RE: Standby Instance questions and HA

Jim:
Sorry, you're not gonna like this answer. HA is a Sun product, not an Oracle product. Under Sun's High Availability, you can configure several modules like Sybase and Oracle. (The Oracle product is Sun Cluster HA-DBMS for Oracle.) It does require what I believe Sun calls a cluster but (IMHO) is a bastardization of the term. It truly is failover, not cluster.

We've had lots of problems with it. It's caused us lots of grief, and only in a few instances gained us anything. It is NOT OPS, as the database does not run in parallel, but only on 1 box at a time. (Everything is double cabled, and so the drives are re-mounted on the 2nd box if a failover occurs.) Your users still get disconnected. You'd probably lose less data than with a standby (since you pick up with the same drives mounted on the other box), but it depends on how you have the standby implemented.

There's no additional cost from Oracle to run this crap, but you'll be paying Sun great sums of money. The Sun web site has more info on HA.

Let me know if you need more info.
Good luck!

Barb

> ----------
> From: James McCann[SMTP:james_at_openet-telecom.com]
> Reply To: ORACLE-L_at_fatcity.com
> Sent: Thursday, January 17, 2002 5:40 AM
> To: Multiple recipients of list ORACLE-L
> Subject: Standby Instance questions and HA
>
> Hi,
> I was reading in the book "Oracle 24/7 Tips and Techniques" about
> Standby
> Instances.
>
> Note, this is not a standby database.
>
> From the book it seams to work in the following way...
>
> There is only one database.
> The database files exist on a shared disk pack. One machine is the primary
> instance, and if this instance dies, a new instance is started on the
> second
> machine using the datafiles on the shared disk.
>
> The problem is that I can't find anything in the Oracle docs about this,
> or
> on Meta Link.
>
> I also want to know if this method of HA requires a clustered environment
> (I
> think it does, but just want to be sure)?
>
> Also, does it come with an Enterprise Edition license?
> Or is it something which each hardware vendor implements in their own way,
> at extra cost?
>
> We have a requirement for a fail over method on Sun Solaris.
> We do not want to loose any committed data (i.e. a standby database could
> loose some), and want the fail over to be as automatic as possible.
>
> We don't want the expense of Parallel Server (Anyone know how expensive it
> is these days?).
>
> The disk pack is RAID, and we may also have a standby database off site.
>
> Has anyone any recommendations?
>
>
> Thanks,
>
> Jim
>
>
>
>
> --
> Please see the official ORACLE-L FAQ: http://www.orafaq.com
> --
> Author: James McCann
> INET: james_at_openet-telecom.com
>
> Fat City Network Services -- (858) 538-5051 FAX: (858) 538-5051
> San Diego, California -- Public Internet access / Mailing Lists
> --------------------------------------------------------------------
> To REMOVE yourself from this mailing list, send an E-Mail message
> to: ListGuru_at_fatcity.com (note EXACT spelling of 'ListGuru') and in
> the message BODY, include a line containing: UNSUB ORACLE-L
> (or the name of mailing list you want to be removed from). You may
> also send the HELP command for other information (like subscribing).
>

-- 
Please see the official ORACLE-L FAQ: http://www.orafaq.com
-- 
Author: Baker, Barbara
  INET: bbaker_at_denvernewspaperagency.com

Fat City Network Services    -- (858) 538-5051  FAX: (858) 538-5051
San Diego, California        -- Public Internet access / Mailing Lists
--------------------------------------------------------------------
To REMOVE yourself from this mailing list, send an E-Mail message
to: ListGuru_at_fatcity.com (note EXACT spelling of 'ListGuru') and in
the message BODY, include a line containing: UNSUB ORACLE-L
(or the name of mailing list you want to be removed from).  You may
also send the HELP command for other information (like subscribing).