Oracle RAC on AIX WPAR

[Former Member]

Hi, this question is actually a consultation about the architecture to be followed for setting up Oracle 11g RAC database for the SAP products. We are planning to have a 2 node Oracle RAC setup for the Production environment. We have gone through the various SAP notes in the SMP and we see that a single OS on each node with one oracle user login as "oracle" is sufficient to install RAC and various seperate databases for each of the SAP products.

However, we came to know that the AIX servers are configured with WPARS and so we will have to have 8 different OS installed in each node or server and each of the OS will host its own Oracle Home and its own Database and so its going to be like have 8 seperate Oracle RAC installations! This is not what we want. But we hear that this is the only way to proceed with SAP installation for Oracle RAC.

In simple terms, we would ideally have a distributed setup where the application server node is separate from the database server node. The database server is clustered (2-node Oracle RAC). Now, on the database servers (node 1 and 2), we should have only 1 OS installed on each node WITHOUT any WPARs. Now, on each node, we should ideally install a shared Oracle_Home and then as we install the various SAP products like CRM, SRM, etc a new oracle_home will be created but with a link to the original shared oracle_home.  So in this way, each SAP product gets to have a separate oracle_home (actually the same oracle shared home) and a separate Oracle Database (this will real separate Oracle Databases for each SAP product). I think this configuration is completely supported and ideal. (ref: Configuration of SAP NetWeaver for Oracle Grid Infrastructure 11.2.0.2 and Oracle Real Application Clusters 11g Release 2: A Best Practices Guide)

However we have a proposal where we have to have 8 WPARs on each of the 2 database server nodes and each of this WPAR will have its own OS and each of this OS will have its own Oracle_Home with its own Oracle Database and they will be on Oracle Clusterware as its Oracle RAC 11gR2.

Can you please let us know how to proceed given the AIX platform and Oracle 11gR2 RAC (11.2.0.3)?

Any inputs are welcome. We need some suggestions and guidance.

Thanks and Regards,
Augustine

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Oracle RAC is not certified with AIX WPAR. For more info please read

Note 1105456 - SAP Installations in AIX WPARs,

http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/database/virtualizationmatrix-172995.html, My Oracle Support document IBM AIX Workload Partition (WPAR) Installation Doc [ID 889220.1].

For supported configurations see Note 527843 - Oracle RAC support in the SAP environment.

About shared oracle home read Note 1778431 - Running Multiple Databases From One Oracle Home.

Regards,

Roman

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hi Roman, You are right about WPAR not being supported. However I just came to know that we are going in on AIX 7.1 and we have DLPAR which is supported as per the SAP Note: Note 1002461 - Support of IBM Dynamic LPAR and Micropartitioning.

So the DLPAR should be supported for Oracle RAC 11gR2 now I suppose.

But my question still remains, why should we go for it when we have 2 nodes separetely for ORACLE RAC Databases? I dont see the need to have 8 OS instances in each database server node.

What are your thoughts on this?

Regards,

Augustine

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Hi Everyone, I need some inputs for all please.

Regards,

Augustine

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

>> we have 2 nodes separetely for ORACLE RAC Databases?

What do you mean by node? Physical server or LPAR on physical server? Please explain in detail.

>> I dont see the need to have 8 OS instances in each database server node.

What do you mean by database server node? Please explain this.

Regards,

Roman

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

Dear Roman, by nodes I mean Physical Server not LPAR.

When I say Database Server node I mean a complete physical server. Why I say node is because we are going to have 2 physical servers as 2 node Oracle RAC setup.

Our SAP Production Environment will be setup like this:

1. A separate physical server with LPARs for all the SAP components and products (application).

2. A separate physical server as node 1 for Oracle RAC databases.

3. A separate physical server as node 2 for Oracle RAC databases.

This is the normal scenario. However the proposal is being made to have LPARs on each of these 2 database servers as well so that each database (around 8 in total) will run on their own LPAR hence its own OS instance.

I hope its clear now.

Regards,

Augustine

[Former Member · Accepted solution]

>> However the proposal is being made to have LPARs on each of these 2 database servers as well so that each database (around 8 in total) will run on their own LPAR hence its own OS instance.

Take into account the following:

- many databases operate on the same release and same patch level - is it applicable for you;

- performance tuning - resource allocation between databases.

Regards,
Roman