think I would do a cold install of the OS, followed by an install of the latest patch bundle and any desired HP applications.

I would then do a fresh install of Oracle.

Now here's the neat part about getting your Oracle data over: All that matters is that all your datafiles/controlfiles/... retain the exact same absolute pathnames. Unless you are using rawdisk then as long as the mountpoints for these Oracle files are the same then it doesn't matter which volume group they are in. By convention, vg00 should be used for the base OS and nothing else. About the only thing you need to do is set up the symbolic link between ${ORACLE_HOME}/dbs/initSID.ora and the real file. If you follow this recipe then you can simply copy all your files over (while the database is shutdown) and you don't have to worry about export/import.

[David Burgess]

Hi Tim,

Sounds like you're busy!

OS - build from a make_recovery tape will work.
Add any drivers fot different cards. Patch the os etc.

I'd split the p01, p02 and p03 over the 3 disks in separate volume groups say vg01, vg02 and vg03 respectively. Install Oracle on the least used disk. Keep the indexes and data on separate disks. This is for performance. ie one disk is being read for data and one for indexes avoids head contention.
You'd be better off exporting the oracle database and then importing it on the new box.

Are you totally new to oracle? Do you have dba support?

Make sure you copy across files such as oratab listener.ora tnsnames.ora /etc/services etc.
Do this using ftp, tar, fbackup etc. Your choice!

HTH

Dave.

[harry d brown jr]

I agree with Clay, a fresh install is better, and you should think about a QA (Quality Assurance) machine, this way you can test changes before they hit production. K's are DIRT cheap now-a-days!

live free or die
harry

[David Burgess]

Forgot to say the ip address in tnsnames.ora will need to change to reflect the new machines ip address. Also any clients that have tnsnames.ora will also need to be updated.

Should be an interesting project.

Good luck!

Dave.

[David Burgess]

Good point. Probably best to cold install. It's cleaner. That way when you're done you'll know exactly how to build the server. Also you'll learn more that way.

Dave.

[Magdi KAMAL]

Hi Tim,

Since you are comming from Microsoft world, I would suggest that you do a fresh install rather than Ignite-UX. So you can really see all the steps installing and controlling the different levels ( it's a good exercice and you will learn alot ).

Once your HP-UX is installed and it's related latest patch bundles, you may start configuring the Logical Volume Manager, mirroring, file systems, gateway, users and groupes, etc...

You still can use the *SAM* tool which allow you to do the most of these tasks, but I would prefer in your first time to do it manually ( ie with commands so that you will be familiar with these commands and options )

Don't forget to note all your problems and solutions ( kind of activity journal, you may need it after ).

Install your Oracle engine to see what you are needing as variables, kernel parameters to be modify to meet the best performance

Then, when you can, play your database creation script to create your database by modifying the script to handle different mount points and paths. And then Export / Import will put data into your new database.

Nice luck.

Magdi

[Tim Krego_2]

Thanks to everyone for all the suggestions and tips.

I originally went with the fresh install route. Since I'm new to HP/UX, unix, and Oracle I thought it would be a good learning experience.

My company has sent me to HP/UX for experienced admins. I've also been to Oracle PL/SQL, DBA, Backup/Recovery classes. So I'm getting support on that end.

Our admin/dba quit and I'm stepping into that role. The good part about this whole situation is that our K-box just keeps running without problems. No reboots and as long as I don't change anything nothing mysterious happens. That wasn't my experience in the MS NT4 world.

Thanks again. This forum rocks.