Build Your Own Oracle RAC Cluster on Oracle Enterprise Linux and iSCSI (Continued)

The information in this guide is not validated by Oracle, is not supported by Oracle, and should only be used at your own risk; it is for educational purposes only.

12. Create "oracle" User and Directories
Perform the following tasks on both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster!
In this section we will create the oracle UNIX user account, recommended O/S groups, and all required directories. The following O/S groups will be created: Description | Oracle Privilege | Oracle Group Name | UNIX Group name | Oracle Inventory and Software Owner | | | oinstall | Database Administrator | SYSDBA | OSDBA | dba | Database Operator | SYSOPER | OSOPER | oper |
We will be using the Oracle Cluster File System, Release 2 (OCFS2) to store the files required to be shared for the Oracle Clusterware software. When using OCFS2, the UID of the UNIX user " oracle" and GID of the UNIX group " oinstall" must be the same on both of the Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster. If either the UID or GID are different, the files on the OCFS2 file system will show up as "unowned" or may even be owned by a different user. For this article, I will use 501 for the " oracle" UID and 501 for the " oinstall" GID.
Note that members of the UNIX group oinstall are considered the "owners" of the Oracle software. Members of the dba group can administer Oracle databases, for example starting up and shutting down databases. Members of the optional group oper have a limited set of database administrative privileges such as managing and running backups. The default name for this group is oper. To use this group, choose the "Custom" installation type to install the Oracle database software. In this article, we are creating the oracle user account to have all responsibilities!
Create Group and User for Oracle
Lets start this section by creating the UNIX oinstall and dba group and oracle user account: # groupadd -g 501 oinstall # groupadd -g 502 dba # groupadd -g 503 oper # useradd -m -u 501 -g oinstall -G dba,oper -d /home/oracle -s /bin/bash -c "Oracle Software Owner" oracle # id oracle uid=501(oracle) gid=501(oinstall) groups=501(oinstall),502(dba),503(oper) Set the password for the oracle account: # passwd oracle Changing password for user oracle. New UNIX password: xxxxxxxxxxx Retype new UNIX password: xxxxxxxxxxx passwd: all authentication tokens updated successfully. Verify That the User nobody Exists
Before installing the Oracle software, complete the following procedure to verify that the user nobody exists on the system: 1. To determine if the user exists, enter the following command: 2. # 3. 4. id nobody 5. uid=99(nobody) gid=99(nobody) groups=99(nobody) If this command displays information about the nobody user, then you do not have to create that user. 6. If the user nobody does not exist, then enter the following command to create it: 7. # 8. 9. /usr/sbin/useradd nobody 10. Repeat this procedure on all the other Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster.

Create the Oracle Base Directory
The next step is to create a new directory that will be used to store the Oracle Database software. When configuring the oracle user's environment (later in this section) we will be assigning the location of this directory to the $ORACLE_BASE environment variable.
The following assumes that the directories are being created in the root file system. Please note that this is being done for the sake of simplicity and is not recommended as a general practice. Normally, these directories would be created on a separate file system.
After the directory is created, you must then specify the correct owner, group, and permissions for it. Perform the following on both Oracle RAC nodes: # mkdir -p /u01/app/oracle # chown -R oracle:oinstall /u01/app/oracle # chmod -R 775 /u01/app/oracle At the end of this procedure, you will have the following: * /u01 owned by root. * /u01/app owned by root. * /u01/app/oracle owned by oracle:oinstall with 775 permissions. This ownership and permissions enables the OUI to create the oraInventory directory, in the path /u01/app/oracle/oraInventory.

Create the Oracle Clusterware Home Directory
Next, create a new directory that will be used to store the Oracle Clusterware software. When configuring the oracle user's environment (later in this section) we will be assigning the location of this directory to the $ORA_CRS_HOME environment variable.
As noted in the previous section, the following assumes that the directories are being created in the root file system. This is being done for the sake of simplicity and is not recommended as a general practice. Normally, these directories would be created on a separate file system.
After the directory is created, you must then specify the correct owner, group, and permissions for it. Perform the following on both Oracle RAC nodes: # mkdir -p /u01/app/crs # chown -R oracle:oinstall /u01/app/crs # chmod -R 775 /u01/app/crs At the end of this procedure, you will have the following: * /u01 owned by root. * /u01/app owned by root. * /u01/app/crs owned by oracle:oinstall with 775 permissions. These permissions are required for Oracle Clusterware installation and are changed during the installation process.

Create Mount Point for OCFS2 / Clusterware
Let's now create the mount point for the Oracle Cluster File System, Release 2 (OCFS2) that will be used to store the two Oracle Clusterware shared files.
Perform the following on both Oracle RAC nodes: # mkdir -p /u02 # chown -R oracle:oinstall /u02 # chmod -R 775 /u02 Create Login Script for oracle User Account
To ensure that the environment is setup correctly for the " oracle" UNIX userid on both Oracle RAC nodes, use the following .bash_profile:
Note: When you are setting the Oracle environment variables for each Oracle RAC node, ensure to assign each RAC node a unique Oracle SID! For this example, I used: * linux1: ORACLE_SID=racdb1 * linux2: ORACLE_SID=racdb2
Login to each node as the oracle user account: # su - oracle .bash_profile for "oracle" User Account | # .bash_profile # Get the aliases and functions if [ -f ~/.bashrc ]; then . ~/.bashrc fi alias ls="ls -FA" export JAVA_HOME=/usr/local/java # User specific environment and startup programs export ORACLE_BASE=/u01/app/oracle export ORACLE_HOME=$ORACLE_BASE/product/10.2.0/db_1 export ORA_CRS_HOME=/u01/app/crs export ORACLE_PATH=$ORACLE_BASE/common/oracle/sql:.:$ORACLE_HOME/rdbms/admin export CV_JDKHOME=/usr/local/java # Each RAC node must have a unique ORACLE_SID. (i.e. racdb1, racdb2,...) export ORACLE_SID=racdb1 export PATH=.:${JAVA_HOME}/bin:${PATH}:$HOME/bin:$ORACLE_HOME/bin export PATH=${PATH}:/usr/bin:/bin:/usr/bin/X11:/usr/local/bin export PATH=${PATH}:$ORACLE_BASE/common/oracle/bin export ORACLE_TERM=xterm export TNS_ADMIN=$ORACLE_HOME/network/admin export ORA_NLS10=$ORACLE_HOME/nls/data export NLS_DATE_FORMAT="DD-MON-YYYY HH24:MI:SS" export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=$ORACLE_HOME/lib export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=${LD_LIBRARY_PATH}:$ORACLE_HOME/oracm/lib export LD_LIBRARY_PATH=${LD_LIBRARY_PATH}:/lib:/usr/lib:/usr/local/lib export CLASSPATH=$ORACLE_HOME/JRE export CLASSPATH=${CLASSPATH}:$ORACLE_HOME/jlib export CLASSPATH=${CLASSPATH}:$ORACLE_HOME/rdbms/jlib export CLASSPATH=${CLASSPATH}:$ORACLE_HOME/network/jlib export THREADS_FLAG=native export TEMP=/tmp export TMPDIR=/tmp |

13. Configure the Linux Servers for Oracle
Perform the following configuration procedures on both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster!
The kernel parameters and shell limits discussed in this section will need to be defined on both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster every time the machine is booted. This section provides information about setting those kernel parameters required for Oracle. Instructions for placing them in a startup script ( /etc/sysctl.conf) are included in Section 16 ("All Startup Commands for Both Oracle RAC Nodes").
Overview
This section focuses on configuring both Oracle RAC Linux servers - getting each one prepared for the Oracle RAC 10g installation. This includes verifying enough swap space, setting shared memory and semaphores, setting the maximum number of file handles, setting the IP local port range, setting shell limits for the oracle user, activating all kernel parameters for the system, and finally how to verify the correct date and time for both nodes in the cluster.
There are several different ways to configure (set) these parameters. For the purpose of this article, I will be making all changes permanent (through reboots) by placing all commands in the /etc/sysctl.conf file.
Swap Space Considerations * Installing Oracle Database 10g Release 2 on RHEL/OEL 5 requires a minimum of 1024MB of memory. (Note: An inadequate amount of swap during the installation will cause the Oracle Universal Installer to either "hang" or "die") * * To check the amount of memory you have, type: * # * * cat /proc/meminfo | grep MemTotal * MemTotal: * * * 2074084 kB * * * To check the amount of swap you have allocated, type: * # * * cat /proc/meminfo | grep SwapTotal * SwapTotal: * * * 4128760 kB * * * If you have less than 2048MB of memory (between your RAM and SWAP), you can add temporary swap space by creating a temporary swap file. This way you do not have to use a raw device or even more drastic, rebuild your system.
As root, make a file that will act as additional swap space, let's say about 500MB:

