| Oracle® Application Server Administrator's Guide 10g Release 3 (10.1.3.2.0) Part Number B32196-01 |
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| Oracle® Application Server Administrator's Guide 10g Release 3 (10.1.3.2.0) Part Number B32196-01 |
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View PDF |
This chapter introduces the Oracle Application Server administration tools.
It contains the following topics:
Oracle realizes that the procedures you use to monitor and administer your application server components can vary, depending upon the size of your organization, the number of administrators you employ, and the types of components you manage. As a result, Oracle offers options for managing your Oracle Application Server installations.
These management options can be divided into the following categories:
Managing Oracle Application Server with Oracle Enterprise Manager 10g Application Server Control
Managing Oracle Application Server Using the OPMN Command Line
Managing Oracle Application Server Using the admin_client.jar Utility
Using Other Tools to Monitor the Built-In Performance Metrics
Oracle Enterprise Manager 10g Application Server Control is installed with every instance of Oracle Application Server. As a result, you can immediately begin managing your application server and its components from your Web browser.
From the Application Server Control Console, you can monitor and administer a single Oracle Application Server instance or a cluster topology, which consists of multiple application server instances and the applications deployed to the OC4J instances within those application servers.
The Application Server Control Console organizes a wide variety of performance data and administrative functions into distinct, Web-based home pages for specific features of the application server and Oracle Containers for J2EE. The Enterprise Manager home pages make it easy to locate the most important monitoring data and the most commonly used administrative functions—all from your Web browser.
In addition to Application Server Control, you can also use the opmnctl command-line tool, which provides a command-line interface to Oracle Process Manager and Notification Server (OPMN). For example, you can use this command-line tool (opmnctl) to:
Start and stop applications and application server instances
Associate two or more application server instances to form a cluster
Display a summary of the instances that are part of a cluster
See Also:
Section 1.5.1, "Getting Started with Oracle Process Manager and Notification Server (OPMN)"
Oracle Containers for J2EE Configuration and Administration Guide for information about configuring and managing OC4J clusters with opmnctl
Oracle Process Manager and Notification Server Administrator's Guide for complete information about the OPMN command line
Oracle Application Server also provides a command-line utility—admin_client.jar—that can be used to perform operations on active OC4J instances.
For many functions, the admin_client.jar utility replaces the admin.jar utility, which is used exclusively for the standalone configuration of the Oracle Application Server OC4J server.
Unlike the admin.jar utility, you can use the admin_client.jar utility to manage OC4J instances in a managed Oracle Application Server environment, as well as OC4J instances in a standalone OC4J environment.
You can perform the following tasks with the admin_client.jar utility:
Deploy applications to a specific OC4J instance or to all instances within a cluster
Undeploy an application
Incrementally update a deployed EJB module with modified classes
Create a new shared library
Stop, start, or restart a specific application, on a specific OC4J instance or cluster-wide
See Also:
"Using the admin_client.jar Utility" in the Oracle Containers for J2EE Configuration and Administration GuideAfter you install and start Oracle Application Server, the application server automatically begins gathering a set of built-in performance metrics. These built-in performance metrics are measured continuously using performance instrumentation inserted into the implementations of Oracle Application Server components.
The Application Server Control Console presents a subset of these performance metrics in an organized fashion on the application server component home pages. For example, the OC4J performance metrics are presented as a series of charts on the OC4J Performance page.
Alternatively, you may want to view the complete set of built-in performance metrics, or you may need to monitor a specific set of application server component metrics. Oracle Application Server provides a set of command-line and servlet-based tools to view the Oracle Application Server built-in performance metrics directly, outside of the Application Server Control Console.
Oracle Enterprise Manager 10g Application Server Control provides Web-based management capabilities designed specifically for Oracle Application Server 10g Release 3 (10.1.3.x).
The following sections provide more information:
Application Server Control New Features for 10g Release 3 (10.1.3.0.0)
New Application Server Control Features Introduced for 10g Release 3 (10.1.3.1)
About the Application Server Control Underlying Technologies
For Oracle Application Server 10g Release 3 (10.1.3.0.0), Application Server Control introduced the following benefits and feature improvements. These features are also part of the 10g Release 3 (10.1.3.1) and 10g Release 3 (10.1.3.2.0) releases:
Note:
In the following sections, 10g Release 3 (10.1.3.x) refers to 10g Release 3 (10.1.3.0.0), 10g Release 3 (10.1.3.1), and 10g Release 3 (10.1.3.2.0).The Application Server Control for 10g Release 3 (10.1.3.x) is deployed as a standard J2EE application (ascontrol) that runs within every OC4J container you create. In small deployments, the OC4J instance that hosts the Application Server Control can also be used to deploy customer applications.
