How to Move USER_SDO_GEOM_METADATA like a Grandpa

Sometimes moving a small amount of data in Oracle database requires more work than the actual task you need to complete. DBAs always have their tools (PL/SQL Developer Text Importer is my favorite one) to move a small amount of data between databases.
But when it comes to nested tables this might be a bit challenging. USER_SDO_GEOM_METADATA table (for those of you who are not familiar with it, it is the catalog information of spatial layers in an Oracle database) has no exception to that. Here how it is easy to handle it
The structure of USER_SDO_GEOM_METADATA table has the following structure

SQL> desc user_sdo_geom_metadata
 Name					   Null?    Type
 ----------------------------------------- -------- ----------------------------
 TABLE_NAME				   NOT NULL VARCHAR2(32)
 COLUMN_NAME				   NOT NULL VARCHAR2(1024)
 DIMINFO					    MDSYS.SDO_DIM_ARRAY
 SRID						    NUMBER

Obviously DIMINFO column is the problematic part since it is in SDO_DIM_ARRAY type. Now create a temporary table by unfolding this nested table at the source database site.

CREATE TABLE temp_metadata AS 
  SELECT t.table_name, 
         t.column_name, 
         d.*, 
         t.srid 
  FROM   user_sdo_geom_metadata t, 
         TABLE(t.diminfo) d; 

Once you are done check the structure of temp_metadata table which only contains primitive SQL types for the columns

SQL> desc temp_metadata
 Name					   Null?    Type
 ----------------------------------------- -------- ----------------------------
 TABLE_NAME					    VARCHAR2(32)
 COLUMN_NAME					    VARCHAR2(1024)
 SDO_DIMNAME					    VARCHAR2(64)
 SDO_LB 					    NUMBER
 SDO_UB 					    NUMBER
 SDO_TOLERANCE					    NUMBER
 SRID						    NUMBER

Choose your favorite tool to move this table to the target database since it contains just a few rows. Then as the final step import this data into USER_SDO_GEOM_METADATA table at the target database (Ensure that there is no other record with the same table_name.column_name key on the target USER_SDO_GEOM_METADATA table otherwise trigger on it will warn you)

insert into user_sdo_geom_metadata
SELECT m.table_name, m.column_name,
   CAST(MULTISET(SELECT sdo_dimname,sdo_lb,SDO_UB,sdo_tolerance
                 FROM temp_metadata n
                 WHERE n.table_name = m.table_name and n.column_name = m.column_name)
   AS SDO_DIM_ARRAY) as diminfo,
   m.srid
FROM (select distinct table_name,column_name,srid from temp_metadata) m;
commit;

You are done! Check everything works fine at the application site.

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Physical vs Logical Blocksize on ASMLib Devices

As you all may know, ASMLib is a recommended module for Oracle databases running on Linux platforms and it is an embedded module for UEK (Oracle Unbreakable Kernel) users. Oracle announced that (two years ago or so) they will no longer maintain ASMLib for Red Hat compatible kernel but this does not mean that they abandon the project, rather it is mainly related to the effort they need to put in maintaining the module for multiple kernel versions.

A while ago, Oracle added a new feature to ASMLib allowing ASM devices to choose between physical or logical block sizes in I/O operations. This should be, I believe, a fail-back mechanism for SSD devices used as ASM disks. Many SSD devices use 4K block size however Linux still uses default 512 bytes logical block size for those devices in the same way it does for motor disks. In early releases of ASMLib (oracleasm-support-2.1.7 and earlier), ASM uses physical block size (4K for SSDs). This is still the default behavior in oracleasm-support-2.1.8 but now sysadmin can choose between physical and logical blocksize by using [-b|-p] switches in oracleasm-configure.sh script.

• -b|—logical-blocks sets logical blocksize usage
• -p|—physical-blocks set physical blocksize usage

Those switches set /sys/module/oracleasm/parameters/use_logical_block_size which is default to be false (use physical blocksize). So that asmlib module can use the value to decide which block size to use.