# dd if=/dev/zero of=tempswap bs=1k count=500000
Now we should change the file permissions:

# chmod 600 tempswap
Finally we format the "partition" as swap and add it to the swap space:

# mke2fs tempswap
# mkswap tempswap
# swapon tempswap
Configuring Kernel Parameters
Oracle Database 10g Release 2 on RHEL/OEL 5 requires the kernel parameter settings shown below. The values given are minimums, so if your system uses a larger value, do not change it: kernel.shmmax = 4294967295 kernel.shmall = 268435456 kernel.shmmni = 4096 kernel.sem = 250 32000 100 128 fs.file-max = 65536 net.ipv4.ip_local_port_range = 1024 65000 net.core.rmem_default=1048576 net.core.rmem_max=1048576 net.core.wmem_default=262144 net.core.wmem_max=262144
RHEL/OEL 5 already comes configured with default values defined for the following kernel parameters: kernel.shmall kernel.shmmax net.core.rmem_default net.core.rmem_max net.core.wmem_default net.core.wmem_max
Use the default values if they are the same or larger than the required values.
This article assumes a fresh new install of Oracle Enterprise Linux 5 and as such, many of the required kernel parameters are already set (see above). This being the case, you can simply copy / paste the following to both Oracle RAC nodes while logged in as root: # cat >> /etc/sysctl.conf <<EOF kernel.shmmni = 4096 kernel.sem = 250 32000 100 128 fs.file-max = 65536 net.ipv4.ip_local_port_range = 1024 65000 EOF The above command persisted the required kernel parameters through reboots by inserting them in the /etc/sysctl.conf startup file. Linux allows modification of these kernel parameters to the current system while it is up and running, so there's no need to reboot the system after making kernel parameter changes. To activate the new kernel parameter values for the currently running system, run the following as root on both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster: # sysctl -p net.ipv4.ip_forward = 0 net.ipv4.conf.default.rp_filter = 1 net.ipv4.conf.default.accept_source_route = 0 kernel.sysrq = 0 kernel.core_uses_pid = 1 net.ipv4.tcp_syncookies = 1 kernel.msgmnb = 65536 kernel.msgmax = 65536 kernel.shmmax = 4294967295 kernel.shmall = 268435456 net.core.rmem_default = 1048576 net.core.rmem_max = 1048576 net.core.wmem_default = 262144 net.core.wmem_max = 262144 kernel.shmmni = 4096 kernel.sem = 250 32000 100 128 fs.file-max = 65536 net.ipv4.ip_local_port_range = 1024 65000 Verify the new kernel parameter values by running the following on both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster: # /sbin/sysctl -a | grep shm vm.hugetlb_shm_group = 0 kernel.shmmni = 4096 kernel.shmall = 268435456 kernel.shmmax = 4294967295 # /sbin/sysctl -a | grep sem kernel.sem = 250 32000 100 128 # /sbin/sysctl -a | grep file-max fs.file-max = 65536 # /sbin/sysctl -a | grep ip_local_port_range net.ipv4.ip_local_port_range = 1024 65000 # /sbin/sysctl -a | grep 'core\.[rw]mem' net.core.rmem_default = 1048576 net.core.wmem_default = 262144 net.core.rmem_max = 1048576 net.core.wmem_max = 262144 Setting Shell Limits for the oracle User
To improve the performance of the software on Linux systems, Oracle recommends you increase the following shell limits for the oracle user: Shell Limit | Item in limits.conf | Hard Limit | Maximum number of open file descriptors | nofile | 65536 | Maximum number of processes available to a single user | nproc | 16384 |
To make these changes, run the following as root: cat >> /etc/security/limits.conf <<EOF oracle soft nproc 2047 oracle hard nproc 16384 oracle soft nofile 1024 oracle hard nofile 65536 EOF

cat >> /etc/pam.d/login <<EOF session required /lib/security/pam_limits.so EOF Update the default shell startup file for the "oracle" UNIX account. * For the Bourne, Bash, or Korn shell, add the following lines to the /etc/profile file by running the following command: * * cat >> /etc/profile <<EOF * if [ \$USER = "oracle" ]; then * if [ \$SHELL = "/bin/ksh" ]; then * ulimit -p 16384 * ulimit -n 65536 * else * ulimit -u 16384 -n 65536 * fi * umask 022 * fi * EOF * For the C shell (csh or tcsh), add the following lines to the /etc/csh.login file by running the following command: * * cat >> /etc/csh.login <<EOF * if ( \$USER == "oracle" ) then * limit maxproc 16384 * limit descriptors 65536 * endif * EOF Setting the Correct Date and Time on All Cluster Nodes
During the installation of Oracle Clusterware, the Database, and the Companion CD, the Oracle Universal Installer (OUI) first installs the software to the local node running the installer (i.e. linux1). The software is then copied remotely to all of the remaining nodes in the cluster (i.e. linux2). During the remote copy process, the OUI will execute the UNIX " tar" command on each of the remote nodes to extract the files that were archived and copied over. If the date and time on the node performing the install is greater than that of the node it is copying to, the OUI will throw an error from the " tar" command indicating it is attempting to extract files stamped with a time in the future: Error while copying directory /u01/app/crs with exclude file list 'null' to nodes 'linux2'. [PRKC-1002 : All the submitted commands did not execute successfully] --------------------------------------------- linux2: /bin/tar: ./bin/lsnodes: time stamp 2009-07-28 09:21:34 is 735 s in the future /bin/tar: ./bin/olsnodes: time stamp 2009-07-28 09:21:34 is 735 s in the future ...(more errors on this node)
Please note that although this would seem like a severe error from the OUI, it can safely be disregarded as a warning. The " tar" command DOES actually extract the files; however, when you perform a listing of the files (using ls -l) on the remote node, they will be missing the time field until the time on the server is greater than the timestamp of the file.
Before starting any of the above noted installations, ensure that each member node of the cluster is set as closely as possible to the same date and time. Oracle strongly recommends using the Network Time Protocol feature of most operating systems for this purpose, with both Oracle RAC nodes using the same reference Network Time Protocol server.
Accessing a Network Time Protocol server, however, may not always be an option. In this case, when manually setting the date and time for the nodes in the cluster, ensure that the date and time of the node you are performing the software installations from (linux1) is less than all other nodes in the cluster (linux2). I generally use a 20 second difference as shown in the following example:
Setting the date and time from linux1: # date -s "7/28/2009 23:00:00" Setting the date and time from linux2: # date -s "7/28/2009 23:00:20" The two-node RAC configuration described in this article does not make use of a Network Time Protocol server.

14. Configure the hangcheck-timer Kernel Module
Perform the following configuration procedures on both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster!
Oracle9i Release 1 (9.0.1) and Oracle9i Release 2 ( 9.2.0.1) used a userspace watchdog daemon called watchdogd to monitor the health of the cluster and to restart a RAC node in case of a failure. Starting with Oracle9i Release 2 (9.2.0.2) (and still available in Oracle 10g Release 2), the watchdog daemon has been deprecated by a Linux kernel module named hangcheck-timer which addresses availability and reliability problems much better. The hang-check timer is loaded into the Linux kernel and checks if the system hangs. It will set a timer and check the timer after a certain amount of time. There is a configurable threshold to hang-check that, if exceeded will reboot the machine. Although the hangcheck-timer module is not required for Oracle Clusterware ( Cluster Manager) operation, it is highly recommended by Oracle.
The hangcheck-timer.ko Module
The hangcheck-timer module uses a kernel-based timer that periodically checks the system task scheduler to catch delays in order to determine the health of the system. If the system hangs or pauses, the timer resets the node. The hangcheck-timer module uses the Time Stamp Counter (TSC) CPU register, which is incremented at each clock signal. The TCS offers much more accurate time measurements because this register is updated by the hardware automatically.
Much more information about the hangcheck-timer project can be found here.
Installing the hangcheck-timer.ko Module
The hangcheck-timer was normally shipped only by Oracle, however, this module is now included with Red Hat Linux AS starting with kernel versions 2.4.9-e.12 and higher. The hangcheck-timer should already be included. Use the following to ensure that you have the module included: # find /lib/modules -name "hangcheck-timer.ko"

/lib/modules/2.6.18-128.el5/kernel/drivers/char/hangcheck-timer.ko

In the above output, we care about the hangcheck timer object ( hangcheck-timer.ko) in the /lib/modules/2.6.18-128.el5/kernel/drivers/char directory since this is the kernel we are running.
Configuring and Loading the hangcheck-timer Module
There are two key parameters to the hangcheck-timer module: * hangcheck-tick : This parameter defines the period of time between checks of system health. The default value is 60 seconds; Oracle recommends setting it to 30 seconds. * hangcheck-margin : This parameter defines the maximum hang delay that should be tolerated before hangcheck-timer resets the RAC node. It defines the margin of error in seconds. The default value is 180 seconds; Oracle recommends setting it to 180 seconds.
Note: The two hangcheck-timer module parameters indicate how long a RAC node must hang before it will reset the system. A node reset will occur when the following is true: system hang time > (hangcheck_tick + hangcheck_margin)

Configuring Hangcheck Kernel Module Parameters
Each time the hangcheck-timer kernel module is loaded (manually or by Oracle), it needs to know what value to use for each of the two parameters we just discussed: ( hangcheck-tick and hangcheck-margin). These values need to be available after each reboot of the Linux server. To do that, make an entry with the correct values to the /etc/modprobe.conf file as follows: # su - # echo "options hangcheck-timer hangcheck_tick=30 hangcheck_margin=180" >> /etc/modprobe.conf Each time the hangcheck-timer kernel module gets loaded, it will use the values defined by the entry I made in the /etc/modprobe.conf file.
Manually Loading the Hangcheck Kernel Module for Testing
Oracle is responsible for loading the hangcheck-timer kernel module when required. For that reason, it is not required to perform a modprobe or insmod of the hangcheck-timer kernel module in any of the startup files (i.e. /etc/rc.local).
It is only out of pure habit that I continue to include a modprobe of the hangcheck-timer kernel module in the /etc/rc.local file. Someday I will get over it, but realize that it does not hurt to include a modprobe of the hangcheck-timer kernel module during startup.
So to keep myself sane and able to sleep at night, I always configure the loading of the hangcheck-timer kernel module on each startup as follows: # echo "/sbin/modprobe hangcheck-timer" >> /etc/rc.local Note: You don't have to manually load the hangcheck-timer kernel module using modprobe or insmod after each reboot. The hangcheck-timer module will be loaded by Oracle automatically when needed.
Now, to test the hangcheck-timer kernel module to verify it is picking up the correct parameters we defined in the /etc/modprobe.conf file, use the modprobe command. Although you could load the hangcheck-timer kernel module by passing it the appropriate parameters (e.g. insmod hangcheck-timer hangcheck_tick=30 hangcheck_margin=180), we want to verify that it is picking up the options we set in the /etc/modprobe.conf file.
To manually load the hangcheck-timer kernel module and verify it is using the correct values defined in the /etc/modprobe.conf file, run the following command: # su - # modprobe hangcheck-timer # grep Hangcheck /var/log/messages | tail -2 Jul 30 17:50:43 linux1 kernel: Hangcheck: starting hangcheck timer 0.9.0 (tick is 30 seconds, margin is 180 seconds). Jul 30 17:50:43 linux1 kernel: Hangcheck: Using get_cycles().

