3 Understanding the SOA Enterprise Deployment Topology

This chapter introduces and describes the Oracle SOA Suite enterprise deployment topologies. These topologies represent specific reference implementations of the concepts described in Chapter 2, "Understanding a Typical Enterprise Deployment".

This chapter contains the following sections:

3.1 Understanding the Primary and Build-Your-Own Enterprise Deployment Topologies

This guide focuses on two primary reference topologies for Oracle SOA Suite and Oracle Business Activity Monitoring. The exact Oracle SOA Suite topology you install and configure for your organization might vary, but for the two primary topologies, this guide provides step-by-step instructions for installing and configuring those topologies.

In addition, this guide provides high-level information about how to design and build your own enterprise deployment topology. For the build-your-own topologies, information is provided about how you can modify the procedures in this guide to take into account adding specific Oracle SOA Suite products to the environment.

3.2 Diagrams of the Primary Oracle SOA Suite Enterprise Topologies

The following sections provide diagrams of the two primary Oracle SOA Suite enterprise deployment topologies:

3.2.1 Diagram of the Oracle SOA Suite and Oracle Service Bus Topology

Figure 3-1 shows a diagram of the Oracle SOA and Oracle Service Bus enterprise deployment topology.

For a description of the standard elements shown in the diagram, see Section 2.2, "Understanding the Typical Enterprise Deployment Topology Diagram".

For a description of the elements shown in the diagram, see Section 3.3, "Understanding the Primary Oracle SOA Suite Topology Diagrams".

Figure 3-1 Oracle SOA Suite and Oracle Service Bus Enterprise Deployment Reference Topology Diagram

Description of Figure 3-1 follows
Description of ''Figure 3-1 Oracle SOA Suite and Oracle Service Bus Enterprise Deployment Reference Topology Diagram''

3.2.2 Diagram of the Oracle SOA Suite and Oracle Business Activity Monitoring Topology

Figure 3-2 shows a diagram of the Oracle SOA Suite and Oracle Business Activity Monitoring enterprise topology.

For a description of the standard elements shown in the diagram, see Section 2.2, "Understanding the Typical Enterprise Deployment Topology Diagram".

For a description of the elements that are specific to the Oracle SOA Suite topologies, see Section 3.3, "Understanding the Primary Oracle SOA Suite Topology Diagrams".

Figure 3-2 Oracle SOA Suite and Oracle Business Activity Monitoring Enterprise Topology Diagram

Description of Figure 3-2 follows
Description of ''Figure 3-2 Oracle SOA Suite and Oracle Business Activity Monitoring Enterprise Topology Diagram''

3.3 Understanding the Primary Oracle SOA Suite Topology Diagrams

Most of the elements of Oracle SOA Suite topologies represent standard features of any enterprise topology that follows the Oracle-recommended best practices. These elements are described detail in Chapter 2, "Understanding a Typical Enterprise Deployment".

Before you review the information here, it is assumed you have reviewed the information in Chapter 2 and that you are familiar with the general concepts of an enterprise deployment topology.

See the following sections for information about the elements that are unique to the topology described in this chapter:

3.3.1 Summary of Oracle SOA Suite Load Balancer Virtual Server Names

In order to balance the load on servers and to provide high availability, the hardware load balancer is configured to recognize a set of virtual server names.

For information about the purpose of each of these server names, see Section 2.2.3.2, "Summary of the Typical Load Balancer Virtual Server Names".

The following virtual server names are recognized by the hardware load balancer in Oracle SOA Suite topologies:

  • soa.example.com - This virtual server name is used for all incoming traffic. It acts as the access point for all HTTP traffic to the runtime SOA components. The load balancer routes all requests to this virtual server name over SSL. As a result, clients access this service using the following secure address:

    soa.example.com:443

  • osb.example.com - This virtual server name that acts as the access point for all HTTP traffic to the runtime Oracle Service Bus resources and proxy services. The load balancer routes all requests to this virtual server name over SSL. As a result, clients access this service using the following secure address:

    osb.example.com:443

  • soainternal.example.com - This virtual server name is for internal communications between the application tier components only and is not exposed to the Internet.