Upgrade to Oracle Enterprise Linux 5.9 and/so UEK2

I have upgraded one of my Oracle Linux boxes to Oracle Linux Release 5.9 which introduces several new things (Release Notes). Just to mention three of them

• java-1.7.0-openjdk
• firefox 10 (Although we have discuss to install latest version of it in Oracle Enterprise Linux for Home User: Install Latest Firefox Version )
• uek2 vanilla kernel branched from Linux Kernel Release 3.0.36
  • BTRFS
  • Transparent Huge Pages

Download and update yum repository file

[root@localhost yum.repos.d]$ cd /etc/yum.repos.d
[root@localhost yum.repos.d]$ wget http://public-yum.oracle.com/public-yum-el5.repo
[root@localhost yum.repos.d]$ mv public-yum-el5.repo.1 public-yum-el5.repo
[root@localhost yum.repos.d]$ grep -B 5 enabled=1 public-yum-el5.repo
[el5_latest]
name=Oracle Linux $releasever Latest ($basearch)
baseurl=http://public-yum.oracle.com/repo/OracleLinux/OL5/latest/$basearch/
gpgkey=http://public-yum.oracle.com/RPM-GPG-KEY-oracle-el5
gpgcheck=1
enabled=1
--
[ol5_u9_base]
name=Oracle Linux $releasever Update 9 installation media copy ($basearch)
baseurl=http://public-yum.oracle.com/repo/OracleLinux/OL5/9/base/$basearch/
gpgkey=http://public-yum.oracle.com/RPM-GPG-KEY-oracle-el5
gpgcheck=1
enabled=1
--
[ol5_UEK_latest]
name=Latest Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel for Oracle Linux $releasever ($basearch)
baseurl=http://public-yum.oracle.com/repo/OracleLinux/OL5/UEK/latest/$basearch/
gpgkey=http://public-yum.oracle.com/RPM-GPG-KEY-oracle-el5
gpgcheck=1
enabled=1

We are ready to upgrade

[root@localhost yum.repos.d]$ yum update

Rebounce Linux

[root@localhost yum.repos.d]$ reboot

Before

Check Oracle Linux Version

[oracle@localhost ~]$ cat /etc/oracle-release
Oracle Linux Server release 5.8

Check kernel version

[oracle@localhost ~]$ uname -a
Linux localhost.localdomain 2.6.32-300.32.2.el5uek #1 SMP Tue Aug 28 10:15:29 EDT 2012 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux

Check your memory page size

[oracle@localhost ~]$ getconf PAGESIZE
4096

After

Once you are done after reboot, check Oracle Linux Version

[oracle@localhost ~]$ cat /etc/oracle-release
Oracle Linux Server release 5.9

Check kernel version

[oracle@localhost ~]$ uname -a
Linux localhost.localdomain 2.6.39-300.28.1.el5uek #1 SMP Tue Feb 5 10:15:29 PST 2013 x86_64 x86_64 x86_64 GNU/Linux

Check your memory page size

[oracle@localhost ~]$ getconf PAGESIZE
4096

Ooops!!! No change ?

[root@localhost ~]$ cat /sys/kernel/mm/transparent_hugepage/enabled 
[always] madvise never

Actually transparent huge page allocation is enabled but it deserves a separate discussion

How to Disable Automatic SGA Management on 11g Release 2

Login database using

sqlplus / as sysdba

Dump the pfile using existing spfile

SQL> create pfile='/home/oracle/Desktop/init.ora' from spfile;

File created.

Oracle will generate implicit parameters defining current sizing of the memory regions in SGA and write them at the top of generated pfile

orcl.__db_cache_size=79691776
orcl.__java_pool_size=4194304
orcl.__large_pool_size=4194304
orcl.__oracle_base='/u01/app/oracle'#ORACLE_BASE set from environment
orcl.__pga_aggregate_target=142606336
orcl.__sga_target=272629760
orcl.__shared_io_pool_size=0
orcl.__shared_pool_size=167772160
orcl.__streams_pool_size=4194304
.
.
.
*.memory_target=414187520
.
.
.

Edit the file to disable AMM and enable static SGA configuration by simply removing memory_target, oracle_base and shared_io_pool_size parameters and doing some make up

*.db_cache_size=79691776
*.java_pool_size=4194304
*.large_pool_size=4194304
*.pga_aggregate_target=142606336
*.sga_target=272629760
*.shared_pool_size=167772160
*.streams_pool_size=4194304
.
.
.

Rebounce database instance by using modified pfile.

SQL> shutdown immediate;
Database closed.
Database dismounted.
ORACLE instance shut down.

SQL> startup pfile='/home/oracle/Desktop/init.ora';
ORACLE instance started.

Total System Global Area  271400960 bytes
Fixed Size                  2227544 bytes
Variable Size             180355752 bytes
Database Buffers           83886080 bytes
Redo Buffers                4931584 bytes
Database mounted.
Database opened.

Once you ensure that new pfile works, recreate new spfile using this pfile (refer to How to move ASM spfile to a different disk group [ID 1082943.1] if your target is ASM diskgroup)

SQL> create spfile using pfile='/home/oracle/Desktop/init.ora';

File created.

Finally rebounce the database by using new spfile

SQL> startup force;
ORACLE instance started.