15. Configure RAC Nodes for Remote Access using SSH
Perform the following configuration procedures on both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster!
Before you can install Oracle RAC 10g, you must configure secure shell (SSH) for the UNIX user account you plan to use to install Oracle Clusterware 10g and the Oracle Database 10g software. The installation and configuration tasks described in this section will need to be performed on both Oracle RAC nodes. As configured earlier in this article, the software owner for Oracle Clusterware 10g and the Oracle Database 10g software will be " oracle".
The goal here is to setup user equivalence for the oracle UNIX user account. User equivalence enables the oracle UNIX user account to access all other nodes in the cluster (running commands and copying files) without the need for a password. Oracle added support in 10g Release 1 for using the SSH tool suite for setting up user equivalence. Before Oracle Database 10g, user equivalence had to be configured using remote shell (RSH).
The SSH configuration described in this article uses SSH1. If SSH is not available, then OUI attempts to use rsh and rcp instead. These services, however, are disabled by default on most Linux systems. The use of RSH will not be discussed in this article.
You need either an RSA or a DSA key for the SSH protocol. RSA is used with the SSH 1.5 protocol, while DSA is the default for the SSH 2.0 protocol. With OpenSSH, you can use either RSA or DSA. For the purpose of this article, we will configure SSH using SSH1.
Note: If you have an SSH2 installation, and you cannot use SSH1, then refer to your SSH distribution documentation to configure SSH1 compatibility or to configure SSH2 with DSA. This type of configuration is beyond the scope of this article and will not be discussed.
So, why do we have to setup user equivalence? Installing Oracle Clusterware and the Oracle Database software is only performed from one node in a RAC cluster. When running the Oracle Universal Installer (OUI) on that particular node, it will use the ssh and scp commands to run remote commands on and copy files (the Oracle software) to all other nodes within the RAC cluster. The oracle UNIX user account on the node running the OUI ( runInstaller) must be trusted by all other nodes in your RAC cluster. This means that you must be able to run the secure shell commands ( ssh or scp) on the Linux server you will be running the OUI from against all other Linux servers in the cluster without being prompted for a password.
Please note that the use of secure shell is not required for normal RAC operation. This configuration, however, must to be enabled for RAC and patchset installations as well as creating the clustered database.
The methods required for configuring SSH1, an RSA key, and user equivalence is described in the following sections.
Configuring the Secure Shell
To determine if SSH is installed and running, enter the following command: # pgrep sshd 2400 If SSH is running, then the response to this command is a list of process ID number(s). Run this command on both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster to verify the SSH daemons are installed and running!
To find out more about SSH, refer to the man page: # man ssh Creating the RSA Keys on Both Oracle RAC Nodes
The first step in configuring SSH is to create an RSA public/private key pair on both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster. The command to do this will create a public and private key for RSA (for a total of two keys per node). The content of the RSA public keys will then need to be copied into an authorized key file which is then distributed to both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster.
Use the following steps to create the RSA key pair. Please note that these steps will need to be completed on both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster: 1. Log on as the oracle UNIX user account. 2. # 3. 4. su - oracle 5. If necessary, create the .ssh directory in the oracle user's home directory and set the correct permissions to ensure that only the oracle user has read and write permissions: 6. $ 7. 8. mkdir -p ~/.ssh 9. $ 10. 11. chmod 700 ~/.ssh 12. Enter the following command to generate an RSA key pair (public and private key) for the SSH protocol: 13. $ 14. 15. /usr/bin/ssh-keygen -t rsa At the prompts: * Accept the default location for the key files (press [ENTER]). * Enter and confirm a pass phrase. This should be different from the oracle UNIX user account password however it is not a requirement.

This command will write the public key to the ~/.ssh/id_rsa.pub file and the private key to the ~/.ssh/id_rsa file. Note that you should never distribute the private key to anyone! 16. Repeat the above steps for both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster.

Now that both Oracle RAC nodes contain a public and private key for RSA, you will need to create an authorized key file on one of the nodes. An authorized key file is nothing more than a single file that contains a copy of everyone's (every node's) RSA public key. Once the authorized key file contains all of the public keys, it is then distributed to all other nodes in the cluster.
Complete the following steps on one of the nodes in the cluster to create and then distribute the authorized key file. For the purpose of this article, I am using linux1: 1. First, determine if an authorized key file already exists on the node ( ~/.ssh/authorized_keys). In most cases this will not exist since this article assumes you are working with a new install. If the file doesn't exist, create it now: 2. $ 3. 4. touch ~/.ssh/authorized_keys 5. $ 6. 7. cd ~/.ssh 8. $ 9. 10. ls -l *.pub 11. -rw-r--r-- 1 oracle oinstall 395 Jul 30 18:51 id_rsa.pub The listing above should show the id_rsa.pub public key created in the previous section. 12. In this step, use SCP (Secure Copy) or SFTP (Secure FTP) to copy the content of the ~/.ssh/id_rsa.pub public key from both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster to the authorized key file just created ( ~/.ssh/authorized_keys). Again, this will be done from linux1. You will be prompted for the oracle UNIX user account password for both Oracle RAC nodes accessed.
The following example is being run from linux1 and assumes a two-node cluster, with nodes linux1 and linux2: $ ssh linux1 cat ~/.ssh/id_rsa.pub >> ~/.ssh/authorized_keys The authenticity of host 'linux1 (192.168.1.100)' can't be established. RSA key fingerprint is 46:0f:1b:ac:a6:9d:86:4d:38:45:85:76:ad:3b:e7:c9. Are you sure you want to continue connecting (yes/no)? yes Warning: Permanently added 'linux1,192.168.1.100' (RSA) to the list of known hosts. oracle@linux1's password: xxxxx $ ssh linux2 cat ~/.ssh/id_rsa.pub >> ~/.ssh/authorized_keys The authenticity of host 'linux2 (192.168.1.101)' can't be established. RSA key fingerprint is eb:39:98:a7:d9:61:02:a2:80:3b:75:71:70:42:d0:07. Are you sure you want to continue connecting (yes/no)? yes Warning: Permanently added 'linux2,192.168.1.101' (RSA) to the list of known hosts. oracle@linux2's password: xxxxx Note: The first time you use SSH to connect to a node from a particular system, you will see a message similar to the following: The authenticity of host 'linux1 (192.168.1.100)' can't be established. RSA key fingerprint is 46:0f:1b:ac:a6:9d:86:4d:38:45:85:76:ad:3b:e7:c9. Are you sure you want to continue connecting (yes/no)? yes Enter yes at the prompt to continue. You will not see this message again when you connect from this system to the same node. 13. At this point, we have the RSA public key from every node in the cluster in the authorized key file ( ~/.ssh/authorized_keys) on linux1. We now need to copy it to the remaining nodes in the cluster. In our two-node cluster example, the only remaining node is linux2. Use the scp command to copy the authorized key file to all remaining nodes in the cluster: 14. $ 15. 16. scp ~/.ssh/authorized_keys linux2:.ssh/authorized_keys 17. oracle@linux2's password: 18. 19. xxxxx 20. authorized_keys 100% 790 0.8KB/s 00:00 21. Change the permission of the authorized key file for both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster by logging into the node and running the following: 22. $ 23. 24. chmod 600 ~/.ssh/authorized_keys 25. At this point, if you use ssh to log in to or run a command on another node, you are prompted for the pass phrase that you specified when you created the RSA key. For example, test the following from linux1: 26. $ 27. 28. ssh linux1 hostname 29. Enter passphrase for key '/home/oracle/.ssh/id_rsa': 30. 31. xxxxx 32. linux1 33. 34. $ 35. 36. ssh linux2 hostname 37. Enter passphrase for key '/home/oracle/.ssh/id_rsa': 38. 39. xxxxx 40. linux2 Note: If you see any other messages or text, apart from the host name, then the Oracle installation will fail. Make any changes required to ensure that only the host name is displayed when you enter these commands. You should ensure that any part of a login script that generates any output, or asks any questions, is modified so it acts only when the shell is an interactive shell.
Enabling SSH User Equivalency for the Current Shell Session
When running the OUI, it will need to run the secure shell tool commands ( ssh and scp) without being prompted for a pass phrase. Even though SSH is configured on both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster, using the secure shell tool commands will still prompt for a pass phrase. Before running the OUI, you need to enable user equivalence for the terminal session you plan to run the OUI from. For the purpose of this article, all Oracle installations will be performed from linux1.
User equivalence will need to be enabled on any new terminal shell session before attempting to run the OUI. If you log out and log back in to the node you will be performing the Oracle installation from, you must enable user equivalence for the terminal shell session as this is not done by default.
To enable user equivalence for the current terminal shell session, perform the following steps: 1. Log on to the node where you want to run the OUI from ( linux1) as the oracle UNIX user account. 2. # 3. 4. su - oracle 5. Enter the following commands: 6. $ 7. 8. exec /usr/bin/ssh-agent $SHELL 9. $ 10. 11. /usr/bin/ssh-add 12. Enter passphrase for /home/oracle/.ssh/id_rsa: 13. 14. xxxxx 15. Identity added: /home/oracle/.ssh/id_rsa (/home/oracle/.ssh/id_rsa) At the prompts, enter the pass phrase for each key that you generated. 16. If SSH is configured correctly, you will be able to use the ssh and scp commands without being prompted for a password or pass phrase from this terminal session: 17. $ 18. 19. ssh linux1 "date;hostname" 20. Thu Jul 30 19:32:49 EDT 2009 21. linux1 22. 23. $ 24. 25. ssh linux2 "date;hostname" 26. Thu Jul 30 19:33:06 EDT 2009 27. linux2 Note: The commands above should display the date set on both Oracle RAC nodes along with its hostname. If any of the nodes prompt for a password or pass phrase then verify that the ~/.ssh/authorized_keys file on that node contains the correct public keys. Also, if you see any other messages or text, apart from the date and hostname, then the Oracle installation will fail. Make any changes required to ensure that only the date and hostname is displayed when you enter these commands. You should ensure that any part of a login script that generates any output, or asks any questions, is modified so it acts only when the shell is an interactive shell. 28. The Oracle Universal Installer is a GUI interface and requires the use of an X Server. From the terminal session enabled for user equivalence (the node you will be performing the Oracle installations from), set the environment variable DISPLAY to a valid X Windows display:
Bourne, Korn, and Bash shells: $ DISPLAY=<Any X-Windows Host>:0

