Wednesday, December 21, 2022

ZDM troubleshooting part 4: NONCDBTOPDB_CONVERSION fails (GUID conflicts with existing PDB)

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is image-3.png
Intro

Every time I think I’m done with my ZDM troubleshooting series, a new topic pops up :). I have also learned that every migration is distinct and brings its own unique challenges, so I have decided to keep the series open-ended. In this post, we will discuss the steps you should take when a conversion of a non-CDB to a PDB fails during a ZDM migration to identify the root cause, and get your migration back on track. So, let's dive in!

Note: you ca always explore the other ZDM troubleshooting related post below:
- Migration failing at ZDM_CONFIGURE_DG_SRC
- Migration failing at ZDM_SWITCHOVER_SRC plus hack 

My ZDM environment

  • ZDM: 21.3 build

Property                                                  Source                                              Target                                      
RAC NOYES
Encrypted NO YES
CDB NO YES
Release 12.212.2
PlatformOn prem LinuxExaCC


 

Prerequisites

All the prerequisites related to the ZDM VM, the Source and Target Database system were satisfied before running the migration.

Responsefile

Prepare a responsefile for a Physical Online Migration with the required parameters (see excerpt). I will just point out that ZDM 21.3 now supports Data Guard Broker configuration .

$ cat physical_online_demo.rsp | grep -v ^#
TGT_DB_UNIQUE_NAME=TGTCDB
MIGRATION_METHOD=ONLINE_PHYSICAL
DATA_TRANSFER_MEDIUM=DIRECT
PLATFORM_TYPE=EXACC
...etc

 

Run migration until the DG config –step1

As usual Irun the migrate command with the -pauseafter ZDM_CONFIGURE_DG_SRC to stop when the replication is configured in order to resume the full migration a later time. 

$ZDM_HOME/bin/zdmcli migrate database –sourcedb SRCDB \ -sourcenode srcHost -srcauth zdmauth \ -srcarg1 user:zdmuser \ -targetnode tgtNode \ -tgtauth zdmauth \ -tgtarg1 user:opc \ -rsp ./physical_online_demo.rsp –ignore ALL -pauseafter ZDM_CONFIGURE_DG_SRC

Resume migration  –step2

Now that the Data guard Configuration is complete. It’s time to resume the full migration to the end. 

$ zdmservice resume job –jobid 1

Querying job status

As you can see, It didn’t take long before noticing that the Switchover step failed. 

$ zdmservice query job –jobid 1
zdmhost.domain.com: Audit ID: 39
Job ID: 1
User: zdmuser
Client: zdmhost
Job Type: "MIGRATE"
Current status: FAILED
Result file path: "/u01/app/oracle/zdmbase/chkbase/scheduled/job-1-*log" ...
Job execution elapsed time: 1 hours 25 minutes 41 seconds
ZDM_GET_SRC_INFO .............. COMPLETED
ZDM_GET_TGT_INFO .............. COMPLETED
ZDM_PRECHECKS_SRC ............. COMPLETED
ZDM_PRECHECKS_TGT ............. COMPLETED
ZDM_SETUP_SRC ................. COMPLETED
ZDM_SETUP_TGT ................. COMPLETED
ZDM_PREUSERACTIONS ............ COMPLETED
ZDM_PREUSERACTIONS_TGT ........ COMPLETED
ZDM_VALIDATE_SRC .............. COMPLETED
ZDM_VALIDATE_TGT .............. COMPLETED
ZDM_DISCOVER_SRC .............. COMPLETED
ZDM_COPYFILES ................. COMPLETED
ZDM_PREPARE_TGT ............... COMPLETED
ZDM_SETUP_TDE_TGT ............. COMPLETED
ZDM_RESTORE_TGT ............... COMPLETED
ZDM_RECOVER_TGT ............... COMPLETED
ZDM_FINALIZE_TGT .............. COMPLETED
ZDM_CONFIGURE_DG_SRC .......... COMPLETED
ZDM_SWITCHOVER_SRC ............ COMPLETED
ZDM_SWITCHOVER_TGT ............ COMPLETED
ZDM_POST_DATABASE_OPEN_TGT .... COMPLETED
ZDM_DATAPATCH_TGT ............. COMPLETED
ZDM_NONCDBTOPDB_PRECHECK ...... COMPLETED
ZDM_NONCDBTOPDB_CONVERSION .... FAILED
ZDM_POST_MIGRATE_TGT .......... PENDING
ZDM_POSTUSERACTIONS ........... PENDING
ZDM_POSTUSERACTIONS_TGT ....... PENDING
ZDM_CLEANUP_SRC ............... PENDING
ZDM_CLEANUP_TGT ............... PENDING