This new architecture eliminates the need for a separate Oracle Management Agent, which was required for the Application Server Control in previous Oracle Application Server releases. As a result, the management software requires less disk space and fewer system resources. You can then manage and monitor your applications with minimal impact on your application server environment.
For 10g Release 3 (10.1.3.x), the Application Server Control is based on the Java Management Extensions (JMX) technology.
See Also:
The Java Management Extensions (JMX) Technology Overview at:http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.5.0/docs/guide/jmx/overview/JMXoverviewTOC.html
Specifically, Application Server Control implements the following Java technology standards:
The JSR 77 J2EE Management specification
Application Server Control takes advantage of container-defined MBeans provided by the 10g Release 3 (10.1.3.x) OC4J container, as well as application-defined MBeans, provided by applications that are developed and configured in accordance with the specification. These MBeans provide configuration, monitoring, and state management capabilities.
See Also:
The JSR 77 J2EE Management Specification at:http://jcp.org/en/jsr/detail?id=077
In addition, Application Server Control includes a new MBean browser that provides complete support for JSR 77 and Application Defined MBean operations, such as viewing MBean attribute values and statistics, MBean method invocation, subscription to JMX notifications, and state management.
The JSR 88 J2EE Application Deployment specification
Application Server Control provides a JSR 88-based deployment wizard to simplify deployment and redeployment of J2EE applications, task-oriented deployment plan editors to assist you in assigning or mapping the common deployment descriptors at deploy time, and a generic deployment plan editor so you can access all deployment descriptors for advanced configuration.
See Also:
The JSR 88 J2EE Application Deployment specification at:http://www.jcp.org/en/jsr/detail?id=88
The Java Naming and Directory Interface (JNDI)
Application Server Control provides a new JNDI browser, which hierarchically displays the JNDI bindings for each application.
See Also:
Description of the Java Naming and Directory Interface (JNDI) at:http://java.sun.com/products/jndi/
From the Application Server Control, you can configure auditing, logging, security, and reliability parameters for Web Services deployed in your OC4J instances. In addition, you can use Oracle Web Services Manager as your exclusive Web Services management solution, or you can use it in concert with the standard auditing, logging, reliability, and security management features.
See Also:
Oracle Application Server Web Services Developer's Guide for information about developing and managing Web services with 10g Release 3 (10.1.3.2.0)Oracle Web Services Manager User and Administrator Guide for more information about Oracle Web Services Manager
With Oracle Application Server 10g Release 3 (10.1.3.x), you can use Oracle Process Manager and Notification Server (OPMN) to associate two or more application server instances to form an Oracle Application Server cluster. When you configure your environment in this manner, you can use a single instance of the Application Server Control to remotely manage all the instances in the cluster.
In a typical production data center, administrative operations (for example, configuration, application deployment, and process control and monitoring) are performed by different sets of administrators, depending upon the data center deployment and security policies.
Typically a super administrator, who is granted full privileges, delegates administrative responsibilities to other administrators who are assigned limited privileges to only carry out specific administrative operations. With Application Server Control, you can assign one of three standard administrative roles to each user.
For 10g Release 3 (10.1.3.1), Application Server Control offered the following new features. These features are also available in 10g Release 3 (10.1.3.2.0):
The ability to create and delete OC4J instances from the Application Server Control Console
The ability to create and delete groups from the Application Server Control Console
A new Runtime Ports page that summarizes all the ports currently in use by components of the Oracle Application Server cluster topology
A new Routing ID page that allows you to view and modify the routing ID assigned to your application servers, OC4J instances, and deployed applications
A new Topology Network Configuration page that you can use to configure the members and the properties of the cluster topology
For more information, see Section 2.3, "Getting Started with the Application Server Control Console".
The Application Server Control Console relies on related technologies to discover, monitor, and administer the Oracle Application Server environment. These technologies automatically perform many of the management tasks as you select options and functions within the Application Server Control Console. For example, they discover the components of each application server instance, gather and process performance data, and provide access to application configuration information.