$ export DISPLAY C shell: $ setenv DISPLAY <Any X-Windows Host>:0 After setting the DISPLAY variable to a valid X Windows display, you should perform another test of the current terminal session to ensure that X11 forwarding is not enabled: $ ssh linux1 hostname linux1 $ ssh linux2 hostname linux2 Note: If you are using a remote client to connect to the node performing the installation, and you see a message similar to: " Warning: No xauth data; using fake authentication data for X11 forwarding." then this means that your authorized keys file is configured correctly; however, your SSH configuration has X11 forwarding enabled. For example: $ export DISPLAY=melody:0 $ ssh linux2 hostname Warning: No xauth data; using fake authentication data for X11 forwarding. linux2 Note that having X11 Forwarding enabled will cause the Oracle installation to fail. To correct this problem, create a user-level SSH client configuration file for the oracle UNIX user account that disables X11 Forwarding: * Using a text editor, edit or create the file ~/.ssh/config * Make sure that the ForwardX11 attribute is set to no. For example, insert the following into the ~/.ssh/config file: * Host * *

* * ForwardX11 no 29. You must run the Oracle Universal Installer from this terminal session or remember to repeat the steps to enable user equivalence (steps 2, 3, and 4 from this section) before you start the Oracle Universal Installer from a different terminal session.
Remove any stty Commands
When installing the Oracle software, any hidden files on the system (i.e. .bashrc, .cshrc, .profile) will cause the installation process to fail if they contain stty commands.
To avoid this problem, you must modify these files to suppress all output on STDERR as in the following examples: * Bourne, Bash, or Korn shell: * if [ -t 0 ]; then *

* * stty intr ^C *

* * fi * C shell: * test -t 0 *

* * if ($status == 0) then *

* * stty intr ^C *

* * endif

Note: If there are hidden files that contain stty commands that are loaded by the remote shell, then OUI indicates an error and stops the installation.

16. All Startup Commands for Both Oracle RAC Nodes
Verify that the following startup commands are included on both of the Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster!
Up to this point, we have talked in great detail about the parameters and resources that need to be configured on both nodes in the Oracle RAC 10g configuration. This section will review those parameters, commands, and entries (in previous sections of this document) that need to occur on both Oracle RAC nodes when they are booted.
For each of the startup files below, entries in gray should be included in each startup file.

/etc/modprobe.conf
(All parameters and values to be used by kernel modules.) ................................................................. alias eth0 r8169 alias eth1 e1000 alias scsi_hostadapter ata_piix alias snd-card-0 snd-intel8x0 options snd-card-0 index=0 options snd-intel8x0 index=0 remove snd-intel8x0 { /usr/sbin/alsactl store 0 >/dev/null 2>&1 || : ; }; /sbin/modprobe -r --ignore-remove snd-intel8x0 options hangcheck-timer hangcheck_tick=30 hangcheck_margin=180 .................................................................

/etc/sysctl.conf
(We wanted to adjust the default and maximum send buffer size as well as the default and maximum receive buffer size for the interconnect. This file also contains those parameters responsible for configuring shared memory, semaphores, file handles, and local IP range for use by the Oracle instance.) ................................................................. # Kernel sysctl configuration file for Oracle Enterprise Linux # # For binary values, 0 is disabled, 1 is enabled. See sysctl(8) and # sysctl.conf(5) for more details. # Controls IP packet forwarding net.ipv4.ip_forward = 0 # Controls source route verification net.ipv4.conf.default.rp_filter = 1 # Do not accept source routing net.ipv4.conf.default.accept_source_route = 0 # Controls the System Request debugging functionality of the kernel kernel.sysrq = 0 # Controls whether core dumps will append the PID to the core filename # Useful for debugging multi-threaded applications kernel.core_uses_pid = 1 # Controls the use of TCP syncookies net.ipv4.tcp_syncookies = 1 # Controls the maximum size of a message, in bytes kernel.msgmnb = 65536 # Controls the default maxmimum size of a mesage queue kernel.msgmax = 65536

# +---------------------------------------------------------+ # | ADJUSTING NETWORK SETTINGS | # +---------------------------------------------------------+ # | With Oracle 9.2.0.1 and onwards, Oracle now makes use | # | of UDP as the default protocol on Linux for | # | inter-process communication (IPC), such as Cache Fusion | # | and Cluster Manager buffer transfers between instances | # | within the RAC cluster. Oracle strongly suggests to | # | adjust the default and maximum receive buffer size | # | (SO_RCVBUF socket option) to 1024 MB, and the default | # | and maximum send buffer size (SO_SNDBUF socket option) | # | to 256 KB. The receive buffers are used by TCP and UDP | # | to hold received data until it is read by the | # | application. The receive buffer cannot overflow because | # | the peer is not allowed to send data beyond the buffer | # | size window. This means that datagrams will be | # | discarded if they don't fit in the socket receive | # | buffer. This could cause the sender to overwhelm the | # | receiver. | # +---------------------------------------------------------+ # +---------------------------------------------------------+ # | Default setting in bytes of the socket "receive" buffer | # | which may be set by using the SO_RCVBUF socket option. | # +---------------------------------------------------------+ net.core.rmem_default=1048576 # +---------------------------------------------------------+ # | Maximum setting in bytes of the socket "receive" buffer | # | which may be set by using the SO_RCVBUF socket option. | # +---------------------------------------------------------+ net.core.rmem_max=1048576 # +---------------------------------------------------------+ # | Default setting in bytes of the socket "send" buffer | # | which may be set by using the SO_SNDBUF socket option. | # +---------------------------------------------------------+ net.core.wmem_default=262144 # +---------------------------------------------------------+ # | Maximum setting in bytes of the socket "send" buffer | # | which may be set by using the SO_SNDBUF socket option. | # +---------------------------------------------------------+ net.core.wmem_max=262144 # +---------------------------------------------------------+ # | ADJUSTING ADDITIONAL KERNEL PARAMETERS FOR ORACLE | # +---------------------------------------------------------+ # | Configure the kernel parameters for all Oracle Linux | # | servers by setting shared memory and semaphores, | # | setting the maximum amount of file handles, and setting | # | the IP local port range. | # +---------------------------------------------------------+ # +---------------------------------------------------------+ # | SHARED MEMORY | # +---------------------------------------------------------+ # Controls the maximum shared segment size, in bytes kernel.shmmax = 4294967295 # Controls the maximum number of shared memory segments, in pages kernel.shmall = 268435456 # Controls the maximum number of shared memory segments system wide kernel.shmmni = 4096 # +---------------------------------------------------------+ # | SEMAPHORES | # | ---------- | # | | # | SEMMSL_value SEMMNS_value SEMOPM_value SEMMNI_value | # | | # +---------------------------------------------------------+ kernel.sem=250 32000 100 128 # +---------------------------------------------------------+ # | FILE HANDLES | # ----------------------------------------------------------+ fs.file-max=65536 # +---------------------------------------------------------+ # | LOCAL IP RANGE | # ----------------------------------------------------------+ net.ipv4.ip_local_port_range=1024 65000 ................................................................. Note: Verify that each of the required kernel parameters (above) are configured in the /etc/sysctl.conf file. Then, ensure that each of these parameters are truly in effect by running the following command on both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster: # sysctl -p net.ipv4.ip_forward = 0 net.ipv4.conf.default.rp_filter = 1 net.ipv4.conf.default.accept_source_route = 0 kernel.sysrq = 0 kernel.core_uses_pid = 1 net.ipv4.tcp_syncookies = 1 kernel.msgmnb = 65536 kernel.msgmax = 65536 net.core.rmem_default = 1048576 net.core.rmem_max = 1048576 net.core.wmem_default = 262144 net.core.wmem_max = 262144 kernel.shmmax = 4294967295 kernel.shmall = 268435456 kernel.shmmni = 4096 kernel.sem = 250 32000 100 128 fs.file-max = 65536 net.ipv4.ip_local_port_range = 1024 65000

/etc/hosts
(All machine/IP entries for nodes in our RAC cluster.) ................................................................. # Do not remove the following line, or various programs # that require network functionality will fail. 127.0.0.1 localhost.localdomain localhost

# Public Network - (eth0) 192.168.1.100 linux1 192.168.1.101 linux2 # Private Interconnect - (eth1) 192.168.2.100 linux1-priv 192.168.2.101 linux2-priv # Public Virtual IP (VIP) addresses - (eth0:1) 192.168.1.200 linux1-vip 192.168.1.201 linux2-vip # Private Storage Network for Openfiler - (eth1) 192.168.1.195 openfiler1 192.168.2.195 openfiler1-priv # Miscellaneous Nodes 192.168.1.1 router 192.168.1.102 alex 192.168.1.103 nascar 192.168.1.105 packmule 192.168.1.106 melody 192.168.1.120 cartman 192.168.1.121 domo 192.168.1.122 switch1 192.168.1.190 george 192.168.1.245 accesspoint .................................................................

/etc/udev/rules.d/55-openiscsi.rules ................................................................. # /etc/udev/rules.d/55-openiscsi.rules KERNEL=="sd*", BUS=="scsi", PROGRAM="/etc/udev/scripts/iscsidev.sh %b",SYMLINK+="iscsi/%c/part%n" .................................................................

