April 16, 2012 at 1:13 pm
Hello,
The DBA position (me) at our organization has, up to this point, been solely responsible for SQL Server systems, with support for our Oracle systems contracted out. With budget constraints, I am now being asked to support our Oracle 10g systems on HP-UX.
We have server management teams to handle the OS and healthy operation of the server and I won't need to handle day-to-day OS management, though I am comfortable with UNIX daemons, vim, cron(tab), etc..
Where I fall short is in knowledge of Oracle and specifically how it is implemented in our environment. The latter I'll pick up over time through experience, but I'm reaching out for any advice from community who manage both or have been in a similar situation:
- What training resources would you recommend?
- What has your experience, if any, with Oracle University been like?
- Is there anything available specifically in the realm of SQL Server to Oracle transition?
- Any books or other resources which you find valuable?
Of course, experience is the best teacher! I'll actually be doing more in our environment as time goes on, but thought I'd also reach out to the community for your thoughts and advice. This question has been asked before in this forum, but it was a couple of years ago so I read the advice there and decided to ask again to gather some fresh input.
Any helpful information you have would be appreciated! Thanks!
April 16, 2012 at 3:59 pm
Oracle software is free for educational purposes so you are entitled to download and install Oracle on a home computer so to train yourself.
Oracle documentation is free and public, please check http://www.oracle.com/pls/db112/homepage
If you are going to be doing production support familiarize yourself with backup/recovey; it can be done using either RMAN or your own scripts. Also familiarize yourself with performance tunning, in this area focus on Explain plan, Trace/tkprof and AWR reports.
On the scripting side, be aware that Oracle SQL and PL/SQL have different syntax - familiarize yourself with the concept of packages.
Hope this helps.
_____________________________________
Pablo (Paul) Berzukov
Author of Understanding Database Administration available at Amazon and other bookstores.
Disclaimer: Advice is provided to the best of my knowledge but no implicit or explicit warranties are provided. Since the advisor explicitly encourages testing any and all suggestions on a test non-production environment advisor should not held liable or responsible for any actions taken based on the given advice.April 16, 2012 at 5:48 pm
Thanks for the advice, Pablo.
I already have a couple of Virtualbox VMs on my local machine running Oracle environments for playing in - these have been very helpful.
I am also working my way through Oracle's documentation, particularly the 2-day DBA guide, which is their recommended reading. It's a joke that they call it "2-day" as there's a ton of information in there! It has been useful.
April 17, 2012 at 1:25 am
You can also find an application that uses an oracle database for training purposes.It dd help me a great deal.
“When I hear somebody sigh, ‘Life is hard,’ I am always tempted to ask, ‘Compared to what?’” - Sydney Harris
April 17, 2012 at 3:16 am
I was thinking of becoming bilingual so asked one of our Oracle guys, he reccomended the following books as a starting point:
Oracle Database 11g DBA Handbook (Oracle Press) - Bob Bryla
Beginning Oracle Database 11g Administration: From Novice to Professional (Expert's Voice in Oracle) - Iggy Fernandez
April 17, 2012 at 9:02 am
SQLDBA360 (4/17/2012)
I was thinking of becoming bilingual so asked one of our Oracle guys, he reccomended the following books as a starting point:Oracle Database 11g DBA Handbook (Oracle Press) - Bob Bryla
Beginning Oracle Database 11g Administration: From Novice to Professional (Expert's Voice in Oracle) - Iggy Fernandez
Did you read these? How helpful were they?
April 18, 2012 at 3:06 pm
As an oracle dba from ranging from 7.32 to 10.2, I've been reading up on 11G via the 2 day DBA documentation as well.
http://docs.oracle.com/cd/B28359_01/server.111/b28301/backrest.htm
It's a good place to start.
I'm no longer working with oracle (only sql server).
There are multiple ways to configure Oracle, as you probably know.
In any configuration, you need to make sure you have things like:
1) a backup of all datafiles when the database is shut down, including control files and pfile/spfile.
2) a process to backup controlfile to trace (I had this file emailed to me daily via unix script).
3) Make sure it is archivelog mode and that disk space doesn't get overwhelmed with archive logs.
4) Make sure redo file groups are redundant.
5) RMAN performing backups.
Do you have a DR server? Are you applying archive/redo logs?
I had a unix script to zip up files, ftp them to the DR site, unzip each file before it was applied, and then move it to a backup directory and zip it back up. They would be purged after a week thanks to extra disk space.
Of note: 11G is just now allowing compression of redologs to DR sites.
I also had a gap resolution script to check for missing archivelogs. The WAN would occassionally go down.
The script would check for the last sequence applied on the DR server and if the next log was available.
If it wasn't, the script would go to the production server via ftp and pull it over.
*****
Give a man a fish, and you've given him a meal. Teach a man to fish and he'll ask to borrow your boat.:-P
April 18, 2012 at 4:01 pm
Thanks, Eric!
We have no true DR site, though our leadership is currently looking into one. We run a lot of high availability clustering, specifically through HP ServiceGuard on our UNIX systems.
May 4, 2012 at 8:53 am
I would also run logical backups (exports or datapump exp) fairly regularly. These are very helpful for "oops" moments-someone deletes a table accidentally, etc.