Troubleshooting the error

To determine the content of the error message, the best approach is to check the $ZDM_BASE logs hosted locally on the target node “$ORACLE_BASE/zdm/zdm_targetDB_$jobID/zdm/log

-- Target node
$ cd $ORACLE_BASE/zdm/zdm_TGTCDB_1/zdm/log

$ tail ./zdm_noncdbtopdb_conversion_*.log
[jobid-1][2022-12-14][mZDM_Queries.pm:556]:[DEBUG] Output is :
SQL*Plus: Release 12.2.0.1.0 Production on Wed Dec 14 2022 ..
Connected to: Oracle Database 12c EE Extreme Perf Release 12.2.0.1.0 - 64bit Production
CREATE PLUGGABLE DATABASE zdm_aux_SRCDB using '/tmp/zdm_aux_SRCDB.xml' NOCOPY
TEMPFILE REUSE

 *  ERROR at line 1:

 ORA-65122: Pluggable database GUID conflicts with the GUID of an existing  container.

[jobid-1][2022-12-14][mZDM_convert_noncdb2pdb.pl:522]:[ERROR
failed to create the PDB 'zdm_aux_SRCDB'

As you can see above, the issue is related to the new PDB created in the target CDB from the auxiliary database


What Happened


In an online physical migration from a non-CDB database to a PDB on a target container, ZDM creates an auxiliary standby database in the background to ensure replication consistency before the final switchover. After the switchover is complete, a data patch is applied and an unplug and plug operation is done to convert the auxiliary DB into a PDB on the target container database (CDB).


Why is ZDM failing to create the new PDB?


Turns out, ZDM attempted to construct a new PDB from the generated XML manifest but was unsuccessful, as Oracle had assigned a default GUID from another PDB in the CDB. I wouldn't say this happens for all instances of target CDBs with existing PDBs (I already completed such migrations in the past), but in this case, two databases had already been migrated to the same target CDB before this one.

Subsidiary question
Why  did the CREATE PLUGGABLE DATABASE command use an existing GUID instead of generating a new one?
I don’t have the answer to this yet but we chose to open an SR and see if there was a workaround for this issue.


SOLUTION: ZDM pl script rewrite

 
Force ZDM to use the clone option :

  • ZDM uses a PDB plugin script called mZDM_convert_noncdb2pdb.pl to perform the PDB conversion

  • All we need to do is to update the script at the plugin section and add AS CLONE  to the create pluggable database command

Location : Make a copy of the below file on he ZDM host before the change

    cp $ZDM_HOME/rhp/zdm/mZDM_convert_noncdb2pdb.pl mZDM_convert_noncdb2pdb.pl.old

    The perl script contains variables replacing the PDB name & XML manifest, but the error here occurred because the script had a "NOCOPY" statement without an "AS CLONE" clause.   

    This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is image-2.pngTo fix the issue, we just need amend it and add the missing clone part.

      …else
      {
      @slq_stmts =(
      ...

      CREATE PLUGGABLE DATABASE $sdb AS CLONE USING '$descfile' NOCOPY TEMPFILE REUSE);
      }


      Note:

      • It is only advised to perform the below change in this particular case or when asked by Oracle support.


      Resume the job

      this is it, ZDM will now create the PDB as clone implying a new GUID after resuming the job to complete the rest of our online physical migration 

      $ zdmservice resume job –jobid 1
      $ zdmservice query job –jobid 1
      ...
      ZDM_CONFIGURE_DG_SRC .......... COMPLETED
      ZDM_SWITCHOVER_SRC ............ COMPLETED
      ZDM_SWITCHOVER_TGT ............ COMPLETED
      ZDM_POST_DATABASE_OPEN_TGT .... COMPLETED
      ZDM_DATAPATCH_TGT ............. COMPLETED
      ZDM_NONCDBTOPDB_PRECHECK ...... COMPLETED
      ZDM_NONCDBTOPDB_CONVERSION .... COMPLETED
      ZDM_POST_MIGRATE_TGT .......... PENDING
      ZDM_POSTUSERACTIONS ........... PENDING
      ZDM_POSTUSERACTIONS_TGT ....... PENDING
      ZDM_CLEANUP_SRC ............... PENDING
      ZDM_CLEANUP_TGT ............... PENDING