    Specifically, for the Oracle SOA Suite enterprise topology, this URL is used for both Oracle SOA Suite and Oracle Service Bus internal communications.

    The traffic from clients to this URL is not SSL-enabled. Clients access this service using the following address and the requests are forwarded to port 7777 on WEBHOST1 and WEBHOST2:

    soainternal.example.com:80

    Note that this URL can also be set as the URL to be used for internal service invocations while modeling composites or at runtime with the appropriate Enterprise Manager MBeans.

  • admin.example.com - This virtual server name is for administrators who need to access the Oracle Enterprise Manager Fusion Middleware Control and Oracle WebLogic Server Administration Console interfaces.

Instructions later in this guide provide instructions so you can:

  • Configure the hardware load balancer to recognize and route requests to the virtual host names

  • Configure the Oracle HTTP Server instances on the Web Tier to recognize and properly route requests to these virtual host names to the correct host computers.

3.3.2 About Accessing SOA Composite Applications via Oracle HTTP Server

When routing requests from the Oracle HTTP Server instances on the Web tier to specific Oracle SOA Suite composite application URLs on the application, consider the following:

  • In previous releases of Oracle Fusion Middleware, Oracle HTTP Server generated an HTTP 503 (Service Unavailable) message if a request to Oracle SOA Suite composite application was received by the Managed Server and the composite application was not yet loaded.

  • In Oracle Fusion Middleware 12c, this behavior has changed. If requests for a composite arrives before the composite is active, then the HTTP requests are put on hold until the required artifacts are available and the composite reaches the active state.

This change in behavior allows you to route requests to composite applications that are not yet loaded during the startup of an Oracle SOA Suite Managed Server. However, the communication channel between the Oracle HTTP Server and Oracle WebLogic Server needs to account for the possibility of long delays in getting replies.

To address this issue, while configuring firewalls between Oracle HTTP Server and Oracle WebLogic Server, set the appropriate timeout to avoid shutting down of connections that are waiting for a composite to be loaded.

For more information, see "Configuring the Firewalls and Ports for an Enterprise Deployment".

Note that the Oracle HTTP Server instances route requests based on the availability of the Oracle WebLogic Server servers and not on the availability of any specific application. The instances continue to route the requests as long as the Oracle WebLogic Server is up and running.

3.3.3 About Accessing Oracle SOA Suite Composite Applications Via the Load Balancer

In the default configuration, the hardware load balancer routes all requests to the Web tier, which then routes the requests to the appropriate resouce in the application tier.

However, you can configure the hardware load balancer to route directly to Managed Servers on the application tier. This configuration has some benefits, especially in an Oracle SOA Suite enterprise deployment:

  • Configuration and processing overhead is lower than when using Oracle HTTP Server.

  • It enables monitoring at the application level, because the load balancer can be configured to monitor specific URLS in each WLS server (something that is not possible with Oracle HTTP Server).

    In the case of Oracle SOA Suite, this enables routing to the Oracle WebLogic Server Managed Servers, but only when all composites are deployed.

If Oracle HTTP server directs an HTTP request for a composite to a Oracle SOA Suite Managed Server and the soa-infra application is not yet active, then the request will fail. Therefore, you should always verify that the soa-infra application is active after you start, restart, or migrate a server.

3.3.4 Summary of the Managed Servers and Clusters on Application Tier Host

The Application tier hosts the Administration Server and Managed Servers in the Oracle WebLogic Server domain.

Depending upon the topology you select, the Oracle WebLogic Server domain for the Oracle SOA Suite domain consists of the clusters shown in Table 3-1. These clusters function as active-active high availability configurations.

