RE: New instance(s) setup question

From: Mark W. Farnham <mwf_at_rsiz.com>
Date: Wed, 5 Jun 2019 17:37:12 -0400
Message-ID: <02f201d51be6$d623dc00$826b9400$_at_rsiz.com>



<snickering on>

If I don't retire next year, that Amazon configuration would limit my ability to do system work over the weekends, but oh well.

<snickering off>  

  1. I bet your bean counter got some dandy meals and so forth
  2. Good on yas! (So sorry, I am unable to reach the server remotely on weekends. Thanks for calling and triggering my 4 hour minimum, but I cannot help you until Monday. By the way, why are you accessing the server out of prescribed hours?)

mwf  

From: oracle-l-bounce_at_freelists.org [mailto:oracle-l-bounce_at_freelists.org] On Behalf Of Bill Ferguson Sent: Wednesday, June 05, 2019 3:02 PM
To: Noveljic Nenad
Cc: oracle-l-freelists
Subject: Re: New instance(s) setup question  

Noveljic -

First, being in the government, we have a "bean counter" that really doesn't understand Oracle and Oracle sales-people, doing the licensing agreements. Somehow my Center got dinged for 56 cores when we only had 16 at that time. We currently have an Unlimited License Agreement for Oracle EE, and three other components (like Advanced security).

But when I migrate things to Amazon, I'm going to go with the SE2 option. That alone and using their license, combined with the minimal IO, should keep our costs around $1,000/month. The Amazon configuration I've been looking at would be the db.m1.medium, for 70 hours of uptime (availability) per week. Since we are for internal use only, and US Government, we don't need to be accessible during non-duty hours. That helps on the cost quite a bit also. If I don't retire next year, that Amazon configuration would limit my ability to do system work over the weekends, but oh well.  

On Wed, Jun 5, 2019 at 10:52 AM Noveljic Nenad <nenad.noveljic_at_vontobel.com> wrote:

Bill,  

Your database server has 4TB of mirrored storage, 4 CPU cores and 32GB RAM. As you mentioned that your licensing fee is $160’000, I’m guessing that you use Enterprise Edition with some expensive options on top of it.  

Sorry for being nosy, but I couldn’t resist asking how did you manage to get the equivalent PaaS from Amazon for just $1000/month? If you don’t mind asking, are the licenses included in that price as well? Would you happen to know the name of the Amazon class and deployment?  

Best regards,  

Nenad  

https://nenadnoveljic.com/blog    

From: Bill Ferguson <wbfergus_at_gmail.com> Sent: Mittwoch, 5. Juni 2019 14:53
To: Noveljic Nenad <nenad.noveljic_at_vontobel.com> Cc: oracle-l-freelists <oracle-l_at_freelists.org> Subject: Re: New instance(s) setup question  

Good points, which I failed to mention in my original post (since I thought it was already overly wordy). The number of people allowed to access the server is a small group of 5 people (most of which will be retiring), and all of the users only access the database(s) through Apex. We may also be migrating to the Amazon cloud later this year, depending on funding, as that should cost us less than $1,000/month, but we are also committed to a current Oracle cost of over $160,000 just for this year, so the bean-counters need to figure out how and where to get the money. Government work is so fun. :)  

On Wed, Jun 5, 2019 at 6:47 AM Noveljic Nenad <nenad.noveljic_at_vontobel.com> wrote:

Hi Bill,  

Having both test and production running on the same hardware, you obviously won’t have a possibility to test the impact of the operating system (OS) patches and upgrades on the databases before applying them in the production environment.  

You can partially mitigate this problem with the virtualization, where you can patch every guest OS separately. I’ve been using MS Hyper-V (see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyper-V ) for years and it has proven as a really good virtualization platform for MS SQL Server databases. However, I don’t have any experience with operating Oracle databases on Windows.  

Another advantage of the virtualization is a better isolation of the production databases from the security point of view. What I mean by that is if the test and production databases are running in the same OS environment people having access to the test databases could abuse some database features or security leaks to gain the access to the production databases.  

Best regards,  

Nenad  

https://nenadnoveljic.com/blog      

From: oracle-l-bounce_at_freelists.org <oracle-l-bounce_at_freelists.org> On Behalf Of Bill Ferguson Sent: Mittwoch, 5. Juni 2019 14:25
To: oracle-l-freelists <oracle-l_at_freelists.org> Subject: New instance(s) setup question  

Hi all -

Probably pretty basic, but a quick question for a new installation. Oracle pricing has really gotten out of hand, and my Center is drastically downsizing everything to save on costs. We also have several security things to address, and multiple people retiring in the next year or so, so we also have an emphasis on getting things simplified and documented for fairly new and inexperienced SysAdmins, DBA and devs.

Anyway, the SysAdmin has setup a new server for me to migrate all of the Oracle stuff to. It is an

 Intel Xeon Silver-4112 2.60 GHz Socket/Processor with four (4) cores and 32 GB of Memory, running Windows Server 2016 Standard.  

The C: (SYSTEM) drive is a mirrored volume consisting of two 1TB SSD drives with NTFS space of 884 GB. The E: (APP) drive is a mirrored volume consisting of two 4TB SATA Enterprise drives with NTFS space of 3.45 TB.