      Conclusion

      • We learned that ZDM may sometimes try to reuse an existing GUID while converting DB to PDB 
      • This may be fixed natively in future releases of ZDM.    
      • I can’t assume this behavior would be the same in all cases, because I already moved databases to a CDB with many PDBs without any problem in the past
      • Oracle documentation is explicit about the "AS CLONE" clause. Nevertheless, I don't think the same DB was migrated in the past to the same destination.
        Specifying AS CLONE also ensures that Oracle Database generates new identifiers(GUID,DBID) if the target CDB already contains a PDB that was created using the same set of data files
      • You might not run into the same error, but this is the quickest fix in case it happens. 

              Thank you for reading

      Monday, December 5, 2022

      What's ODABR snapshot & how to efficiently use it to patch ODA from 18 to 19.x

      This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is image-1.png


      Intro

      Although most of the focus, nowadays, has shifted to migration of on-premises workloads into the Cloud, companies still leverage Oracle databases engineered systems like Oracle database appliance to run their databases on-prem. As a matter of fact ,ODA is a low entry pricing and flexible CPU licensing platform that can still host workloads that aren’t mature enough to go to the cloud. Until then, system updates fall under the customer’s responsibility. In today’s use case, patching your ODA software version from 18.8 to 19.x will require to upgrade your OS from Linux Enterprise 6 to 7. But how does Oracle make that move seamless and safe in case of failure?This is why I chose to discuss a tool called ODABR that allows rollback capability during OS upgrade on ODAs.

      BACKUP BEFORE YOU PATCH
      It will be especially interesting to learn how to effectively use it with reduced available storage when patching an ODA to 19.6. Read more about ODA release matrix in the official Oracle blog 


      Patching process to ODA 19.6

      The upgrade from 18.8 to 19.6 has two main stages :

      1. A first pass to upgrade the Linux from OEL 6 to OEL 7.

      2. A second to update the ODA binaries (DCS and Grid) as for previous versions.

       

      What’s ODABR

      ODA backup & recovery is a utility developed by Oracle engineer Ruggero Citton, which allows to backup and recover an ODA node using consistent & incremental System backups on Bare metal ODAs as described in Oracle support Note ID 2466177.1. ODABR is a perquisite for the 1st stage (OS upgrade to OEL7) as it will save a disk restore point in case of rollback after ODA patching  failure (precheck will even fail if the tool is not installed).

      ODA backups

      System Node Backup includes following filesystems:

      • / : Root file system

      • /boot : Boot partition

      • /opt : opt file system (OAK/DCS,TFA, OWG, ASR)

      • /u01: Grid Infrastructure, RDBMS binaries

      • Grid Infrastructure OCR file

      There are 2 types of backups with ODABR but only one is needed when patching the ODA to 19.6

      • Consistent backup is guarantee by the LVM snapshot feature (used during patching)

      • Incremental backup managed automatically using rsync features (physical copy to specified destination)


      LVM snapshot used by ODABR

      ODABR is just reusing Linux LVM snapshot feature that create two copies of the same logical Volume, where one is used for backup purposes while the other continues in operation. The delta is tracked since snapshot creation

      • Snapshot creation is quick & doesn’t need stopping the server.

      • A Snapshot will use only the space needed to accommodate the difference between the two LVs (delta also called Copy-on-Write (CoW) )

      ODABR installation
      Download and install the rpm: >> odabr-2.0.1

      [root@odadev1~]# rpm -Uvh odabr-2.0.1-62.noarch.rpm 
      odabr-2.0.1.62 has been installed on /opt/odabr succesfully!