Table 3-1 Summary of the Clusters in the Oracle SOA Suite Enterprise Deployment Topology

Cluster Managed Servers

Oracle SOA Suite, Oracle Business Process Management, and Oracle B2B Cluster

WLS_SOA1, WLS_SOA2

Oracle Web Services Manager Cluster

WLS_WSM1, WLS_WSM2

Oracle Service Bus Cluster

WLS_OSB1, WLS_OSB2

Oracle Oracle Enterprise Scheduler

WLS_ESS1, WLS_ESS2

Oracle Business Activity Monitoring Cluster

WLS_BAM1, WLS_BAM2

3.4 Roadmap for Implementing the Primary Oracle SOA Suite Enterprise Topologies

The following sections summarize the high-level steps you must perform to install and configure the enterprise topology described in this chapter:

3.4.1 Flow Chart of the Steps to Install and Configure the Primary Oracle SOA Suite Enterprise Topologies

Figure 3-3 shows a flow chart of the steps required to install and configure the primary enterprise deployment topologies described in this chapter. The sections following the flow chart explain each step in the flow chart.

This guide is designed so you can start with a working Oracle SOA Suite domain and then later extend the domain to add additional capabilities.

This modular approach to building the topology allows you to make strategic decisions, based on your hardware and software resources, as well as the Oracle SOA Suite features that are most important to your organization.

It also allows you to validate and troubleshoot each individual product or component as they are configured.

This does not imply that configuring multiple products in one Configuration Wizard session is not supported; it is possible to group various extensions like the ones presented in this guide in one Configuration Wizard execution. However, the instructions in this guide focus primarily on the modular approach to building an enterprise deployment.

Figure 3-3 Flow Chart of the Enterprise Topology Configuration Steps

Description of Figure 3-3 follows
Description of ''Figure 3-3 Flow Chart of the Enterprise Topology Configuration Steps''

3.4.2 Roadmap Table for Planning and Preparing for an Enterprise Deployment

Table 3-2 describes each of the planning and preparing steps shown in the enterprise topology flow chart in Figure 3-3.

Table 3-2 Roadmap Table for Planning and Preparing for an Enterprise Deployment

Flow Chart Step More Information

Understand the basics of a Typical Enterprise Deployment

Chapter 2, "Understanding a Typical Enterprise Deployment"

Understand the Oracle SOA Suite Reference Topologies

Section 3.2, "Diagrams of the Primary Oracle SOA Suite Enterprise Topologies"

Section 3.3, "Understanding the Primary Oracle SOA Suite Topology Diagrams"

Review the Oracle SOA Suite EDG Workbook

Chapter 4, "Using the Enterprise Deployment Workbook"

Procure the hardware, IP addresses and software downloads

Chapter 5, "Procuring Resources for an Enterprise Deployment"

Prepare the hardware load balancer and firewalls

Chapter 6, "Preparing the Load Balancer and Firewalls for an Enterprise Deployment"

Prepare the file system

Chapter 7, "Preparing the File System for an Enterprise Deployment"

Verify system requirements, mount shared storage, and enable virtual IPs

Chapter 8, "Preparing the Host Computers for an Enterprise Deployment"

Identify or install a supported Oracle RAC Database

Chapter 9, "Preparing the Database for an Enterprise Deployment"

3.4.3 Roadmap Table for Configuring the Oracle SOA Suite and Oracle Service Bus Enterprise Topology

Table 3-3 describes each of the configuration steps required when configuring the Oracle SOA Suite and Oracle Service Bus topology shown in Figure 3-1.

These steps correspond to the Oracle SOA Suite and Oracle Service Bus Topology steps shown in the flow chart in Figure 3-3.

Table 3-3 Roadmap Table for Configuring the Oracle SOA Suite and Oracle Service Bus Enterprise Topology

Flow Chart Step More Information

Create the initial Infrastructure domain

Chapter 10, "Creating the Initial Infrastructure Domain for an Enterprise Deployment"

Extend the domain to Include the Web Tier

Chapter 11, "Configuring the Web Tier for an Enterprise Deployment"

Extend the domain with Oracle SOA Suite

Chapter 12, "Extending the Domain with Oracle SOA Suite"

Extend the Domain with Oracle Service Bus

Chapter 13, "Extending the Domain with Oracle Service Bus"

Extend the domain with Enterprise Scheduler

Chapter 15, "Extending the Domain with Oracle Enterprise Scheduler"

Note that extending the domain with Enterprise Scheduler is optional; perform the procedurs in this chapter only if you want to configure Enterprise Scheduler.

