Configuring a standby instance for monitoring

A standby instance in the Oracle^® dataguard feature ensures high availability, data protection, and disaster recovery for enterprise data.

The following sections describes the procedure for configuring a standby instance for monitoring.

Before you begin

• You must have configured an Oracle instance. 
• You must have sysdba privileges to the database, and the required access permissions and correct user credentials to configure a standby instance.
  
• The PATROL account must have read access to the tnsnames.ora file.
  
• Confirm that ORACLE_DATAGUARD.kml is loaded on your system.
  
   Click here to view information for loading a knowledge module

   From the PATROL Central Console:

  1. In the Common Tasks tab of the PATROL Central Operator Taskpad, click the Load Knowledge Modules icon.
  2. To start the wizard, click Next.
  3. Select the check boxes for the managed systems that you want to load Knowledge Modules on. Click Next.
  4. Select the check box for each Knowledge Module or KML that you want to load. Click Next.
     
     1. • Individual Knowledge Modules are on the Individual Knowledge Modules tab.
        • KMLs are on the Knowledge Module Lists tab.
  5. Click Finish.

Preparing a standby instance for monitoring in the PATROL Central console

The standby instance type will be either logical or physical standby.  

To configure the standby instance

Click to view a short video on how to configure an Oracle Data Guard instance for monitoring in a PATROL environment.

https://youtu.be/_IwuG0TUGPs

1. From the ORACLE_DATAGUARD application class, right-click and select Knowledge Module Commands>DataGuard Instance Configure.
2. Select the primary instance from the DataGuard Instance Configure dialog box and click Apply and Exit to close this dialog box.

3. In the DataGuard Instance Configuration dialog box, enter the following standby instance details and click Apply.

   Field	Description
   Standby TNS Entry	The TNS service entry name that you will use to connect to the standby instance.
   Username and Password	The username and password that you will use to connect to the standby instance. Note Do not append "as sysdba" to the password. If the database user password contains special characters, specify the password within the double quotes. Example: “%BMC$"

    Click here to view information about the TNS service name

   You can retrieve the TNS service entry name from the Oracle primary instance with the following SQL*PLUS query string:

     Select VALUE from v$parameter where name like 'log_archive_dest%' and name not like 'log_archive_dest_state%' and value is not null;

   The query answer will be service=<TNS STRING>.

4. Click Exit to close this dialog box.

Viewing the ORACLE_DATAGUARD instance in the PATROL Central interface

After configuring the standby instance, the hierarchy of the dataguard implementation in the PATROL Central interface is as follows:

1. ORACLE_DATAGUARD application class represents the dataguard instance-monitoring feature.
2. Primary instance database name
3. Configured Oracle standby instance name
4. DGCollectors application class with parameters that collect the data for the standby instance
   
   1. CollDataGuard
   2. CollTimeDataGuard
5. DGPARAMS application class with data and time lag parameters for each configured standby instance
   1. ApplyLag
   2. LogApplyGap
   3. LogTransferGap
   4. TransportLag
6. StandbyStatus parameter that queries the configured standby database running on a dataguard environment.
7. DGConfigurationStatus displays the configuration status of the Dataguard

Preparing a standby instance for monitoring in the TrueSight console

You can configure a standby instance for monitoring in the TrueSight console and then apply the instance to a PATROL Agent.  

To configure the standby instance

1.   Define a monitoring policy in the TrueSight Console, select the following parameters, and click Add:
   
   • Monitoring Solution: Oracle Database
   • Version: 9.7.10
   • Monitor Profile: Oracle Standby Data Guard
   • Monitor Type: Oracle Standby Data Guard
2. Enter the primary instance name, and click Add to enter the standby instance details.

3. Enter the StandBy Instance Information and click OK:

   Field	Description
   Standby TNS Entry	The TNS service entry name that you will use to connect to the standby instance.
   Username and Password	The username and password that you will use to connect to the standby instance. Note Do not append "as sysdba" to the password. If the database user password contains special characters, specify the password within the double quotes. Example: “%BMC$"

    Click here to view information about the TNS service name

   You can retrieve the TNS service entry name from the Oracle primary instance with the following SQLPLUS query string:

   Select VALUE from v$parameter where name like 'log_archive_dest%' and name not like 'log_archive_dest_state%' and value is not null;

   The query answer will be service=<TNS STRING>.

4. Click OK to save this standby instance monitoring configuration.

After creating the standby instance, the implementation hierarchy for the application class is similar to the PATROL Central view.

Preparing standby instances for monitoring with batch configuration

You can prepare a batch configuration to set up many standby instances through the TrueSight console, or by using text configuration file outside Oracle KM.

Batch configuration can be completed through the TrueSight console, or manually with a batch configuration file that you can work with in a text editor. After the batch configuration has been saved, the KM agent discovery scans for the existence of the configuration file. After it finds the file, it automatically starts the configuration process, using the information in the configuration file.

The batch configuration file contains the settings for all the instances that you want to configure. When the discovery process runs, all the instances defined in the configuration file are simultaneously configured, which saves time versus configuring all of the instances individually.

To use the TrueSight console for standby batch configuration

1.   Define a monitoring policy in the TrueSight Console, select the following parameters, and click Add:
   
   • Monitoring Solution: Oracle Database
   • Version: 9.7.10
   • Monitor Profile: Oracle Standby Data Guard
   • Monitor Type: Oracle Standby Data Guard Global Configuration

2. Enter the primary instance batch information , and click Add to enter the dataguard instance details.

3. Enter the Data Guard Instance Information and click OK:

   Field	Description
   Data Guard TNS Entry	The TNS service entry name that you will use to connect to the dataguard instance.
   Username and Password	The username and password that you will use to connect to the standby instance. Note Do not append "as sysdba" to the password. If the database user password contains special characters, specify the password within the double quotes. Example: “%BMC$"

4. Click OK to save this configuration information.

To manually configure a batch file for the standby instance

To configure a batch configuration file, you can use the DG_batch_conf_sample.wri file as a template.

From a command prompt:

1. Open the DG_batch_conf_sample.wri file in the following location, depending on your operating system.
   
   • For UNIX systems, the file is located at $PATROL_HOME/../oracle/conf.
   • For Windows systems, the file is located at %PATROL_HOME%\oracle\conf.
2. Edit the Oracle System ID (SID) and the keyword values to reflect the instances you want to configure.
3. Save the file as DG_batch_conf<port_number>.txt, in a text only format.

When the discovery finds this file, it starts processing the file to configure the instances on that PATROL agent port.

When the discovery completes processing this file, the file name is changed to DG_batch_conf<port_number>.done .

You can check the following log files for the successful completion of the batch configuration, or any errors. These files are saved in the same directory location as the DG_batch_conf_sample.wri file.

• DGBatchConfig<port_number>.log
• DataGuardConfig<port_number>.log

Preparing a standby instance for monitoring with Patrol Configuration Management

You have an option to configure a standby instance by using Patrol Configuration Management (PCM).

After you have configured the instance for monitoring, the PCM creates a DGConfig.cfg file in the %PATROL_HOME%\oracle\rulesets directory.

When you apply the rule set to the configured PATROL Agent, it automatically configures all the instances for which the rule sets have been created.

For the configuration details, you can see the DataGuardConfig{Agentport-no}.log file in the %PATROL_HOME%\oracle\conf directory.