/etc/udev/scripts/iscsidev.sh ................................................................. #!/bin/sh # FILE: /etc/udev/scripts/iscsidev.sh BUS=${1} HOST=${BUS%%:*} [ -e /sys/class/iscsi_host ] || exit 1 file="/sys/class/iscsi_host/host${HOST}/device/session*/iscsi_session*/targetname" target_name=$(cat ${file}) # This is not an open-scsi drive if [ -z "${target_name}" ]; then exit 1 fi echo "${target_name##*.}" .................................................................

/etc/rc.local
(Loading the hangcheck-timer kernel module.) ................................................................. #!/bin/sh # # This script will be executed *after* all the other init scripts. # You can put your own initialization stuff in here if you don't # want to do the full Sys V style init stuff. touch /var/lock/subsys/local

# +---------------------------------------------------------+ # | HANGCHECK TIMER | # | (I do not believe this is required, but doesn't hurt) | # +---------------------------------------------------------+ /sbin/modprobe hangcheck-timer .................................................................

17. Install & Configure Oracle Cluster File System (OCFS2)
Most of the installation and configuration procedures in this section should be performed on both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster! Creating the OCFS2 filesystem, however, should only be executed on one of nodes in the RAC cluster.
It is now time to install and configure the Oracle Cluster File System, Release 2 (OCFS2) software. Developed by Oracle Corporation, OCFS2 is a Cluster File System which allows all nodes in a cluster to concurrently access a device via the standard file system interface. This allows for easy management of applications that need to run across a cluster.
OCFS Release 1 was released in December 2002 to enable Oracle Real Application Cluster (RAC) users to run the clustered database without having to deal with RAW devices. The file system was designed to store database related files, such as data files, control files, redo logs, archive logs, etc. OCFS2 is the next generation of the Oracle Cluster File System. It has been designed to be a general purpose cluster file system. With it, users can store not only database related files on a shared disk, but also store Oracle binaries and configuration files (a shared Oracle Home for example) making management of RAC even easier.
In this guide, you will be using the release of OCFS2 included with Oracle Enterprise Linux Release 5.3 (OCFS2 Release 1.2.9-1) to store the two files that are required to be shared by the Oracle Clusterware software. Along with these two files, you will also be using this space to store the shared SPFILE for all Oracle ASM instances.
See this page for more information on OCFS2 (including Installation Notes) for Linux.
Install OCFS2
In previous editions of this article, this would be the time where you would need to download the OCFS2 software from http://oss.oracle.com/. This is no longer necessary since the OCFS2 software is included with Oracle Enterprise Linux. The OCFS2 software stack includes the following packages:
32-bit (x86) Installations * OCFS2 Kernel Driver * * ocfs2-x.x.x-x.el5-x.x.x-x.el5.i686.rpm - (for default kernel) * ocfs2-x.x.x-x.el5PAE-x.x.x-x.el5.i686.rpm - (for PAE kernel) * ocfs2-x.x.x-x.el5xen-x.x.x-x.el5.i686.rpm - (for xen kernel) * OCFS2 Tools * * ocfs2-tools-x.x.x-x.el5.i386.rpm * OCFS2 Tools Development * * ocfs2-tools-devel-x.x.x-x.el5.i386.rpm * OCFS2 Console * * ocfs2console-x.x.x-x.el5.i386.rpm

64-bit (x86_64) Installations * OCFS2 Kernel Driver * * ocfs2-x.x.x-x.el5-x.x.x-x.el5.x86_64.rpm - (for default kernel) * ocfs2-x.x.x-x.el5PAE-x.x.x-x.el5.x86_64.rpm - (for PAE kernel) * ocfs2-x.x.x-x.el5xen-x.x.x-x.el5.x86_64.rpm - (for xen kernel) * OCFS2 Tools * * ocfs2-tools-x.x.x-x.el5.x86_64.rpm * OCFS2 Tools Development * * ocfs2-tools-devel-x.x.x-x.el5.x86_64.rpm * OCFS2 Console * * ocfs2console-x.x.x-x.el5.x86_64.rpm

With Oracle Enterprise Linux 5.3, the OCFS2 software packages do not get installed by default. The OCFS2 software packages can be found on CD #3. To determine if the OCFS2 packages are installed (which in most cases, they will not be), perform the following on both Oracle RAC nodes: # rpm -qa | grep ocfs2 | sort If the OCFS2 packages are not installed, load the Oracle Enterprise Linux CD #3 into each of the Oracle RAC nodes and perform the following: From Oracle Enterprise Linux 5 - [CD #3] # mount -r /dev/cdrom /media/cdrom # cd /media/cdrom/Server # rpm -Uvh ocfs2-tools-1.2.7-1.el5.i386.rpm # rpm -Uvh ocfs2-2.6.18-128.el5-1.2.9-1.el5.i686.rpm # rpm -Uvh ocfs2console-1.2.7-1.el5.i386.rpm # cd / # eject After installing the OCFS2 packages, verify from both Oracle RAC nodes that the software is installed: # rpm -qa | grep ocfs2 | sort ocfs2-2.6.18-128.el5-1.2.9-1.el5 ocfs2console-1.2.7-1.el5 ocfs2-tools-1.2.7-1.el5 Disable SELinux (RHEL4 U2 and higher)
Users of RHEL4 U2 and higher (Oracle Enterprise Linux 5.3 is based on RHEL 5.3) are advised that OCFS2 currently does not work with SELinux enabled. If you are using RHEL4 U2 or higher (which includes us since we are using Oracle Enterprise Linux 5.3) you will need to verify SELinux is disabled in order for the O2CB service to execute.
During the installation of Oracle Enterprise Linux, we Disabled SELinux on the SELinux screen. If, however, you did not disable SELinux during the installation phase, you can use the tool system-config-securitylevel to disable SELinux.
To disable SELinux (or verify SELinux is disabled), run the "Security Level Configuration" GUI utility: # /usr/bin/system-config-securitylevel & This will bring up the following screen:

Figure 16: Security Level Configuration Opening Screen / Firewall Disabled
Now, click the SELinux tab and select the "Disabled" option. After clicking [OK], you will be presented with a warning dialog. Simply acknowledge this warning by clicking "Yes". Your screen should now look like the following after disabling the SELinux option:

Figure 17: SELinux Disabled
If you needed to disable SELinux in this section on any of the nodes, those nodes will need to be rebooted to implement the change. SELinux must be disabled before you can continue with configuring OCFS2!
Configure OCFS2
OCFS2 will be configured to use the private network (192.168.2.0) for all of its network traffic as recommended by Oracle. While OCFS2 does not take much bandwidth, it does require the nodes to be alive on the network and sends regular keepalive packets to ensure that they are. To avoid a network delay being interpreted as a node disappearing on the net which could lead to a node-self-fencing, a private interconnect is recommended. It is safe to use the same private interconnect for both Oracle RAC and OCFS2.
A popular question then is what node name should be used and should it be related to the IP address? The node name needs to match the hostname of the machine. The IP address need not be the one associated with that hostname. In other words, any valid IP address on that node can be used. OCFS2 will not attempt to match the node name (hostname) with the specified IP address.
The next step is to generate and configure the /etc/ocfs2/cluster.conf file on both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster. The easiest way to accomplish this is to run the GUI tool ocfs2console. In this section, we will not only create and configure the /etc/ocfs2/cluster.conf file using ocfs2console, but will also create and start the cluster stack O2CB. When the /etc/ocfs2/cluster.conf file is not present, (as will be the case in our example), the ocfs2console tool will create this file along with a new cluster stack service (O2CB) with a default cluster name of ocfs2. This will need to be done on both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster as the root user account: $ su -

# ocfs2console & This will bring up the GUI as shown below:

Figure 18: ocfs2console GUI
Using the ocfs2console GUI tool, perform the following steps: 1. Select [Cluster] -> [Configure Nodes...]. This will start the OCFS2 Cluster Stack ( Figure 19) and bring up the "Node Configuration" dialog. 2. On the "Node Configuration" dialog, click the [Add] button. * This will bring up the "Add Node" dialog. * In the "Add Node" dialog, enter the Host name and IP address for the first node in the cluster. Leave the IP Port set to its default value of 7777. In my example, I added both nodes using linux1 / 192.168.2.100 for the first node and linux2 / 192.168.2.101 for the second node.
Note: The node name you enter "must" match the hostname of the machine and the IP addresses will use the private interconnect. * Click [Apply] on the "Node Configuration" dialog - All nodes should now be "Active" as shown in Figure 20. * Click [Close] on the "Node Configuration" dialog. 3. After verifying all values are correct, exit the application using [File] -> [Quit]. This needs to be performed on both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster.

Figure 19: Starting the OCFS2 Cluster Stack
The following dialog show the OCFS2 settings I used for the nodes linux1 and linux2:

Figure 20: Configuring Nodes for OCFS2
Note: See the Troubleshooting section if you get the error:

o2cb_ctl: Unable to access cluster service while creating node After exiting the ocfs2console, you will have a /etc/ocfs2/cluster.conf similar to the following. This process needs to be completed on both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster and the OCFS2 configuration file should be exactly the same for all of the nodes: node: ip_port = 7777 ip_address = 192.168.2.100 number = 0 name = linux1 cluster = ocfs2 node: ip_port = 7777 ip_address = 192.168.2.101 number = 1 name = linux2 cluster = ocfs2 cluster: node_count = 2 name = ocfs2
O2CB Cluster Service
Before we can do anything with OCFS2 like formatting or mounting the file system, we need to first have OCFS2's cluster stack, O2CB, running (which it will be as a result of the configuration process performed above). The stack includes the following services: * NM: Node Manager that keep track of all the nodes in the cluster.conf * HB: Heart beat service that issues up/down notifications when nodes join or leave the cluster * TCP: Handles communication between the nodes * DLM: Distributed lock manager that keeps track of all locks, its owners and status * CONFIGFS: User space driven configuration file system mounted at /config * DLMFS: User space interface to the kernel space DLM

All of the above cluster services have been packaged in the o2cb system service ( /etc/init.d/o2cb). Here is a short listing of some of the more useful commands and options for the o2cb system service.
Note: The following commands are for documentation purposes only and do not need to be run when installing and configuring OCFS2 for this article! * /etc/init.d/o2cb status * Module "configfs": Loaded * Filesystem "configfs": Mounted * Module "ocfs2_nodemanager": Loaded * Module "ocfs2_dlm": Loaded * Module "ocfs2_dlmfs": Loaded * Filesystem "ocfs2_dlmfs": Mounted * Checking O2CB cluster ocfs2: Online * Heartbeat dead threshold: 31 * Network idle timeout: 30000 * Network keepalive delay: 2000 * Network reconnect delay: 2000 * Checking O2CB heartbeat: Not active * /etc/init.d/o2cb offline ocfs2 * Stopping O2CB cluster ocfs2: OK
The above command will offline the cluster we created, ocfs2. * /etc/init.d/o2cb unload * Unmounting ocfs2_dlmfs filesystem: OK * Unloading module "ocfs2_dlmfs": OK * Unmounting configfs filesystem: OK * Unloading module "configfs": OK
The above command will unload all OCFS2 modules. * /etc/init.d/o2cb load * Loading module "configfs": OK * Mounting configfs filesystem at /sys/kernel/config: OK * Loading module "ocfs2_nodemanager": OK * Loading module "ocfs2_dlm": OK * Loading module "ocfs2_dlmfs": OK * Mounting ocfs2_dlmfs filesystem at /dlm: OK
Loads all OCFS2 modules. * /etc/init.d/o2cb online ocfs2 * Starting O2CB cluster ocfs2: OK
The above command will online the cluster we created, ocfs2.