Now my question is How to get Oracle setup on just this one machine, with both my production and development databases. Should I go with two separate installs (instances), or just go with the multi-tenant and have two pluggable databases? The production database is roughly 1GB in size, with maybe 3-4 users per day, and a total of around 150 users, so performance and throughput, I/O, etc. are extremely minimal. But with myself (hopefully) retiring within a year, and my current backup seeming to be out of her league and not being very motivated to pick up the reins and charge ahead, I want to keep as much as I can, as simple as I can (so I have less documentation to write).

At this point in time, I don't have much confidence that she'll be up to the task of taking over if I do retire, especially if I pick the more complicated maintenance installation option. So I'm faced with the prospect of two installations, which is what we currently have with two separate servers. Or, I could go with the multi-tenant option and have two pluggable databases. But that approach has me worried about future upgrades, etc. That will add a whole new level of "stuff" she'll have to learn and for me to document. I'm also worried about availability in case somehow the root container gets hosed and she need to perform a reinstall or anything else that would probably bury her technically.

Any opinions other than hiring someone with more motivation and more experience? We are a government agency, so hiring somebody with the skills at our pay scale is pretty far-fetched, especially when management doesn't think we deserve what little pay we do get. Thanks.

--

  • Bill Ferguson

Please consider the environment before printing this e-mail.

Bitte denken Sie an die Umwelt, bevor Sie dieses E-Mail drucken.

Important Notice
This message is intended only for the individual named. It may contain confidential or privileged information. If you are not the named addressee you should in particular not disseminate, distribute, modify or copy this e-mail. Please notify the sender immediately by e-mail, if you have received this message by mistake and delete it from your system. Without prejudice to any contractual agreements between you and us which shall prevail in any case, we take it as your authorization to correspond with you by e-mail if you send us messages by e-mail. However, we reserve the right not to execute orders and instructions transmitted by e-mail at any time and without further explanation. E-mail transmission may not be secure or error-free as information could be intercepted, corrupted, lost, destroyed, arrive late or incomplete. Also processing of incoming e-mails cannot be guaranteed. All liability of Vontobel Holding Ltd. and any of its affiliates (hereinafter collectively referred to as "Vontobel Group") for any damages resulting from e-mail use is excluded. You are advised that urgent and time sensitive messages should not be sent by e-mail and if verification is required please request a printed version. Please note that all e-mail communications to and from the Vontobel Group are subject to electronic storage and review by Vontobel Group. Unless stated to the contrary and without prejudice to any contractual agreements between you and Vontobel Group which shall prevail in any case, e-mail-communication is for informational purposes only and is not intended as an offer or solicitation for the purchase or sale of any financial instrument or as an official confirmation of any transaction. The legal basis for the processing of your personal data is the legitimate interest to develop a commercial relationship with you, as well as your consent to forward you commercial communications. You can exercise, at any time and under the terms established under current regulation, your rights. If you prefer not to receive any further communications, please contact your client relationship manager if you are a client of Vontobel Group or notify the sender. Please note for an exact reference to the affected group entity the corporate e-mail signature. For further information about data privacy at Vontobel Group please consult www.vontobel.com.

--

  • Bill Ferguson

Important Notice
This message is intended only for the individual named. It may contain confidential or privileged information. If you are not the named addressee you should in particular not disseminate, distribute, modify or copy this e-mail. Please notify the sender immediately by e-mail, if you have received this message by mistake and delete it from your system. Without prejudice to any contractual agreements between you and us which shall prevail in any case, we take it as your authorization to correspond with you by e-mail if you send us messages by e-mail. However, we reserve the right not to execute orders and instructions transmitted by e-mail at any time and without further explanation. E-mail transmission may not be secure or error-free as information could be intercepted, corrupted, lost, destroyed, arrive late or incomplete. Also processing of incoming e-mails cannot be guaranteed. All liability of Vontobel Holding Ltd. and any of its affiliates (hereinafter collectively referred to as "Vontobel Group") for any damages resulting from e-mail use is excluded. You are advised that urgent and time sensitive messages should not be sent by e-mail and if verification is required please request a printed version. Please note that all e-mail communications to and from the Vontobel Group are subject to electronic storage and review by Vontobel Group. Unless stated to the contrary and without prejudice to any contractual agreements between you and Vontobel Group which shall prevail in any case, e-mail-communication is for informational purposes only and is not intended as an offer or solicitation for the purchase or sale of any financial instrument or as an official confirmation of any transaction. The legal basis for the processing of your personal data is the legitimate interest to develop a commercial relationship with you, as well as your consent to forward you commercial communications. You can exercise, at any time and under the terms established under current regulation, your rights. If you prefer not to receive any further communications, please contact your client relationship manager if you are a client of Vontobel Group or notify the sender. Please note for an exact reference to the affected group entity the corporate e-mail signature. For further information about data privacy at Vontobel Group please consult www.vontobel.com.

--

  • Bill Ferguson
--
http://www.freelists.org/webpage/oracle-l
Received on Wed Jun 05 2019 - 23:37:12 CEST

Original text of this message