      Backup Syntax

      Usage:
      odabr backup [-snap] [-destination <dest path> [-dryrun][-silent]] | [-mgmtdb]
             [-osize <opt snapsize>][-rsize <root snapsize>][-usize <u01 snap size>]

      odabr infosnap --- show available snapshots
      odabr delsnap --- delete all snapshots

      The backup syntax is pretty straightforward with  -snap & -destination (nfs/local path or ssh/rsync) as main option 


      Patching to 19.6 challenge with limited Free space

       
      Before upgrading the OS, ODABR will create LVM snapshots for the file systems that need 190GB of free space:

      root LVM snapshot  30Gb
      opt  LVM snapshot  60Gb
      u01  LVM snapshot 100Gb

      But in most situations, old systems unused space is lower.
      Example:  A node with only 78GB unused space which will cause an error during the patching prechecks

      [root@odadev2 ~]# df -Ph / /u01 /opt
      Filesystem                          Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on
      /dev/mapper/VolGroupSys-LogVolRoot   30G  6.9G   22G  25% /
      /dev/mapper/VolGroupSys-LogVolU01   148G  104G   37G  75% /u01  
      /dev/mapper/VolGroupSys-LogVolOpt    59G   38G   19G  68% /opt
      === 78GB available only

      PRECHECK ERROR

      # odacli create-prepatchreport -v 19.6.0.0.0 -os
      # odacli describe-prepatchreport -i 12d61cda-1cef-40b9-ad7d-8e087007da23v

      Patch pre-check report
      ------------------------------------------------------------------------
      Job ID: 666f7269-7f9a-49b1-8742-2447e94fe54e
      Description: Patch pre-checks for [OS]
      Status: FAILED
      Created: November 7, 2022 5:30:42 PM CEST
      Result: One or more pre-checks failed for [OS]
      Pre-Check Status Comments
      ----------------------- -------- --------------------------------------
      Validate LVM free space Failed Insufficient space to create LVM
      snapshots on node: odadev1.

      Expected free space(GB): 190, available space GB): 78.



      Workarounds  

      In case of limited Free space we have 2 options

      1. Cowboy

      My Oracle ACE peer Fernando Simon explains a drastic way to reduce the /u01 footprint in his excellent blogpost- Patch ODA from 18.3 to 19.8. Part 2 by unmounting the disk and using both resize2fs & lvreduce to claim free space.


      2. Manual OADR backup with custom snapshot size 

      A snapshot will require as much storage space as changes made in the logical volume, meaning the OS upgrade change will be the main source of all the changes stored in the snapshots.
      Solution: run a manual backup by specifying lower size required for /, /opt, and /u01 snapshots , but you need to run the patchreport at least one time.
      Example

      With only 98G free space, we can run adapt the FS snapshots to lower sizes (opt=30g , root=5g,  u01=70G)

      [root@odadev1 ~]# df -Ph / /opt /u01

      Filesystem                          Size  Used Avail Use% Mounted on /dev/mapper/VolGroupSys-LogVolRoot   30G  7.6G   21G  28% / /dev/mapper/VolGroupSys-LogVolOpt    59G   41G   16G 73% /opt /dev/mapper/VolGroupSys-LogVolU01   148G   80G   61G  57% /u01

      -- Actual free space

      [root@odadev1 ~]# pvs  

      PV         VG          Fmt  Attr PSize   PFree   /dev/md
      1   VolGroupSys lvm2 a--u 446.00g 98.00g

      Note: specify lower values for the lvm snapshots size than the actual filesystem usage.
      - odacli update-server command will use these custom snapshots (98GB) during the upgrade instead of creating larger ones automatically which would take 190GB. 

      [root@odadev1 ~]# /opt/odabr/odabr backup -snap -osize 30 -rsize 5 -usize 70

      ¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦  odabr - ODA node Backup Restore - Version: 2.0.1-62 Copyright Oracle, Inc. 20  --------------------------------------------------------                       Author: Ruggero Citton <ruggero.citton@oracle.com> RAC Pack, Cloud Innovation ¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦¦
      SUCCESS
      : 2022-11-7 12:10:18:...snapshot backup for 'opt' created successfully SUCCESS: 2022-11-7 12:10:20:...snapshot backup for 'u01' created successfully SUCCESS: 2022-11-7 12:10:20:...snapshot backup for 'root' created successfully SUCCESS: 2022-11-7 12:10:20: LVM snapshots backup done successfully


      -- Check the created LVM snapshots

      [root@odadev02 ~]# /opt/odabr/odabr infosnap LVM snap name         Status                COW Size              Data% -------------         ----------            ----------            ------ root_snap             active                5.00 GiB              0.05% opt_snap              active                30.00 GiB             0.02% u01_snap              active                70.00 GiB             0.02%

      As shown above and below, the size of the snapshot will only contain the changes written during the OS upgrade.