Configure O2CB to Start on Boot and Adjust O2CB Heartbeat Threshold
You now need to configure the on-boot properties of the OC2B driver so that the cluster stack services will start on each boot. You will also be adjusting the OCFS2 Heartbeat Threshold from its default setting of 31 to 61. Perform the following on both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster: # /etc/init.d/o2cb offline ocfs2 # /etc/init.d/o2cb unload # /etc/init.d/o2cb configure Configuring the O2CB driver. This will configure the on-boot properties of the O2CB driver. The following questions will determine whether the driver is loaded on boot. The current values will be shown in brackets ('[]'). Hitting <ENTER> without typing an answer will keep that current value. Ctrl-C will abort. Load O2CB driver on boot (y/n) [n]: y Cluster to start on boot (Enter "none" to clear) [ocfs2]: ocfs2 Specify heartbeat dead threshold (>=7) [31]: 61 Specify network idle timeout in ms (>=5000) [30000]: 30000 Specify network keepalive delay in ms (>=1000) [2000]: 2000 Specify network reconnect delay in ms (>=2000) [2000]: 2000 Writing O2CB configuration: OK Loading module "configfs": OK Mounting configfs filesystem at /sys/kernel/config: OK Loading module "ocfs2_nodemanager": OK Loading module "ocfs2_dlm": OK Loading module "ocfs2_dlmfs": OK Mounting ocfs2_dlmfs filesystem at /dlm: OK Starting O2CB cluster ocfs2: OK Format the OCFS2 Filesystem
Note: Unlike the other tasks in this section, creating the OCFS2 file system should only be executed on one of nodes in the RAC cluster. I will be executing all commands in this section from linux1 only.
We can now start to make use of the iSCSI volume we partitioned for OCFS2 in the section " Create Partitions on iSCSI Volumes".
If the O2CB cluster is offline, start it. The format operation needs the cluster to be online, as it needs to ensure that the volume is not mounted on some other node in the cluster.
Earlier in this document, we created the directory /u02 under the section Create Mount Point for OCFS2 / Clusterware which will be used as the mount point for the OCFS2 cluster file system. This section contains the commands to create and mount the file system to be used for the Cluster Manager.
Note that it is possible to create and mount the OCFS2 file system using either the GUI tool ocfs2console or the command-line tool mkfs.ocfs2. From the ocfs2console utility, use the menu [Tasks] - [Format].
The instructions below demonstrate how to create the OCFS2 file system using the command-line tool mkfs.ocfs2.
To create the file system, we can use the Oracle executable mkfs.ocfs2. For the purpose of this example, I run the following command only from linux1 as the root user account using the local SCSI device name mapped to the iSCSI volume for crs — /dev/iscsi/crs/part1. Also note that I specified a label named " oracrsfiles" which will be referred to when mounting or un-mounting the volume: $ su - # mkfs.ocfs2 -b 4K -C 32K -N 4 -L oracrsfiles /dev/iscsi/crs/part1 mkfs.ocfs2 1.2.7 Filesystem label=

oracrsfiles Block size=4096 (bits=12) Cluster size=32768 (bits=15) Volume size=2145943552 (65489 clusters) (523912 blocks) 3 cluster groups (tail covers 977 clusters, rest cover 32256 clusters) Journal size=67108864 Initial number of node slots: 4 Creating bitmaps: done Initializing superblock: done Writing system files: done Writing superblock: done Writing backup superblock: 1 block(s) Formatting Journals: done Writing lost+found: done mkfs.ocfs2 successful Mount the OCFS2 Filesystem
Now that the file system is created, we can mount it. Let's first do it using the command-line, then I'll show how to include it in the /etc/fstab to have it mount on each boot.
Note: Mounting the cluster file system will need to be performed on both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster as the root user account using the OCFS2 label oracrsfiles!
First, here is how to manually mount the OCFS2 file system from the command-line. Remember that this needs to be performed as the root user account: $ su - # mount -t ocfs2 -o datavolume,nointr -L "oracrsfiles" /u02 If the mount was successful, you will simply get your prompt back. We should, however, run the following checks to ensure the file system is mounted correctly.
Use the mount command to ensure that the new file system is really mounted. This should be performed on both nodes in the RAC cluster: # mount /dev/mapper/VolGroup00-LogVol00 on / type ext3 (rw) proc on /proc type proc (rw) sysfs on /sys type sysfs (rw) devpts on /dev/pts type devpts (rw,gid=5,mode=620) /dev/hda1 on /boot type ext3 (rw) tmpfs on /dev/shm type tmpfs (rw) none on /proc/sys/fs/binfmt_misc type binfmt_misc (rw) sunrpc on /var/lib/nfs/rpc_pipefs type rpc_pipefs (rw) domo:Public on /domo type nfs (rw,addr=192.168.1.121) configfs on /sys/kernel/config type configfs (rw) ocfs2_dlmfs on /dlm type ocfs2_dlmfs (rw)

/dev/sde1 on /u02 type ocfs2 (rw,_netdev,datavolume,nointr,heartbeat=local)

Please take note of the datavolume option I am using to mount the new file system. Oracle database users must mount any volume that will contain the Voting Disk file, Cluster Registry (OCR), Data files, Redo logs, Archive logs and Control files with the datavolume mount option so as to ensure that the Oracle processes open the files with the O_DIRECT flag. The nointr option ensures that the I/O's are not interrupted by signals.
Any other type of volume, including an Oracle home (which I will not be using for this article), should not be mounted with this mount option.
Why does it take so much time to mount the volume? It takes around 5 seconds for a volume to mount. It does so as to let the heartbeat thread stabilize. In a later release, Oracle plans to add support for a global heartbeat, which will make most mounts instant.
Configure OCFS2 to Mount Automatically at Startup
Let's take a look at what you've have done so far. You installed the OCFS2 software packages which will be used to store the shared files needed by Cluster Manager. After going through the install, you loaded the OCFS2 module into the kernel and then formatted the clustered file system. Finally, you mounted the newly created file system using the OCFS2 label " oracrsfiles". This section walks through the steps responsible for mounting the new OCFS2 file system each time the machine(s) are booted using its label.
Start by adding the following line to the /etc/fstab file on both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster: LABEL=oracrsfiles /u02 ocfs2 _netdev,datavolume,nointr 0 0 Notice the " _netdev" option for mounting this file system. The _netdev mount option is a must for OCFS2 volumes. This mount option indicates that the volume is to be mounted after the network is started and dismounted before the network is shutdown.
Now, let's make sure that the ocfs2.ko kernel module is being loaded and that the file system will be mounted during the boot process.
If you have been following along with the examples in this article, the actions to load the kernel module and mount the OCFS2 file system should already be enabled. However, you should still check those options by running the following on both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster as the root user account: $ su - # chkconfig --list o2cb o2cb 0:off 1:off 2:on 3: on 4: on 5: on 6:off The flags that I have marked in bold should be set to " on".
Check Permissions on New OCFS2 Filesystem
Use the ls command to check ownership. The permissions should be set to 0775 with owner " oracle" and group " oinstall".
The following tasks only need to be executed on one of nodes in the RAC cluster. I will be executing all commands in this section from linux1 only.
Let's first check the permissions: # ls -ld /u02 drwxr-xr-x 3

root root 4096 Jul 31 17:21 /u02 As you can see from the listing above, the oracle user account (and the oinstall group) will not be able to write to this directory. Let's fix that: # chown oracle:oinstall /u02 # chmod 775 /u02 Let's now go back and re-check that the permissions are correct for both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster: # ls -ld /u02 drwxrwxr-x 3

oracle oinstall 4096 Jul 31 17:21 /u02 Create Directory for Oracle Clusterware Files
The last mandatory task is to create the appropriate directory on the new OCFS2 file system that will be used for the Oracle Clusterware shared files. We will also modify the permissions of this new directory to allow the " oracle" owner and group " oinstall" read/write access.
The following tasks only need to be executed on one of nodes in the RAC cluster. I will be executing all commands in this section from linux1 only. # mkdir -p /u02/oradata/racdb # chown -R oracle:oinstall /u02/oradata # chmod -R 775 /u02/oradata # ls -l /u02/oradata total 4 drwxrwxr-x 2 oracle oinstall 4096 Jul 31 17:31 racdb Reboot Both Nodes
Before starting the next section, this would be a good place to reboot both of the nodes in the RAC cluster. When the machines come up, ensure that the cluster stack services are being loaded and the new OCFS2 file system is being mounted: # mount /dev/mapper/VolGroup00-LogVol00 on / type ext3 (rw) proc on /proc type proc (rw) sysfs on /sys type sysfs (rw) devpts on /dev/pts type devpts (rw,gid=5,mode=620) /dev/hda1 on /boot type ext3 (rw) tmpfs on /dev/shm type tmpfs (rw) none on /proc/sys/fs/binfmt_misc type binfmt_misc (rw) sunrpc on /var/lib/nfs/rpc_pipefs type rpc_pipefs (rw) configfs on /sys/kernel/config type configfs (rw) ocfs2_dlmfs on /dlm type ocfs2_dlmfs (rw) cartman:SHARE2 on /cartman type nfs (rw,addr=192.168.1.120)