Table 2-1 provides a summary of the underlying technologies leveraged by the Application Server Control Console.
Table 2-1 Summary of the Application Server Control Underlying Technologies
| Technology | Description |
|---|---|
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The Application Server Control Console uses DMS to gather performance data about your Oracle Application Server components. For more information, see Oracle Application Server Performance Guide. |
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OPMN provides process control and monitoring for application server instances and their components. It gathers component status information, and distributes the status information to components that are interested in it. Application Server Control uses OPMN for such tasks as starting and stopping the components of your application server instance. For more information, see Oracle Process Manager and Notification Server Administrator's Guide. |
At any time while using the Application Server Control Console, you can click Help at the top of the page to get more information. In most cases, the Help window displays a help topic about the current page. Click Contents in the Help window to browse the list of help topics, or click Search to search for a particular word or phrase.
Use the following sections to get started with the Application Server Control Console and become familiar with the Enterprise Manager home pages within the Application Server Control Console:
Using Application Server Control to Manage the Cluster Topology
Using Application Server Control to Manage the Application Server Components
Using Application Server Control to View and Manage an OC4J Instance
About MBeans and the Application Server Control MBean Browsers
The following sections describe how to display the Application Server Control Console and introduce you to the initial home pages you should see when you display the Application Server Control Console for the first time:
The URL for the Application Server Control Console, including the port number, is included in the text file that displays at the end of the Oracle Application Server installation procedure. This text file is saved in the following location after you install the application server:
(UNIX) ORACLE_HOME/install/readme.txt (Windows) ORACLE_HOME\install\readme.txt
The Application Server Control Console URL typically includes the name of the host computer and the port number assigned to the Application Server Control Console during the installation. For example, on UNIX:
http://mgmthost1.acme.com:7777/em
To view the Application Server Control Console from the Oracle Application Server Welcome Page:
Display the Oracle Application Server Welcome Page by entering the following URL in your Web browser:
http://hostname.domain:port
For example:
http://sys42.acme.com:7777
Note:
The default port for Oracle HTTP Server (and, as a result, the Welcome page) is provided at the end of the Oracle Application Server installation, as well as in the following text file in the
install directory of the application server Oracle home:
readme.txt
Click Log on to the Oracle Enterprise Manager 10g Application Server Control Console.
Enterprise Manager displays the administrator logon dialog box.
Enter the Oracle Application Server administrator user name and password and click OK.
The default user name for the administrator user is oc4jadmin. This is the account you can use to log in to the Application Server Control Console for the first time. The oc4jadmin password is the one you supplied during the installation of Oracle Application Server.
After you log in to the Application Server Control Console by using the default oc4jadmin account, use the following procedure to create a new administration user account for yourself and additional administrative user accounts for the system administrators on your team.
Oracle recommends that you do not use the oc4jadmin account for everyday administration tasks. Instead, the oc4jadmin account should be reserved and used exclusively as the administration credentials for the cluster. For more information, see Section A.2.2, "About the oc4jadmin Account".
Task 1 Create a New Administrator Account for Yourself
Click Setup at the top of any Application Server Control Console page.
Click Users to display the Users page.
Click Create to create a new administrator account.
Follow the instructions on the screen to provide a name for your account, a default password, and to assign the ascontrol_admin role to your administrator account.
Consider using a combination of your last name and your first name initial as a name for the account (for example, bsmith).
It is important that you assign yourself the ascontrol_admin role so you can perform all administration tasks and create additional administration users.
Task 2 Create Additional Administration Accounts for Members of Your Team
Follow the procedure in the previous step to create additional user accounts for the members of your team.
Refer to Table 2-2 for a description of the administrative roles you can assign to each user.