Extend the domain with Oracle B2B

Chapter 17, "Extending the Domain with Oracle B2B"

Note that extending the domain with Oracle B2B is optional; perform the procedures in this chapter only if you want to configure Oracle B2B.

3.4.4 Roadmap Table for Configuring the Oracle SOA Suite and Oracle Business Activity Monitoring Enterprise Topology

Table 3-4 describes each of the configuration steps required to configure the Oracle SOA Suite and Oracle Business Activity Monitoring topology shown in Figure 3-2.

These steps correspond to the configuration steps shown for the Oracle SOA Suite Oracle Business Activity Monitoring topology in the flow chart in Figure 3-3.

Table 3-4 Roadmap Table for Configuring the Oracle SOA Suite and Oracle Business Activity Monitoring Enterprise Topology

Flow Chart Step More Information

Create the initial Infrastructure domain

Chapter 10, "Creating the Initial Infrastructure Domain for an Enterprise Deployment"

Extend the domain to Include the Web Tier

Chapter 11, "Configuring the Web Tier for an Enterprise Deployment"

Extend the domain with Oracle SOA Suite

Chapter 12, "Extending the Domain with Oracle SOA Suite"

Extend the domain with Business Process Management

Chapter 14, "Extending the Domain with Business Process Management"

Extend the domain with Oracle Business Activity Monitoring

Chapter 16, "Extending the Domain with Business Activity Monitoring"

Extend the domain with Oracle B2B

Chapter 17, "Extending the Domain with Oracle B2B"

3.5 Building Your Own Oracle SOA Suite Enterprise Topology

This document provides step-by-step instructions for configuring the two primary enterprise topologies for Oracle SOA Suite, which are described in Section 3.2.

However, Oracle recognizes that the requirements of your organization may vary, depending on the specific set of Oracle Fusion Middleware products you purchase and the specific types of applications you deploy.

In many cases, you can install and configure an alternative topology--one that includes additional components, or one that does not include all the Oracle SOA Suite products shown in the primary topology diagrams.

The following sections describe some alternative Oracle SOA Suite topologies you can implement, using some variations of the instructions in this guide:

3.5.1 Flow Chart of the "Build Your Own" Enterprise Topologies

Building your own enterprise topology involves picking and choosing which Oracle Fusion Middleware products and which configuration steps you want to use to build your topology.

Figure 3-4 shows the high-level configuration steps required to build some typical alternative Oracle SOA Suite enterprise topologies. Each of the configuration steps corresponds to a chapter in this guide.

Note that modifications of the steps in this guide are necessary in order to implement the "Build Your Own" topologies. Refer to Section 3.5.2, "Description of the Supported "Build Your Own" Topologies" for more information.

Figure 3-4 Flow Chart of the Oracle SOA Suite Build-Your-Own Topologies

Description of Figure 3-4 follows
Description of ''Figure 3-4 Flow Chart of the Oracle SOA Suite Build-Your-Own Topologies''

3.5.2 Description of the Supported "Build Your Own" Topologies

Table 3-5 describes the configuration steps to follow if you want to use the instructions in this guide to build the enterprise topologies listed in Figure 3-4.

It also identifies some differences you will need to consider when you use the existing instructions in this guide to build each topology.

Table 3-5 Roadmap Table for Building Your Own Enterprise Topology

Topology After configuring the Web Tier, refer to the following chapters... Considerations and Dependencies

SOA Suite and Business Process Management only

  1. Chapter 12, "Extending the Domain with Oracle SOA Suite"

  2. Chapter 14, "Extending the Domain with Business Process Management"

These instructions assume you will run the Oracle SOA Suite and Business Process Management installer twice--once to install Oracle SOA Suite and once to install Oracle Business Process Management.