/dev/sdc1 on /u02 type ocfs2 (rw,_netdev,datavolume,nointr,heartbeat=local)

If you modified the O2CB heartbeat threshold, you should verify that it is set correctly:: # cat /proc/fs/ocfs2_nodemanager/hb_dead_threshold

61

How to Determine OCFS2 Version
To determine which version of OCFS2 is running, use: # cat /proc/fs/ocfs2/version OCFS2 1.2.9 Wed Jan 21 21:32:59 EST 2009 (build 5e8325ec7f66b5189c65c7a8710fe8cb)

18. Install & Configure Automatic Storage Management (ASMLib 2.0)
Most of the installation and configuration procedures in this section should be performed on both of the Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster! Creating the ASM disks, however, will only need to be performed on a single node within the cluster.
In this section, we will install and configure ASMLib 2.0 which will be used by Automatic Storage Management (ASM). In this article, we will use ASM as the shared file system and volume manager for all Oracle physical database files (data, online redo logs, control files, archived redo logs) as well as a Flash Recovery Area.
ASM was introduced in Oracle Database 10g Release 1 and is used to alleviate the DBA from having to manage individual files and drives. ASM is built into the Oracle kernel and provides the DBA with a way to manage thousands of disk drives 24x7 for both single and clustered instances of Oracle. All of the files and directories to be used for Oracle will be contained in a disk group. ASM automatically performs load balancing in parallel across all available disk drives to prevent hot spots and maximize performance, even with rapidly changing data usage patterns.
There are two different methods to configure ASM on Linux: * ASM with ASMLib I/O: This method creates all Oracle database files on raw block devices managed by ASM using ASMLib calls. RAW devices are not required with this method as ASMLib works with block devices. * * ASM with Standard Linux I/O: This method creates all Oracle database files on raw character devices managed by ASM using standard Linux I/O system calls. You will be required to create RAW devices for all disk partitions used by ASM.
In this article, I will be using the "ASM with ASMLib I/O" method. Oracle states in Metalink Note 275315.1 that " ASMLib was provided to enable ASM I/O to Linux disks without the limitations of the standard UNIX I/O API". I plan on performing several tests in the future to identify the performance gains in using ASMLib. Those performance metrics and testing details are out of scope of this article and therefore will not be discussed.
If you would like to learn more about Oracle ASMLib 2.0, visit http://www.oracle.com/technology/tech/linux/asmlib/
Install ASMLib 2.0 Packages
In previous editions of this article, this would be the time where you would need to download the ASMLib 2.0 software from Oracle ASMLib Downloads for Red Hat Enterprise Linux Server 5. This is no longer necessary since the ASMLib software is included with Oracle Enterprise Linux (with the exception of the Userspace Library which is a separate download). The ASMLib 2.0 software stack includes the following packages:
32-bit (x86) Installations * ASMLib Kernel Driver * * oracleasm-x.x.x-x.el5-x.x.x-x.el5.i686.rpm - (for default kernel) * oracleasm-x.x.x-x.el5PAE-x.x.x-x.el5.i686.rpm - (for PAE kernel) * oracleasm-x.x.x-x.el5xen-x.x.x-x.el5.i686.rpm - (for xen kernel) * Userspace Library * * oracleasmlib-x.x.x-x.el5.i386.rpm * Driver Support Files * * oracleasm-support-x.x.x-x.el5.i386.rpm
64-bit (x86_64) Installations * ASMLib Kernel Driver * * oracleasm-x.x.x-x.el5-x.x.x-x.el5.x86_64.rpm - (for default kernel) * oracleasm-x.x.x-x.el5PAE-x.x.x-x.el5.x86_64.rpm - (for PAE kernel) * oracleasm-x.x.x-x.el5xen-x.x.x-x.el5.x86_64.rpm - (for xen kernel) * Userspace Library * * oracleasmlib-x.x.x-x.el5.x86_64.rpm * Driver Support Files * * oracleasm-support-x.x.x-x.el5.x86_64.rpm
With Oracle Enterprise Linux 5.3, the ASMLib 2.0 software packages do not get installed by default. The ASMLib 2.0 Kernel Drivers and Driver Support File can be found on CD #3. The Userspace Library will need to be downloaded as it is not included with Oracle Enterprise Linux. To determine if the Oracle ASMLib packages are installed (which in most cases, they will not be), perform the following on both Oracle RAC nodes: # rpm -qa | grep oracleasm | sort If the Oracle ASMLib 2.0 packages are not installed, load the Oracle Enterprise Linux CD #3 into each of the Oracle RAC nodes and perform the following: From Oracle Enterprise Linux 5 - [CD #3] # mount -r /dev/cdrom /media/cdrom # cd /media/cdrom/Server # rpm -Uvh oracleasm-support-2.1.2-1.el5.i386.rpm # rpm -Uvh oracleasm-2.6.18-128.el5-2.0.5-1.el5.i686.rpm # cd / # eject After installing the ASMLib packages, verify from both Oracle RAC nodes that the software is installed: # rpm -qa | grep oracleasm | sort oracleasm-2.6.18-128.el5-2.0.5-1.el5 oracleasm-support-2.1.2-1.el5 Getting Oracle ASMLib
As mentioned in the previous section, the ASMLib 2.0 software is included with Oracle Enterprise Linux with the exception of the Userspace Library (a.k.a. the ASMLib support library). The Userspace Library is required and can be downloaded for free at: * oracleasmlib-2.0.4-1.el5.i386.rpm
After downloading the Userspace Library to both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster, install it using the following: # rpm -Uvh oracleasmlib-2.0.4-1.el5.i386.rpm Preparing... ########################################### [100%] 1:oracleasmlib ########################################### [100%] For information on obtaining the ASMLib support library through the Unbreakable Linux Network (which is not a requirement for this article), please visit Getting Oracle ASMLib via the Unbreakable Linux Network.
Configuring and Loading the ASMLib 2.0 Packages
Now that you have installed the ASMLib Packages for Linux, you need to configure and load the ASM kernel module. This task needs to be run on both Oracle RAC nodes as the root user account: $ su - # /etc/init.d/oracleasm configure Configuring the Oracle ASM library driver. This will configure the on-boot properties of the Oracle ASM library driver. The following questions will determine whether the driver is loaded on boot and what permissions it will have. The current values will be shown in brackets ('[]'). Hitting <ENTER> without typing an answer will keep that current value. Ctrl-C will abort. Default user to own the driver interface []: oracle Default group to own the driver interface []: oinstall Start Oracle ASM library driver on boot (y/n) [n]: y Scan for Oracle ASM disks on boot (y/n) [y]: y Writing Oracle ASM library driver configuration: done Initializing the Oracle ASMLib driver: [ OK ] Scanning the system for Oracle ASMLib disks: [ OK ] Create ASM Disks for Oracle
Creating the ASM disks only needs to be performed from one node in the RAC cluster as the root user account. I will be running these commands on linux1. On the other Oracle RAC node, you will need to perform a scandisk to recognize the new volumes. When that is complete, you should then run the oracleasm listdisks command on both Oracle RAC nodes to verify that all ASM disks were created and available.
In the section " Create Partitions on iSCSI Volumes", we configured (partitioned) four iSCSI volumes to be used by ASM. ASM will be used for storing Oracle database files like online redo logs, database files, control files, archived redo log files, and the flash recovery area. Use the local device names that were created by udev when configuring the four ASM volumns.
Note: If you are repeating this article using the same hardware (actually, the same shared logical drives), you may get a failure when attempting to create the ASM disks. If you do receive a failure, try listing all ASM disks that were used by the previous install using: # /etc/init.d/oracleasm listdisks

VOL1

VOL2

VOL3

VOL4

As you can see, the results show that I have four ASM volumes already defined. If you have the four volumes already defined from a previous run, go ahead and remove them using the following commands. After removing the previously created volumes, use the " oracleasm createdisk" commands (below) to create the new volumes. # /etc/init.d/oracleasm deletedisk VOL1 Removing ASM disk "VOL1" [ OK ] # /etc/init.d/oracleasm deletedisk VOL2 Removing ASM disk "VOL2" [ OK ] # /etc/init.d/oracleasm deletedisk VOL3 Removing ASM disk "VOL3" [ OK ] # /etc/init.d/oracleasm deletedisk VOL4 Removing ASM disk "VOL4" [ OK ]

To create the ASM disks using the iSCSI target names to local device name mappings, type the following: $ su - # /etc/init.d/oracleasm createdisk VOL1 /dev/iscsi/asm1/part1 Marking disk "/dev/iscsi/asm1/part1" as an ASM disk [ OK ] # /etc/init.d/oracleasm createdisk VOL2 /dev/iscsi/asm2/part1 Marking disk "/dev/iscsi/asm2/part1" as an ASM disk [ OK ] # /etc/init.d/oracleasm createdisk VOL3 /dev/iscsi/asm3/part1 Marking disk "/dev/iscsi/asm3/part1" as an ASM disk [ OK ] # /etc/init.d/oracleasm createdisk VOL4 /dev/iscsi/asm4/part1 Marking disk "/dev/iscsi/asm4/part1" as an ASM disk [ OK ] On all other nodes in the RAC cluster, you must perform a scandisk to recognize the new volumes: # /etc/init.d/oracleasm scandisks Scanning system for ASM disks [ OK ]

We can now test that the ASM disks were successfully created by using the following command on both nodes in the RAC cluster as the root user account: # /etc/init.d/oracleasm listdisks VOL1 VOL2 VOL3 VOL4

19. Download Oracle RAC 10 g Software
The following download procedures only need to be performed on one node in the cluster!
The next step is to download and extract the required Oracle software packages from the Oracle Technology Network (OTN):
Note: If you do not currently have an account with OTN, you will need to create one. This is a FREE account!
Oracle offers a development and testing license free of charge. No support, however, is provided and the license does not permit production use. A full description of the license agreement is available on OTN.