Total System Global Area  271400960 bytes
Fixed Size                  2227544 bytes
Variable Size             180355752 bytes
Database Buffers           83886080 bytes
Redo Buffers                4931584 bytes
Database mounted.
Database opened.

Slides and Offline Recording of my NYOUG Webinar

I have announced my webinar on Oracle ZFS Storage Appliance for Exadata Backup & Recovery in NYOUG DBA webinar series. You can download webinar slides and voice recod from NYOUG web site

Grow Oracle Linux Root Filesystem

It is always the case that in my Linux VM installations I run out of root file system space and need to grow it (I can hear you experienced admin, I should create another filesystem for my use and not use root file system for my joy). Here are the steps to grow root filesystem for Oracle Linux running on VMware:

Click on the wrench symbol to go to your virtual machine configuration menu

Choose Hard Disk (SCSI) menu to increase the size of an availabe virtual disk (in this case your root file system disk)

Grow your virtual disk to a proper size (In this case I grow it form 28GB to 34GB)

Now you can start your Oracle Linux on VM*.

First step at guest OS (Oracle Linux) is to grow disk partition size using fdisk. Here are the steps assuming that your root file system is on /dev/sda2 partition

1. fdisk /dev/sda
2. d (to delete)
3. 2 (to delete partition 2)
4. n (to create a new partition)
5. p (to create a new partition with primary type)
6. 2 (to create a new primary partition with id 2)
7. Accept all defaults (to create a new primary partition with default offset and fully covering virtual disk you have already provisioned)
8. w (write partition table)

Once you are done with disk partition modification rebounce Oracle Linux to ensure partition tables are read by Linux.

Once the guest OS is back, resize physical volume using pvresize. We will add 6GB (slightly less maybe) to existing physical partition using pvresize command

pvresize --setphysicalvolumesize 31G /dev/sda2

Now we can grow logical volume by 6GB

lvresize -L +6G /dev/VolGroup00/LogVol00

Final step is to grow file system online using resize2fs

resize2fs /dev/VolGroup00/LogVol00

You are done. You can continue filling root file system  🙂

* Before starting it is a good decision to protect your existing VM guest by using VMware snapshots.

NYOUG SIG Webinar: Oracle ZFS Storage Appliance for Exadata Backup & Recovery

In Friday December 14, 2012 at 12:00 PM -1:00 PM EDT I will be giving a webinar for NYOUG SIG with the following abstract
When it comes to the backup and recovery infrastructure of the Exadata Database Machine, conventional solutions often have only limited performance to keep up with Exadata throughput, whereas Oracle ZFS Storage Appliance can be configured as a very fast, capable, and easy-to-manage backup and recovery solution for any Exadata environment. In this session Husnu Sensoy will describe some of the configuration possibilities of the ZFS Storage Appliance to create a flexible backup and recovery environment for Exadata, as well as various tuning do’s and dont’s to maximize your backup and recovery performance.

Join me to hear more about ZFS Storage Appliance and Exadata.

Oracle Enterprise Linux for Home User: Install Latest Firefox Version

It is a joy to use Linux for any purpose. Although Oracle Linux is mainly designed for enterprise stack, a stable operating system for a technical user is always a need.

However default configurations and program versions are not suitable for daily use always. One example of this is Firefox 3.0.6 available in Oracle Linux (or Red Hat). Here is how you can upgrade it to 17.0

Download latest Firefox release from Mozilla web page. Then unpack and install it by simply following.

tar -xjvf firefox-17.0.tar.bz2
cp -r firefox /opt/
ln -sf /opt/firefox/firefox /usr/bin/firefox

Oracle Day 2012 Presentation

We are back from OOW 2012 and now it is time to broadcast what we learn in San Francisco. So as a TROUG Founder I will be presenting my Open World Session in Turkey this time. Join me if you wish to hear more about data mining, optimisation,etc. this time in Turkish.

Here are session details:

• What: Veri Madenciligi Veritabaninda Yapilir: Uygulamalariyla Oracle R Enterprise ve Oracle Data Mining Opsiyonu (Database Data Mining: Practical Enterprise R and Oracle Advanced Analytics)
• When: 15th of November 2012 14:20 – 14:50
• Where: Istanbul Kongre Merkezi, Taskisla Caddesi Harbiye 34367, Istanbul/Turkiye

Join me and learn that BI is not about filtering tables, rotating tables, combining and aggregating tables without knowing the actual reason of doing them 🙂