Alternatively, you can install both Oracle SOA Suite and Oracle Business Process Management at the same time by selecting the BPM install type during the installation.

Similarly, you can configure this topology by running the Configuration Wizard only once by selecting both the SOA and Oracle Business Process Management templates during the Configuration Wizard session.

Oracle SOA Suite and Oracle B2B only

  1. Chapter 12, "Extending the Domain with Oracle SOA Suite"

  2. Chapter 17, "Extending the Domain with Oracle B2B"

No special instructions required.

SOA Suite and Enterprise Scheduler only

  1. Chapter 12, "Extending the Domain with Oracle SOA Suite"

  2. Chapter 15, "Extending the Domain with Oracle Enterprise Scheduler"

No special instructions required.

Oracle Service Bus and Enterprise Scheduler only

  1. Chapter 13, "Extending the Domain with Oracle Service Bus"

  2. Chapter 15, "Extending the Domain with Oracle Enterprise Scheduler"

This topology does not require Oracle SOA Suite. However, the instructions in Chapter 13 assume you have already created a cluster of two SOA Managed Servers.

As a result, when you create this topology, ignore any references to the SOA Managed Servers or the SOA Cluster.

In addition, you must run the Repository Creation Utility (RCU) to create the SOAINFRA schema, which is also required by Oracle Service Bus.

Oracle Business Activity Monitoring only

Chapter 16, "Extending the Domain with Business Activity Monitoring"

The instructions in Chapter 16 assume you are extending an existing Oracle SOA Suite domain and that the Oracle SOA Suite software (which includes Oracle BAM) has already been installed in an Oracle home on shared storage.

For this Oracle BAM-only topology, you will need to install Oracle SOA Suite into the Oracle Fusion Middleware Infrastructure Oracle home before you can configure the domain to include an Oracle BAM cluster.

In addition, you must run the Repository Creation Utility (RCU) to create the required SOA schemas.

Oracle Service Bus only

Chapter 13, "Extending the Domain with Oracle Service Bus"

This topology does not require Oracle SOA Suite. However, the instructions in Chapter 13 assume you have already created a cluster of two SOA Managed Servers.

As a result, when you create this topology, ignore any references to the SOA Managed Servers or the SOA Cluster.

In addition, you must run the Repository Creation Utility (RCU) to create the SOAINFRA schema, which is also required by Oracle Service Bus.

3.5.3 About Installing and Configuring a Custom Enterprise Topology

If you choose to implement a topology that is not described in this guide, be sure to review the certification information, system requirements, and interoperability requirements for the products you want to include in the topology.

After you verify that the topology is supported, then you can either use the instructions in this guide as a guide to installing and configuring the components you need, or you can install and configure a standard installation topology using the Oracle Fusion Middleware 12c installation guides and use the "Start Small and Scale Out" approach to configuring your environment.

For more information, see "Planning for a Production Environment" in Planning an Installation of Oracle Fusion Middleware.

3.5.4 About Using Server Migration to Enable High Availability of the Oracle SOA Suite Enterprise Topology

To ensure high availability of the Oracle SOA Suite products and components, this guide recommends that you enable Oracle WebLogic Server Whole Server Migration for the Oracle SOA Suite, Oracle Business Process Management, Oracle Service Bus, and Oracle B2B clusters that you create as part of the reference topology.

Whole server migration provides for the automatic restart of a server instance, with all of its services, on a different physical machine. When a failure occurs in a server that is part of a cluster that is configured with server migration, the server is restarted on any of the other machines that host members of the cluster.

For more information, see Chapter 19, "Using Whole Server Migration and Service Migration in an Enterprise Deployment".

For Oracle Business Activity Monitoring (Oracle BAM), this guide recommends using Oracle WebLogic Server Automatic Service Migration for specific JMS services in the Oracle BAM cluster.

For more information, see Section 16.8, "Configuring Automatic Service Migration for the Oracle BAM Servers".