      [root@odadev1 ~]# lvs
        LV         VG          Attr       LSize   Pool Origin     Data% Meta% Move Log
        LogVolDATA VolGroupSys -wi-a-----  10.00g
        LogVolOpt  VolGroupSys owi-aos---  60.00g
        LogVolRECO VolGroupSys -wi-a-----  10.00g
        LogVolRoot VolGroupSys owi-aos---  30.00g
        LogVolSwap VolGroupSys -wi-ao----  24.00g
        LogVolU01  VolGroupSys owi-aos--- 150.00g
       
      opt_snap   VolGroupSys swi-a-s---  30.00g      LogVolOpt  0.01 <— snapshot
        root_snap  VolGroupSys swi-a-s---   5.00g      LogVolRoot 0.04 <— snapshot
        u01_snap   VolGroupSys swi-a-s---  70.00g      LogVolU01  0.02 <- snapshot



      ODABR tips when patching

      • You can use the "odabr –dryrun” option before choosing the right size .

      • When custom snapshots already exist on the system during odacli create-prepatchreport run, the precheck fails, because it expects to create these snapshots itself. However, odacli update-server –c OS still continues with the upgrade. 

      • Use -force option during upgrade to skip the auto backup.

        # odacli update-server -v 19.6.0.0.0 -c os --local --force Verifying OS upgrade Current OS base version: 6 is lessthan target OS base version: 7 OS needs to upgrade to 7.7

      • Run ODABR backup right after the repository update in order to avoid extracting the patch a second time

        $  odacli update-repository –f oda-asm-zipfile1,zipfile2,zipfile3,zipfile4


            You can now follow the rest of the guided steps to patch ODA from 18.8 to 19.9

      • When Running the post upgrade checks: You’ll be asked to delete the snapshots

        [root@odadev1]# ./odacli update-server-postcheck -v 19.6.0.0.0
        Comp Pre-Check Status Comments
        ---- --------------- -------- ---------------------------------
        OS ODABR snapshot WARNING ODABR snapshot found. Run 'odabr delsnap'

        -- Delete the snapshots
        [root@odadev1]# /opt/odabr/odabr delsnap
        INFO: 2022-11-07 20:44:55: Removing LVM snapshots
        SUCCESS: 2022-11-07 20:44:55: ...snapshot for 'opt' removed successfully
        SUCCESS: 2022-11-07 20:44:55: ...snapshot for 'u01' removed successfully
        SUCCESS: 2022-11-07 20:44:56: ...snapshot for 'root' removed successfully



       
      Recovering from a Failed Operating System Upgrade

      In case things go south, we can always rollback sine we have a restore point.

      1. Download ODARescue Live Disk ISO image for the 19.6 release to enable booting the node on which the OS upgrade failed: See Oracle Support Note 2495272.1:This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is image.png
        Then Configure the ODA system on Oracle ILOM to boot from the ISO image

      2. Specify the NFS location, including the IP address and path with file name, for the ISO image.

        -set /SP/services/kvms/host_storage_device/remote server_URI=nfs://10.10.1.1:/export/iso/ODARescue_LiveDisk.iso
      3. Configure the ISO image from the Oracle ILOM Service Processor (SP) serial console so that you can use the ISO image to boot the Oracle Database Appliance system.

        -> set /SP/services/kvms/host_storage_device/ mode=remote -> set /HOST boot_device=cdrom

      4. Reboot the ODA host from ILOM using ODARescue ISO image.

      5. Login as root user with password "welcome1" ( user "odalive" can also be used).

      6. If you decide to revert to the Oracle Linux 6 configuration after troubleshooting, then run the below 

        # odarescue ol6restore
        ol6restore will restore:
        boot/efi partition
        LVM snapshots (root, opt, u01)
        grub v1

        This command restores the Oracle Linux 6 configuration using the snapshots that were taken using ODABR.

      Conclusion

      • ODABR is a very convenient tool that can help you backup & recover your server from OS corruption
      • We also learned how to reduce the snapshot footprint before upgrading the ODA from 18.8 to 19.6
      • With this in mind, you can patch your ODA to 19.6 safely even if your free space is lower than 190GB
      • I hope this can help learn more about this tool which got me curious back when I first patched ODA to 19.6 couple of years ago 

              Thank you for reading