By the way here are other TROUG Sessions in Oracle Day 2012

Oracle R Enterprise Configuration on Oracle Linux

Before starting to deal with large volumes of data problems on Oracle R Enterprise (ORE) you need to perform a couple of configurations over your Oracle Linux and Oracle Database systems. Here is the recipe:

• Ensure that you have the following lines in your oracle users .bash_profile file

  export R_HOME=/usr/lib64/R
  export PATH=/usr/bin:$PATH
  

• Ensure that you have already installed libpng.x86_64 and libpng-devel.x86_64 packages on your Oracle Linux otherwise issue to install them.

  yum install libpng.x86_64 libpng-devel.x86_64
  

• Switch to root and issue R. Once you are in R session, install two prerequisites of ORE:

  install.packages("DBI")
  install.packages("png")
  

• Ensure that your database is 11.2.0.3 otherwise refer you need to apply several database patches:
• Go to Oracle R Enterprise Download Page and download Oracle R Enterprise Server Install for Oracle Database on Linux 64-bit (91M) and Oracle R Enterprise Client Supporting Packages for Linux 64-bit Platform (1M)  (ore-server-linux-x86-64-1.1.zip and ore-supporting-linux-x86-64-1.1.zip) under Oracle R Enterprise Downloads (v1.1) section
• Unzip the file by issuing

  unzip ore-server-linux-x86-64-1.1.zip ore-supporting-linux-x86-64-1.1.zip
  

• At this point ensure that your database to support Oracle R Enterprise is up and running
• Execute install.sh in order to create ORE libraries and database objects into SYS and RQSYS schemas.

  cd server
  ./install.sh
  

  
Oracle R Enterprise 1.1 Server Installation.

  Copyright (c) 2012, Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved.

  Do you wish to proceed? [yes]

  Checking R ................... Pass
  Checking R libraries ......... Pass
  Checking ORACLE_HOME ......... Pass
  Checking ORACLE_SID .......... Pass
  Checking sqlplus ............. Pass
  Checking ORE ................. Pass

  Choosing RQSYS tablespaces
  PERMANENT tablespace to use for RQSYS [SYSAUX]:
  TEMPORARY tablespace to use for RQSYS [TEMP]:

  Current configuration
  R_HOME = /usr/lib64/R
  R_LIBS_USER = /u01/app/oracle/product/11.2.0/dbhome_1/R/library
  ORACLE_HOME = /u01/app/oracle/product/11.2.0/dbhome_1
  ORACLE_SID = orcl
  PERMANENT tablespace = SYSAUX
  TEMPORARY tablespace = TEMP

  Installing libraries ......... Pass
  Installing RQSYS ............. Pass
  Installing ORE packages ...... Pass
  Creating ORE script .......... Pass

  NOTE: To use ORE functionality, a database user with RQROLE role,
  a few more grants and synonyms is required. A complete list of
  requirements is available in rquser.sql. There is also a demo
  script demo_user.sh creating a new user RQUSER.

  To use embedded R functionality, an RQADMIN role is required.
  Please, consult the documentation for more information on various
  roles.

  Done


• Finally install some required R libraries/packages by using install.packages command in R. Ensure that user (root will do that) you will start R has a write permission on /usr/lib64/R/library

  install.packages("/home/oracle/Desktop/server/ORE_1.1_R_x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu.tar.gz", repos = NULL)
  install.packages("/home/oracle/Desktop/server/OREbase_1.1_R_x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu.tar.gz", repos = NULL)
  install.packages("/home/oracle/Desktop/server/OREeda_1.1_R_x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu.tar.gz", repos = NULL)
  install.packages("/home/oracle/Desktop/server/OREgraphics_1.1_R_x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu.tar.gz", repos = NULL)
  install.packages("/home/oracle/Desktop/server/OREstats_1.1_R_x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu.tar.gz", repos = NULL)
  install.packages("/home/oracle/Desktop/server/ORExml_1.1_R_x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu.tar.gz", repos = NULL)
  install.packages("/home/oracle/Desktop/supporting/ROracle_1.1-2_R_x86_64-unknown-linux-gnu.tar.gz", repos = NULL)
  

• Finally start a R session (ensure that $ORACLE_HOME/lib is in your LD_LIBRARY_PATH before starting R session) and load ORE library

  library(ORE)
  Loading required package: OREbase
  Loading required package: ROracle
  Loading required package: DBI
  
  Attaching package: 'OREbase'
  
  The following object(s) are masked from 'package:base':
  
      cbind, data.frame, eval, interaction, order, paste, pmax, pmin,
      rbind, table
  
  Loading required package: OREstats
  Loading required package: MASS
  Loading required package: OREgraphics
  Loading required package: OREeda
  Loading required package: ORExml