32-bit (x86) Installations http://www.oracle.com/technology/software/products/database/oracle10g/htdocs/10201linuxsoft.html 64-bit (x86_64) Installations http://www.oracle.com/technology/software/products/database/oracle10g/htdocs/10201linx8664soft.html You will be downloading and extracting the required software from Oracle to only one of the Linux nodes in the cluster—namely, linux1. You will perform all Oracle software installs from this machine. The Oracle installer will copy the required software packages to all other nodes in the RAC configuration using the remote access method we setup in Section 15 (Configure RAC Nodes for Remote Access using SSH).
Login to the node that you will be performing all of the Oracle installations from ( linux1) as the " oracle" user account. In this example, you will be downloading the required Oracle software to linux1 and saving them to /home/oracle/orainstall.
Downloading and Extracting the Software
First, download the Oracle Clusterware Release 2 (10.2.0.1.0), Oracle Database 10g Release 2 (10.2.0.1.0), and Oracle Database 10g Companion CD Release 2 (10.2.0.1.0) software for either Linux x86 or Linux x86-64. All downloads are available from the same page.
As the oracle user account, extract the three packages you downloaded to a temporary directory. In this example, we will use /home/oracle/orainstall.
Extract the Oracle Clusterware package as follows: # su - oracle $ mkdir -p /home/oracle/orainstall $ cd /home/oracle/orainstall $ unzip 10201_clusterware_linux32.zip Then extract the Oracle Database Software: $ cd /home/oracle/orainstall $ unzip 10201_database_linux32.zip Finally, extract the (optional) Oracle Companion CD Software: $ cd /home/oracle/orainstall $ unzip 10201_companion_linux32.zip

20. Pre-Installation Tasks for Oracle Database 10g Release 2
Perform the following checks on both Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster!
Before installing the Oracle Clusterware and Oracle RAC software, it is highly recommended to run the Cluster Verification Utility (CVU) to verify the hardware and software configuration. CVU is a command-line utility provided on the Oracle Clusterware installation media. It is responsible for performing various system checks to assist you with confirming the Oracle RAC nodes are properly configured for Oracle Clusterware and Oracle Real Application Clusters installation. The CVU only needs to be run from the node you will be performing the Oracle installations from ( linux1 in this article). Note that the CVU is also run automatically at the end of the Oracle Clusterware installation as part of the Configuration Assistants process.
Prerequisites for Using Cluster Verification Utility
Install cvuqdisk RPM (Oracle Enterprise Linux and RHEL Users Only)
The first pre-requisite for running the CVU pertains to users running Oracle Enterprise Linux, Red Hat Linux, and SuSE. If you are using any of the above listed operating systems, then you must download and install the package cvuqdisk to both of the Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster. This means you will need to install the cvuqdisk RPM to both linux1 and linux2. Without cvuqdisk, CVU will be unable to discover shared disks and you will receive the error message "Package cvuqdisk not installed" when you run CVU.
The cvuqdisk RPM can be found on the Oracle Clusterware installation media in the rpm directory. For the purpose of this article, the Oracle Clusterware media was extracted to the /home/oracle/orainstall/clusterware directory on linux1. Note that before installing the cvuqdisk RPM, we need to set an environment variable named CVUQDISK_GRP to point to the group that will own the cvuqdisk utility. The default group is oinstall which is the group we are using for the oracle UNIX user account in this article.
Locate and copy the cvuqdisk RPM from linux1 to linux2 as the " oracle" user account: $ ssh linux2 "mkdir -p /home/oracle/orainstall/clusterware/rpm" $ scp /home/oracle/orainstall/clusterware/rpm/cvuqdisk-1.0.1-1.rpm linux2:/home/oracle/orainstall/clusterware/rpm Perform the following steps as the " root" user account on both Oracle RAC nodes to install the cvuqdisk RPM: $ su - # cd /home/oracle/orainstall/clusterware/rpm # CVUQDISK_GRP=oinstall; export CVUQDISK_GRP # rpm -iv cvuqdisk-1.0.1-1.rpm Preparing packages for installation... cvuqdisk-1.0.1-1 # ls -l /usr/sbin/cvuqdisk -rwsr-x--- 1 root oinstall 4168 Jun 2 2005 /usr/sbin/cvuqdisk

Verify Remote Access / User Equivalence
The CVU should be run from linux1 — the node we will be performing all of the Oracle installations from. Before running CVU, login as the oracle user account and verify remote access / user equivalence is configured to all nodes in the cluster. When using the secure shell method, user equivalence will need to be enabled for the terminal shell session before attempting to run the CVU. To enable user equivalence for the current terminal shell session, perform the following steps remembering to enter the pass phrase for each key that you generated when prompted: # su - oracle $ exec /usr/bin/ssh-agent $SHELL $ /usr/bin/ssh-add Enter passphrase for /home/oracle/.ssh/id_rsa: xxxxx Identity added: /home/oracle/.ssh/id_rsa (/home/oracle/.ssh/id_rsa)

Verifying Oracle Clusterware Requirements with CVU
Once all prerequisites for running the CVU utility have been met, we can now check that all pre-installation tasks for Oracle Clusterware are completed by executing the following command as the "oracle" UNIX user account from linux1: $ cd /home/oracle/orainstall/clusterware/cluvfy $ mkdir -p jdk14 $ unzip jrepack.zip -d jdk14 $ CV_HOME=/home/oracle/orainstall/clusterware/cluvfy; export CV_HOME $ CV_JDKHOME=/home/oracle/orainstall/clusterware/cluvfy/jdk14; export CV_JDKHOME $ ./runcluvfy.sh stage -pre crsinst -n linux1,linux2 -verbose

Review the CVU report. Note that there are several errors you may ignore in this report.
If your system only has 1GB of RAM memory, you may receive an error during the "Total memory" check: Check: Total memory Node Name Available Required Comment ------------ ------------------------ ------------------------ ---------- linux2 1009.65MB (1033880KB) 1GB (1048576KB) failed linux1 1009.65MB (1033880KB) 1GB (1048576KB) failed Result: Total memory check failed.
As you can see from the output above, the requirement is for 1GB of memory (1048576 KB). Although your system may have 1GB of memory installed in each of the Oracle RAC nodes, the Linux kernel is calculating it to be 1033880 KB which comes out to be 14696 KB short. This can be considered close enough and safe to continue with the installation. As I mentioned earlier in this article, I highly recommend both Oracle RAC nodes have 2GB of RAM memory or higher for performance reasons.
The first error is with regards to finding a suitable set of interfaces for VIPs which can be safely ignored. This is a bug documented in Metalink Note 338924.1: Suitable interfaces for the private interconnect on subnet "192.168.2.0": linux2 eth1:192.168.2.101 linux1 eth1:192.168.2.100 ERROR: Could not find a suitable set of interfaces for VIPs. Result: Node connectivity check failed.

As documented in the note, this error can be safely ignored.
The last set of errors that can be ignored deal with specific RPM package versions that are not required with Oracle Enterprise Linux 5. For example: * compat-db-4.0.14-5 * compat-gcc-7.3-2.96.128 * compat-gcc-c++-7.3-2.96.128 * compat-libstdc++-7.3-2.96.128 * compat-libstdc++-devel-7.3-2.96.128 * compat-libstdc++-devel-7.3-2.96.128

While these specific packages are listed as missing in the CVU report, please ensure that the correct versions of the compat-* packages are installed on both of the Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster. For example, in Oracle Enterprise Linux 4 Update 5, these would be: * compat-gcc-32-3.2.3-47.3 * compat-gcc-32-c++-3.2.3-47.3 * compat-libstdc++-33-3.2.3-47.3

Checking the Hardware and Operating System Setup with CVU
The next CVU check to run will verify the hardware and operating system setup. Again, run the following as the "oracle" UNIX user account from linux1: $ cd /home/oracle/orainstall/clusterware/cluvfy $ ./runcluvfy.sh stage -post hwos -n linux1,linux2 -verbose Review the CVU report. As with the previous check (pre-installation tasks for CRS), the check for finding a suitable set of interfaces for VIPs will fail and can be safely ignored
Also note you may receive warnings in the "Checking shared storage accessibility..." portion of the report: Checking shared storage accessibility... WARNING: Unable to determine the sharedness of /dev/sde on nodes: linux2,linux2,linux2,linux2,linux2,linux1,linux1,linux1,linux1,linux1

Shared storage check failed on nodes "linux2,linux1".
If this occurs, this too can be safely ignored. While we know the disks are visible and shared from both of our Oracle RAC nodes in the cluster, the check itself may fail. Several reasons for this have been documented. The first came from Metalink indicating that cluvfy currently does not work with devices other than SCSI devices. This would include devices like EMC PowerPath and volume groups like those from Openfiler. At the time of this writing, no workaround exists other than to use manual methods for detecting shared devices. Another reason for this error was documented by Bane Radulovic at Oracle. His research shows that CVU calls smartclt on Linux, and the problem is that smartclt does not return the serial number from our iSCSI devices. For example, a check against /dev/sde shows: # /usr/sbin/smartctl -i /dev/sde smartctl version 5.33 [i686-redhat-linux-gnu] Copyright (C) 2002-4 Bruce Allen Home page is http://smartmontools.sourceforge.net/ Device: Openfile Virtual disk Version: 0 Serial number: Device type: disk Local Time is: Mon Sep 3 02:02:53 2007 EDT Device supports SMART and is Disabled Temperature Warning Disabled or Not Supported At the time of this writing, it is unknown if the Openfiler developers have plans to fix this.