9 Upgrading Oracle Database Appliance Using Data Preserving Reprovisioning
Understand how you can directly upgrade your Oracle Database Appliance software from Oracle Database Appliance releases 12.1.2.12, 12.2.1.4, 18.3, 18.5, 18.7, and 18.8 to the latest release without upgrading to intermediate releases.
- About Upgrading Using Data Preserving Reprovisioning
Understand how you can upgrade your appliance from Oracle Database Appliance releases 12.1.2.12, 12.2.1.4, 18.3, 18.5, 18.7, and 18.8 to the latest release without upgrading to the intermediate releases. - Step 1: Detaching Nodes for Upgrade Using Data Preserving Reprovisioning
The Oracle Database Appliance nodes are detached in Step 1 in upgrading from Oracle Database Appliance releases 12.1.2.12, 12.2.1.4, 18.3, 18.5, 18.7, and 18.8 to the latest release. - Step 2: Reimaging Nodes for Upgrading Using Data Preserving Reprovisioning
Step 2 in upgrading Oracle Database Appliance from Oracle Database Appliance releases 12.1.2.12, 12.2.1.4, 18.3, 18.5, 18.7, and 18.8 to the latest release. - Step 3: Provisioning Nodes Using Data Preserving Reprovisioning Method
Step 3 in upgrading Oracle Database Appliance from Oracle Database Appliance releases 12.1.2.12, 12.2.1.4, 18.3, 18.5, 18.7, and 18.8 to the latest release.
About Upgrading Using Data Preserving Reprovisioning
Understand how you can upgrade your appliance from Oracle Database Appliance releases 12.1.2.12, 12.2.1.4, 18.3, 18.5, 18.7, and 18.8 to the latest release without upgrading to the intermediate releases.
When you upgrade from Oracle Database Appliance releases 12.1.2.12, 12.2.1.4, 18.3, 18.5, 18.7 and 18.8, you are required to upgrade to the intermediate releases, so that you can finally, patch your appliance to the latest release. This process involves many steps in the upgrade path, and may have a long patching duration and application downtime. You can use Data Preserving Reprovisioning to upgrade your appliance directly to the latest release.
About Upgrading Using Data Preserving Reprovisioning
Data Preserving Reprovisioning enables reprovisioning of an already deployed Oracle Database Appliance system without modifying the storage and and the databases on the appliance. The advantage of this method over the regular upgrade process is that it has a much shorter upgrade path. This is achieved by saving the information of the source system, capturing them as server data archive files. Then, the appliance is reimaged to the desired version, such as Oracle Database Appliance release 19.20 or later and the saved metadata is used to directly reprovision the system and bring back all the databases.
- The upgrade utility runs prechecks on the system, such as detection of databases that are inactive and provides a warning before you upgrade the appliance. You can proactively address these failures beforehand and not encounter issues at the time of reprovisioning of the appliance.
- During the first step of detaching the node, information about the system is collected and preserved, including information about the VLAN, CPU, and Oracle AFD settings. These settings are migrated after the reimage and the third step in this process reprovisions these settings.
- The deployment is initially at Oracle Database Appliance release 12.1.2.12, 12.2.1.4, or 18.x, but after the reprovisioning process, the software is upgraded to Oracle Database Appliance release 19.20 and the deployment automatically starts using new features wherever applicable. For example, the database software is installed on Oracle ACFS-based storage.
- You can upgrade your appliance directly to the latest Oracle Database Appliance release without upgrading to intermediate releases.
Steps in the Data Preserving Reprovisioning for Upgrade Process
- Detach Nodes using Oracle Database Appliance upgrade utility
from the source version of the appliance: This step saves the
metadata about the databases, listeners, networks, and other configuration
details in archive files, namely, the server data archive files. Then, the
services running on the system are shutdown and uninstalled to prepare the
environment for reimage in step 2.
The server data archive files are generated after the successful detach of nodes. You must save the server data archive files in a location other than the appliance which is being upgraded, and copy these files back to the appliance to restore the system in step 3.
- Reimage Nodes using the Oracle Database Appliance ISO image: The procedure is similar to provisioning the appliance. This step sets up the operating system and DCS software with the Oracle Database Appliance release you want to upgrade to.
- Provision Nodes using the Data Preserving Reprovisioning method: This step reconfigures networks, operating system users and groups, installs Oracle Grid Infrastructure and configures the licensed CPU cores. Then, this step reprovisions the databases to the same state as they were, before they were detached in step 1. The databases are restarted and added to the Oracle Grid Infrastructure cluster.
The procedure for each step is detailed in the subsequent topics in this chapter.
