Oracle
11g Installation and Set Up On Sun's VirtualBox and Oracle Enterprise
Linux (Stages 1-2)
Recently we
decided to try out Oracle 11g on Linux. The only problem
was
we didn't have a spare Linux server lying about. What to do?
Well
we could of course have gone out and bought one, but we decided a
smarter way was to build a virtual Linux environment using
Sun's VirtualBox and the RedHat compatible Oracle
Enterprise Linux instead.
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This is the tale of how we did it and a guide for you to follow in our footsteps.
This part covers the installation of
Sun's VirtualBox and the configuration of the virtual machine (stage 1 & 2).
Part 2 covers the installation and confgiration of Linux on the
virtual
machine for the Oracle 11g database ( stage 3).
Part
3 covers the
installation and
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configuration of the database in the virtual Linux
environment (stage 4).
If you're new to virtualization then Sun's
VirtualBox provides a great introduction
to the subject. In a nutshell, VirtualBox provides a
virtual
environment to enable software written for one operating
system
(such as Linux) - known as the guest - to run unchanged on another (such as
Windows) - known as the host.
As far as the host operating system is concerned,
VirtualBox is just another process, but running within it is the
guest operating system along with all the guest's processes
(such
as the Oracle 11g database processes) as if they were running on a
real machine.
VirtualBox is not an emulator because
it uses the
guest operating system to run the guest applications, although it does
have to
emulate certain hardware requests. For more information about
virtualization and how VirtualBox works
see the VirtualBox website.
In our case,
we used Windows Vista as the host operating system and Oracle
Enterprise Linux as the guest.
Let's now take a look at the trials and tribulations we had. In stage 1
we installed Virtual Box. Stage 2 was
the configuration of a new virtual machine ready for stage 3
installing Oracle Enterprise Linux. Finally stage 4 was the
installation of the Oracle software and configuration of
the database.
Stage
1 - Install VirtualBox
VirtualBox is
available from VirtualBox.org
and is free for personal use (whether commercial or not) and
for evaluation purposes.
Step 1 Download
VirtualBox
On the
download page you'll see links to the installation
files for the (x86 only)
host
operating systems: Windows, Linux, OS X and Solaris/Open Solaris.
For
Windows, all you need to do is download the relatively small (63
Mb) "VirtualBox Setup Wizard" exe file.
Step 2 -
VirtualBox Setup
Run VirtualBox
Setup Wizard (the
file downloaded in step 1), accept the license
agreement, decide whether or not you
want USB and networking support in your virtual environment and then
VirtualBox is installed.
Stage 2 -
Configure The Virtual Environment
Once
you've installed VirtualBox, before you can do anything else you have
to create and configure the virtual
machine(s) which includes the allocation of resources (physical memory,
disk space, peripherals) from the
real machine.
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Step 1 - Start
VirtualBox
To
start the process of configuring your virtual environment just run
VirtualBox and you'll be presented with the "Welcome" screen.
Step 2 - Create
a new virtual machine
Now the real
fun starts - allocating physical resources to your new
virtual machine.
Step 2a - Start
the new virtual machine
creation wizard
To
start the process of creating a new virual machine, just click
on
the icon of the circular saw to start the "new virtual machine" wizard.
Step 2b - Name
the new virtual machine
and specify the guest o/s
The
2nd page of the wizard enables you to specify the name of your virtual
machine and the type of guest operating system you intend to run.
The name you give to the virtual machine is just for identification.
Specifying
the type of guest operating system and the particular flavour seems to
be designed to help VirtualBox optimise the virtual environment.
However we didn't test what happens when you specify the guest o/s as
one thing and then actaully install something completely different!
Step 2c -
Allocate RAM to the virtual
machine
How much RAM
you allocate depends on a how big a virtual
machine you need and how much physical RAM the host machine has.
For
Oracle 11g on Linux x86, the requirement is for a minimum of
1GB
of RAM. On top of
that you need some spare RAM for Linux to run so the virtual
environment has to be configured to
meet those requirements.
VirtualBox
doesn't allow you to continue to the next step in the new
virtual
machine wizard if you allocate more than 50% of physical RAM to
your virtual machine, although you can change settings later by
clicking on the icon of the cog. In our testing, however, we found
that allocating more than 50% of
pysical RAM to the
virtual machine adversely affected its stability so it's best
to
stcik to the 50% guidelines.
Step 2c -
Allocate hard disk to the virtual
machine
The
next stage is to specify the virtual hard disk to be used for the
virtual machine. You can either use an existing or create a new one. At
this point you're not configuring the size just allocating it.
Step 2d -
Create a new virtual disk
Assuming
you selected the option to create a new disk for your virtual machine,
you're taken into the "Create New Virtual Disk" wizard the first step
of which is to choose between a fixed size disk or an expandable disk
which will take space from the real hard disk as it is needed.
We ran into problems using an expandable disk so we stuck with a fixed
size one.
Step 2e -
Specify size and location
of new virtual disk
This step
alows you to specify the name, location and size of the
virtual disk. Default values are provided for all three.
The most important field here is the size. For
Oracle 11g on Linux x86, the requirement is for a minimum of
3.5GB of disk space for the Oracle software and at least
another 1.6GB of disk space for the data files plus a
minimum of 1.5GB of swap space and 400MB of temp space.
On top of
that you need sufficient disk
space to install Linux so the virtual environment has to be configured
to
meet those requirements.
Our
initial allocation was 8GB but we had to add more space later for the
Oracle 11g data files (which in the end was a simple process but it
took us a while to figure out how to do it) so make this as big as you
can. 12GB should be more than enough for Linux and a starter Oracle 11g
database.
This is the final step in the virtual hard disk
creation. The next page provides a summary of the
specification
for your new virtual disk allowing you to go back and change paramters
if required. After the virtual disk is created the new virtual machine
wizard displays a summary of the characteristics of the virtual machine
you're about to create and again gives you the chance to go back and
change any parameters.
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