Oracle Instance Memory Usage

How much memory does an Oracle instance actually use? How much does each individual database connection consume? ...

What's in your Exadata Smart Flash Cache?

One of the exclusive Exadata features is the Smart Flash Cache ( Oracle White Paper PDF). On a full rack, there is 5 TB ...

Survey Results: Why Do You Use RMAN Catalog DB for Your Oracle DB Backups?

Updating ASMLIB Driver Using "update-driver"

It is a controversial question whether to use ASMLIB for managing disks for an ASM instance, but I don't want to start ...

Secrets of Oracle's Automatic Degree of Parallelism

Background: Automatic degree of parallelism, or Auto DOP, is a new feature in 11gR2 that promises to help manage ...

Oracle Database Appliance: Storage Performance -- Part 1

Today I want to show what kind of IO performance we can get from Oracle Database Appliance (ODA). In this part, I will ...

Oracle VM Manager: OVMAPI_6000E Internal Error: Connection Refused

Quick Update This is just a quick post to share my first 3.1.1 Oracle VM Manager (OVMM) troubleshooting experience. ...

Oracle Database Appliance -- Storage expansion with NFS (dNFS, HCC)

The biggest objection to Oracle Database Appliance (ODA) we hear from customers is about 4TB usable space limit ...

Linux Patching and Oracle: Detect RPM conflicts before they happen

A common scenario in the life of a DBA on a linux server looks something like this: From: Sue-the-sysadamin To:the-dba ...

Locks, Latches, Mutexes, and CPU Usage

I was alerted about a high CPU usage on a client machine. Checking which processes used the most CPU, I found that ...

Physical Disk, Cell Disk, Grid Disk, and ASM Disk in Exadata

Exadata is the Ferrari of the technology world. It’s considered the technology for the select few, but everyone dreams ...

Getting GoldenGate Heartbeats Working with SUPPRESSTRIGGERS

Those of you who have seen me present about GoldenGate will know that I recommend using a heartbeat table to monitor ...

DBA_SCHEDULER_RUNNING_JOBS, where have you been?!

Backstory Where: Meeting room, Pythian office, Sydney, Australia. When: Afternoon, after lunch time. What: Discussion ...

Unofficial Oracle Database Appliance FAQ

Introduction I’ve started putting together some information about the Oracle Database Appliance in question-and-answer ...

Data Pump Monitoring

During database maintenance, one of the most critical questions is: "When will it be finished?" Whether it is an ...

Tools That Make Your Work with Oracle VM Easier

After completing your Oracle VM and Oracle VM Manager installation, you are ready to start your friendship with Oracle ...

Disabling Oracle triggers on a per-session basis

Update Jan-2014: I’ve added a note on disabling triggers in Oracle 11.2.0.4 Introduction I recently blogged about an ...

CheckSystemSpace ignorance

Context Every installation is unique. It can be the same software and hardware but one installation will squease you ...

My SLOB IO Testing Index

Previous References ALL Pythian blog posts with Post Tag #SLOB My First Experience Running SLOB – Status Update 1 – or ...

Swappiness

Swappiness, as the name suggests, affects the swapping in the Linux systems. Introduction Its kind of slider value. 0 ...

RDBMS Online Patching

If you support Oracle RDBMS 11.2.0.2 and want to zero downtime applying patches to databases then it is time to have a ...

RMAN duplicate in details

Its all started from the question on communities.oracle.com An “enhancement” in 11.2 prevents RMAN duplicating non ...

Exadata Patching Overview

Introduction Hello everyone ! For my first time posting here on the Pythian Blog, I would like to share some of my ...

Comparing Oracle Database Appliance and Exadata

Introduction Oracle Database Appliance (ODA) is in many ways similar to an Exadata quarter rack: they both use two ...

Oracle Direct NFS: How to Start

First of all, if you are using NFS to store Oracle database data files, I strongly advise you to enable Oracle Direct ...

Viewing RMAN jobs status and output

Checking RMAN backup status via database views Yesterday I was discussing with a fellow DBA about ways to check the ...

Encryption RMAN Backup

There are 2 configurable items related with RMAN encryption backup : CONFIGURE ENCRYPTION FOR DATABASE OFF; # default ...

Exadata Memory Expansion Kit

It’s always interesting to dig into the spec sheets for Exadata hardware, especially when those "minor" details like ...

Introducing the Quarterly Database Patch for Exadata

Introduction Hot on the heels of 11.2.0.3 coming out for Exadata, there’s yet another Exadata patch schedule out: the ...