Customizations to the Appliance and Their Persistence After Upgrade
- Custom RPMs: If your appliance has any custom operating systems installed from Oracle Linux Yum repository, then the prechecks report lists these custom RPMs. You must uninstall these RPMs and then continue with the next step in the upgrade process. You can reinstall these custom RPMs as required, after the upgrade.
- Fixes applied by STIG and CIS scripts: Since the system is reimaged during the upgrade progess, fixes applied on the appliance to conform with Security Technical Implementation Guides (STIG) and Center for Internet Security (CIS) benchmarks are lost. When you reimage with the latest ISO image, the operating system is upgraded to Oracle Linux 7. You must, then, run STIG and CIS scripts again.
- Oracle ASR: Oracle ASR is not restored during the
reprovisioning process. After the reprovisioning process, you can manually
configure Oracle ASR with the latest RPMs using the command
odacli configure-asr
.
Step 1: Detaching Nodes for Upgrade Using Data Preserving Reprovisioning
The Oracle Database Appliance nodes are detached in Step 1 in upgrading from Oracle Database Appliance releases 12.1.2.12, 12.2.1.4, 18.3, 18.5, 18.7, and 18.8 to the latest release.
Important:
Run the commands in this topic in the same order as documented.Important:
Ensure that you take a backup of the databases before you start this process. The nodes are reimaged during this process, so ensure that your backup is stored on a location outside the appliance.WARNING:
Do not run cleanup.pl either before or after running theodaupgradeutil detach-node
command. Running cleanup.pl
erases all the Oracle ASM disk groups on the storage and you cannot reprovision your
Oracle Database Appliance system.
WARNING:
Make sure to save these files in a location outside the Oracle Database Appliance system. These files are needed to reprovision the system after you reimage the appliance in Step 2 of this process. Without these files, the system cannot be reprovisioned in Step 3 and you will lose all data stored in the Oracle ASM disk groups.Important:
When the source versions are running DCS software,odaupgradeutil
commands do not
edit the DCS metadata. This implies that when a resource such as a database is
deconfigured, the command odacli list-databases
continues to show
the status as CONFIGURED
. However, in reality, the database service
is brought down and listeners are no longer active, which can be verified using the
srvctl
command from the database home. This is expected
behavior.
Step 2: Reimaging Nodes for Upgrading Using Data Preserving Reprovisioning
Step 2 in upgrading Oracle Database Appliance from Oracle Database Appliance releases 12.1.2.12, 12.2.1.4, 18.3, 18.5, 18.7, and 18.8 to the latest release.
WARNING:
Do not run cleanup.pl either before or after reimaging the nodes. Running cleanup.pl erases all the Oracle ASM disk groups on the storage and you cannot reprovision your Oracle Database Appliance system.- Download the Oracle Database Appliance release 19.20 bare metal ISO image and reimage the appliance as described in the topic Reimaging an Oracle Database Appliance Baremetal System.
- Plumb the network as described in the topic Plumbing the Network.
Important:
For high-availability systems,serverarchive_node0_hostname.zip
and serverarchive_node1_hostname.zip
contain
the file configure-firstnet.rsp
. For single-node
systems, serverarchive_hostname.zip
contains
the file configure-firstnet.rsp
. The
configure-firstnet.rsp
file contains the
values that you need to provide when running odacli
configure-firstnet
after reimaging the system.
Extract the file configure-firstnet.rsp
, use any
text editor to open the file, and then provide the IP address that
was saved in in the file.
Step 3: Provisioning Nodes Using Data Preserving Reprovisioning Method
Step 3 in upgrading Oracle Database Appliance from Oracle Database Appliance releases 12.1.2.12, 12.2.1.4, 18.3, 18.5, 18.7, and 18.8 to the latest release.
WARNING:
Update the firmware immediately after reimaging the system with Oracle Database Appliance release 19.20 or later. Failing to update the firmware can lead to errors during the reprovisioning step.WARNING:
Do not run cleanup.pl before you run the commandodacli
restore-node -g
. Running cleanup.pl erases all the Oracle ASM
disk groups on the storage and you cannot reprovision your Oracle Database Appliance
system with all databases intact. However, after you run the command odacli
restore-node -g
at least once, and the process of reprovisioning has
started, the clean up is specific to the attempt of reprovisioning and does not
erase the Oracle ASM disk groups. If the command odacli restore-node
-g
has failed, then cleanup.pl can be used to clean up failures
in that step. In such a case, the command odacli restore-node -g
must be attempted again to complete the provisioning.
WARNING:
After reimaging the appliance, do not log into the Browser User Interface (BUI). When running theodacli restore-node -g
command, you are prompted
for the password for the oda-admin
user. Use this password to log
into the BUI after the odacli restore-node -g
and odacli
restore-node -d
commands complete successfully. Do not start the
BUI before completing the odacli restore-node -g
and odacli
restore-node -d
operations.