"Drop ILM Partition Support" for All ILM-Applicable Maintenance Objects

The Drop ILM Partition Support feature has been enhanced to support dropping the oldest partitions with data for all ILM-applicable maintenance objects. Support will exist to drop the oldest and non-empty partition for the selected maintenance object. This support is provided through the ILM Dashboard where customers can view a list of partitions for a ILM-applicable maintenance object, select the oldest partition they would like to drop, and initiate a request to drop it. The process of requesting to drop a partition can only be performed by users setup in the system as Requesters. Oracle recommends that only a small set of users have this access. Refer to the "Access Requirements" section below for more information on how to set up the Requesters.

Requests for partition drops go through an approval process where Approver user(s) review the request and approve or reject it as needed. When approved, the partition is dropped. Oracle recommends that a only small set of informed and experienced database administrator users have this access. They should have experience on ILM partitions with associated data, data retention policies, and change management processes. Refer to the "Access Requirements" section below for more information on how to set up Approvers.

The partition drop process must now go through the ILM Dashboard and the approval process. You can no longer drop a partition by direct submission of batch control ILM Automation - Drop Partition (K1-ILMDR).

NOTE: A pre-requisite exists for dropping the oldest partitions with data. The crawler batch control associated with the maintenance object must be run prior to requesting the partition drop, so that relevant data is appropriately marked for the partition to be dropped.

NOTE: In the 24A release, an "CM_ILM_DROP_PARTITION (ILM Drop Partition)" accelerator scheduler batch stream was released that customers can use to drop the partitions. This is no longer supported and is removed in this release. Customers who still have this accelerator stream should no longer use it.

Drop ILM Partition Support allows customers to drop an ILM partition on their own without having to raise a service request to the Cloud Operations team. This empowers customers to drop ILM partitions with data quickly and saves storage space/costs associated with the partition immediately. Requiring a request and approval process before the partition is dropped, ensures important and necessary partitions are not accidentally dropped.

Steps to Enable

Provide the required access before using the feature. Details are in the Access #Requirements section.

Tips And Considerations

This feature allows the customers to drop the partition with or without the data. Once the partition is dropped, the data is also removed from the database and there is no way that you can restore the data back into your environment. It is imperative that customers must review the partition and the respective data before requesting and approving the drop partition request.

Access Requirements

System administrators can add all users they want to set up as Requesters to the user group Drop Partition Approval Request Requester (K1_DRPPTN_APVREQ_RQR).

The users they want to set up as Approvers should be added to the user group Drop Partition Approval Request Approver (K1_DRPPTN_APVREQ_APP).