Table 2-2 Administrative Roles That You Can Assign to Application Server Control Administrators
| Role | Description |
|---|---|
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ascontrol_admin |
Assign this role to administrators who need complete administrative privileges and access to the Application Server Control application and pages. You can consider these administrators the "super users" assigned to manage your Oracle Application Server and OC4J environment. |
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ascontrol_appadmin |
Assign this role to administrators who need to manage all deployed applications, except the default and Application Server Control (ascontrol) applications. These administrators can manage the applications you deploy, but they cannot create new administrative users or make global configuration changes. |
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ascontrol_monitor |
Assign this role to administrators who must monitor the Oracle Application Server and OC4J environment, but do not need to make any configuration changes to the applications or the OC4J instance. This role is essentially a read-only role. This role is applied automatically to all administrative users that you create. If you do not apply the ascontrol_admin or ascontrol_appadmin role, then the account can be used for monitoring only. |
When you install Oracle Application Server and then log in to the Application Server Control Console, the first page you see is the Cluster Topology page. The following sections describe how you can use this page to get started managing your Oracle Application Server environment:
See Also:
Oracle Application Server Installation Guide for information on configuring a cluster during the Oracle Application Server 10g Release 3 (10.1.3.1.0) installation
Section 6.2, "Configuring Cluster Topologies" for information on configuring clusters after installation
When you install Oracle Application Server, the Cluster Topology page (Figure 2-1) is the first page you see when you log into Application Server Control. You can also view this page at any time by clicking Cluster Topology in the Application Server Control Console.
The Cluster Topology page provides you with a high-level view of the application servers, OC4J instances, Web servers, and applications deployed to the cluster.
Note that each OC4J instance in the cluster automatically includes an ascontrol application, which represents the Application Server Control. However, only one Application Server Control is used to manage all the Oracle Application Server instances in the cluster.
To identify the active Application Server Control, which is being used to manage the cluster, click Expand All to view all components of the cluster, and then locate the active ascontrol application, which is identified by the active Application Server Control icon.
Note that the OC4J instance that is used to deploy the active ascontrol application is called the Administration OC4J instance. You can identify the Administration OC4J instance during the Oracle Application Server installation procedure.
See Also:
Section A.6, "Managing the Active Application Server Control" for more information about identifying and configuring the active Application Server Control for a cluster topologyWhen you deploy your own applications, they also appear on the Cluster Topology page. To view all the applications deployed to the OC4J instances in the cluster, select Applications from the View By menu above the Members section of the page. Application Server Control organizes the list into distinct categories.
For the purposes of Oracle Application Server 10g Release 3 (10.1.3.2.0), a group is a set of OC4J instances that belong to the same cluster topology. Specific configuration operations can be executed simultaneously on all OC4J instances in the group.
For more information, refer to the following sections:
When you first install Oracle Application Server, a default group is created for you. The default_group contains any OC4J instances created during the installation.
After installation, the groups available in the cluster are listed in the Groups section of the Cluster Topology page (Figure 2-1). From the Groups section of the page, you can start, stop, delete, and create groups. You can also click the name of a group and use the resulting Group page. From the Group page, you can:
Move OC4J instances in and out the group
Deploy applications to the group
Perform certain administration tasks on the group
Every OC4J instance must be in a group. As a result, when you create a new OC4J instance, you must identify the group to which it will belong.
See Also:
"About Groups" in the Application Server Control online help
Groups allow you perform some common administrative tasks automatically across multiple OC4J instances.
Specifically, from the Group page, you can, in one step, perform each of the following tasks across multiple OC4J instances:
Process management operations, such as start, stop, or restart
Deployment operations, such as deploy, undeploy, and redeploy
JDBC management operations, such as creating, modifying, or removing JDBC data sources and connection pools
JMS Provider operations, such as creating and removing JMS destinations, and creating, modifying, or removing JMS connection factories
To display the Group page, simply click the name of the group in the Groups section of the Cluster Topology page.
See Also:
"Guidelines for Creating OC4J Instances and Groups" in the Application Server Control online helpFrom the Cluster Topology Page, you can perform a set of cluster-wide administration tasks from the Administration section of the page. Table 2-3 summarizes the cluster topology administration tasks.