Also, setting up a flashback area might help too, if you have the available space.
May 4, 2012 at 9:01 am
if you're planning to learn then aim for the OCP qualification, you'll pick up a lot more if you aim at passing the exam
https://blogs.oracle.com/certification/entry/0118
MVDBA
May 4, 2012 at 9:04 am
oh - also if you have the budget for in house training then you might want to talk to a company based in Nottingham called "Quantix"
I worked for them for a few years and the oracle consultants they have are among the best in europe.
MVDBA
June 5, 2012 at 1:16 pm
Aloha
I saw your posting and thought I would reply, I was a similar boat, SQL Server DBA/Oracle
Oracle and SQL Server are different beasts, I think having a knowledge of Oracle will help with SQL Server knowledge.
As people have mentioned Oracle website has a wealth of knowledge
Ask Tom oracle is a great website, he answers questions - the archives may help
Burleson consulting
If you have metalink (oracle support site) that's a nice one also. Lots of artcles.
The Oracle training has been watered down with the invention of oracle Enterprise Manger (OEM)
But ORACLE WORKSHOP I is very good (I took it in San Francisco,CA). I would not say WORKSHOP II is as useful, of course my teacher could have just been terrible. ** keep in mind you can get a refund if your instructor is BAD, regretably I did not for workshop II
In my opinion I would get a feel of installing/and reading up on the basics of Oracle before going to the Oracle Workshop I class so that you are able to learn more about the differences.
Also I went to a seminar once by a company called Scalability Experts (a Microsoft partner I think) And they shared comparisons of SQL Server and Oracle. Try to google the article, that might help give some fundamental details of how they are similar.
As far as books, I think a book amazon with good reviews will probably get you started. Not all authors are the same in their writing style.
Good luck!
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...0.05 points per day since registration... slowly crawl up to 1 pt per day hopefully 😀
June 6, 2012 at 3:06 pm
As an accidental Oracle dba myself (coming from sql server 2000) I've found the Oracle concepts most interesting to grasp what the main differences are.
After that backup/restore (rman, needs excercise. Remember the databaseID) or transfering data (expdmp/impdp).
Things to avoid in Oracle: Working as sysdba (you bypass some safety code), When Other Excpetion.
Works case-sensitive (mostly), be careful with the control file,databaseid, init-parameters and System/Sysaux tablespaces (extra attention audit goes most likely in those)
Oracle isn't so flexible as SQL Server on resetting/moving/shrinking databases (in my experience). Beware that in 10g you can also activate licensed features by accident (dba_hist... part of the paid diagnostic/tuning pack) and you will need a lot of tools/scripts (like monitoring growth).
Oracle works wonderfully but seems to require more administration, also a lot of interesting features are moved to the expensive enterprise level (and they don't have an MSDN program).
Any books or other resources which you find valuable?
Most are already posted in this topic.
Oracle support aka Metalink is the official resource for patches,documents but requires an oracle login + active support contract. Beware that 10g is "out of support" by now.
Oracle has also an online magazine
Oracle developer section with free oracle sql developer
Search around for Oracle Statspack, free background monitoring instead of paid AWR[/url]
Linked server between MSSQL and Oracle
Had succes with orafaq as an active forum, but be prepared to format your code and post your OS. Other resources are already in this topic. Tom Kyte from Ask Tom is also a name to remember.
Other:
Use the new Oracle Scheduled jobs (DBMS_SCHEDULER) which have logging instead of Oracle jobs (DBMS_JOB)
Try to boost your HP-UX skills for troubleshooting
Have up to date statistics for the optimizer (review standard scheduled job).
Oracle doesn't reclaim space automatically and scans till the "high water mark".
Learn the basic diagnostics, "sqlplus" is quite reliable to connect to the oracle instance but not unicode ready.
There is no auto-commit (only autocommit with DDL statements, and those DDL have no "wait till unlocked" feature)
"NLS" session settings should match the client (or the file when importing one)
Use the proper to_date, to_char, to_number (has a 3th parameter for decimals) functions
Undo without guarantee caused some trouble (snapshot too old)
More when I find my favorites on Oracle.
June 30, 2012 at 5:50 pm
Elizabeth Good (5/4/2012)
I would also run logical backups (exports or datapump exp) fairly regularly. These are very helpful for "oops" moments-someone deletes a table accidentally, etc.Also, setting up a flashback area might help too, if you have the available space.
IF somebody is able to "delete a table accidentaly" then the problem relates to bad security and bad testing.
Also, dumps created by either (exp or expdp) will not allow for point-in-time recovery not to mention that referencial integrity might be compromised if just a table (or a few tables) are "recovered" this way.
Fix the problem, do not try a bandaid.
_____________________________________
Pablo (Paul) Berzukov
Author of Understanding Database Administration available at Amazon and other bookstores.
Disclaimer: Advice is provided to the best of my knowledge but no implicit or explicit warranties are provided. Since the advisor explicitly encourages testing any and all suggestions on a test non-production environment advisor should not held liable or responsible for any actions taken based on the given advice.May 28, 2024 at 7:07 am
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