Table 2-3 Summary of the Cluster Topology Administration Tasks
| Task | Description | More information |
|---|---|---|
|
Cluster MBean Browser |
Display the Cluster MBean Browser, which you can use to view the hierarchy of managed beans that are specific to cluster-wide operations. |
Section 2.3.6, "About MBeans and the Application Server Control MBean Browsers" |
|
Routing ID Configuration |
Display or modify the routing IDs currently assigned to the components of your Oracle Application Server cluster. |
"Changing Routing IDs" in the Application Server Control online help |
|
Java SSO Configuration |
Configure deployed applications to use OC4J Java Single Sign-On (Java SSO), a lighter-weight single sign-on solution supplied with OC4J that does not require additional infrastructure. Note that for a Basic Installation, Java SSO is automatically deployed, configured, and started. For an Advanced Installation, it is deployed, but not configured or started. |
"Java SSO Setup and Configuration" in the Oracle Containers for J2EE Security Guide |
|
Topology Network Configuration |
Configure the members and properties of the current Oracle Application Server cluster topology. |
Section 6.2, "Configuring Cluster Topologies" "Summary of the Supported Cluster Topologies" in the Application Server Control online help |
|
Runtime Ports |
View and modify the ports used by the components of your Oracle Application Server cluster. |
|
After you get familiar with the Cluster Topology page, you can then drill down to the Home page for a particular application server instance.
Click the name of the application server instance on the Cluster Topology to display the Application Server page. For example, in Figure 2-1, click 061112_basic.stacz52.ucle.com.
The resulting Application Server page is shown in Figure 2-2. This page lists the components of the application server instance, including the OC4J instances created in this instance and, if one was installed as part of this specific Oracle Application Server instance, the Oracle HTTP Server.
The actual list of components shown on the Application Server page will vary depending upon the installation type you selected.
Use the Create OC4J Instance button to create a new OC4J instance in this application server instance. For more information, see Section 6.1, "Adding and Deleting OC4J Instances".
Figure 2-2 Viewing the Components of the Application Server Instance
If you click the name of an OC4J instance on the Cluster Topology page, or on the Application Server page, Enterprise Manager displays the OC4J Home page (Figure 2-3).
Figure 2-3 Managing an OC4J Instance from the OC4J Home Page
Use the OC4J Home page to obtain general information about the OC4J instance, and to view the response and load chart. Select a refresh interval from the View Data drop-down menu (for example, 30 Second Refresh) to monitor the response and load metrics over a period of time. To start, stop, or restart the OC4J instance, navigate to the Cluster Topology page, select the instance, and click Start, Stop, or Restart.
The OC4J Home page and its related Applications, Web Services, Performance, and Administration pages are designed to provide you with a central, Web-based view of the OC4J instance, as well as the applications and Web services deployed to the instance.
For more information, click Help at any time while using the OC4J Home page. The online help provides reference information about the fields on each page, as well as links to related tasks and related documentation that can help you get started.
A managed bean (MBean) is a Java object that represents a JMX manageable resource in a distributed environment, such as an application, a service, a component or a device.
MBeans are defined in the J2EE Management Specification (JSR-77), which is part of Java Management Extensions, or JMX, a set of specifications that allow standard interfaces to be created for managing applications in a J2EE environment.
You can create MBeans for deployment with an application into OC4J, enabling the application or its components to be managed and monitored through the Application Server Control Console.
See Also:
"Using MBeans in OC4J" in the Oracle Containers for J2EE Configuration and Administration GuideApplication Server Control provides a set of MBean browsers that allow to you browse the MBeans for an OC4J instance, a cluster, or for a selected application. You can also perform specific monitoring and configuration tasks from the MBean browser.
For more information, see the following sections:
To view the System MBean Browser, which contains the MBeans specific to the selected OC4J instance:
Navigate to the OC4J Home page for the OC4J instance.
Click Administration to display the OC4J Administration page.
Click the task icon in the System Bean Browser row of the table.
Enterprise Manager displays the System MBean Browser. Click Help if you need more information about using the System Bean Browser.
Note that the online help also provides a set of topics that provide a tour of the MBean Browser, including online demonstrations of using the MBean browser.
See Also:
"Step 1: Explore the Structure of the MBean Browser" in the Application Server Control online helpTo view the MBeans for a specific application:
Click Applications on the OC4J Home page to display the list of applications deployed to the OC4J instance.
Click the name of a deployed application.
Click Administration to display the Application Administration page, which contains a table listing the various administration tasks you can perform for the selected application.
Click the appropriate task icon in the table to browse the System MBeans associated with the selected application or to view the MBeans defined for the application.
Enterprise Manager displays the selected MBean Browser page.
To view the MBeans associated with the cluster topology, click Cluster MBean Browser on the Cluster Topology page.
Enterprise Manager displays the Cluster MBean Browser, which highlights the MBeans used to manage the cluster and any groups defined within the cluster.
