2 Options and Packs

Oracle Database Options

All the Oracle Database options can be purchased with Oracle Database Enterprise Edition. Real Application Clusters is included with Oracle Database Standard Edition. You cannot purchase any options with Oracle Database Standard Edition One. The Personal Edition includes all options except Real Application Clusters at no additional cost.

Oracle Real Application Clusters

Oracle Real Application Clusters (RAC) is a database computing environment that harnesses the processing power of multiple interconnected computers using clustering technology. RAC provides unlimited scalability and high availability for all applications. RAC makes the database highly available in the presence of computer hardware or software failure: in the event any computer in the cluster fails, the database continues to provide service on the surviving computers in the cluster. RAC provides scalable performance: as demand for database throughput grows, additional computers can be added to the database cluster with no downtime. RAC supports a single-system image for ease of management. RAC also provides a complete and integrated stack of clustering software on all platforms; third-party clusterware software is not required. Finally, RAC provides cluster file system capability on the Windows and Linux platforms. When using RAC and Standard Edition, the maximum number of processors per cluster is 4.

Oracle Partitioning

Oracle Partitioning enhances the data management environment for OLTP, data mart, data warehouse, and content management applications by adding significant manageability, availability, and performance capabilities to large underlying database tables and indexes. Oracle Partitioning lets you store large tables as individually managed smaller pieces, while retaining a single application-level view of the data. Range, hash, list, and composite (range combined with hash and range combined with list) partitioning methods are supported.

Oracle Data Mining

Oracle Data Mining enables companies to build advanced business intelligence applications that mine corporate databases, reveal new patterns and relationships, and integrate that information into business applications. This option embeds data mining functionality into Oracle Database for making classifications, predictions, and associations. All model-building, scoring, and metadata management operations are accessible by way of either a Java or PL/SQL API.

Oracle Advanced Security

Oracle Advanced Security provides network encryption and a complete suite of strong authentication services to Oracle Database. Network encryption is implemented using industry-standard data encryption and data integrity algorithms. This feature provides a choice of algorithms and cipher strengths for deployment. Strong authentication services support a comprehensive suite of industry-standard third-party authentication options. The authentication options include single sign-on services to the Oracle Database by interoperating with existing authentication frameworks and two-factor authentication choices such as smart cards and token cards.

Users wishing to use Enterprise User Security in Oracle Database Enterprise Edition no longer need to license the Oracle Advanced Security Option for password-based authentication. However, they must license the Oracle Identity Management Option, which includes Oracle Internet Directory (OID). Users wishing to use stronger authentication alternatives (such as Kerberos or PKI) for Enterprise User Security must license Oracle Advanced Security and Oracle Identity Management. Oracle Identity Management is an option to the Oracle Application Server 10g Standard Edition product. Any Oracle Advanced Security licenses purchased on or before January 31, 2004, have restricted use of the Oracle Identity Management option to support enterprise user security. Please contact your Oracle sales representative for additional information.

Oracle Label Security

Oracle Label Security provides sophisticated and flexible security based on row labels for fine-grained access control. This option employs labeling concepts used by government, defense, and commercial organizations to protect sensitive information and provide data separation. It includes a powerful tool to manage policies, labels, and user label authorizations.

By default, Oracle Label Security is configured to use Oracle Database for all policy management. Users interested in centralized policy management using the Oracle Identity Management infrastructure must additionally license Oracle Identity Management. Please contact your Oracle sales representative for additional information.

Oracle On-Line Analytical Processing (OLAP)

Oracle OLAP is a scalable, high-performance calculation engine with fully integrated management and administration for delivering analytic applications. Fully integrated in the database, this option provides a complete set of analytic functions. Predictive analysis can be used, for example, to forecast market trends, predict product manufacturing requirements, and build enterprise budgeting and financial analysis systems. Using complex, multidimensional queries and calculations, information such as market shares and net present value can be derived. The Java OLAP API provides efficient object-orientation for building applications that require complex analytic queries.

Oracle Spatial

Oracle Spatial enables users and application developers to integrate their spatial data seamlessly into enterprise applications. This option comprises an integrated set of functions and procedures that facilitate analysis based on the spatial relationships of associated data. Examples of such analysis include the proximity of store locations to customers within a given distance and sales revenue per territory. Oracle Spatial manages spatial data in an industry-standard database, resulting in application integration that takes place at the server. This enables vendor tools and applications to access spatial data directly from Oracle Database, providing interoperability and minimizing cost.

Oracle Management Packs

The sections that follow describe the Oracle management packs. The management packs can be purchased only with Enterprise Edition. The features in these packs are accessible through Oracle Enterprise Manager Database Control, Oracle Enterprise Manager Grid Control, and APIs provided with Oracle Database software.

Oracle Change Management Pack

The Oracle Change Management Pack enables database administrators to make complex changes to schema objects safely, track changes to schemas and databases over time, make copies of schemas or objects, and compare and synchronize schemas and databases. With Oracle Change Management, you can:

• Capture and store object definitions

• Compare object definitions and highlight differences

• Synchronize object definitions

• Propagate object definitions to one or more sites

• Clone objects with a subset of their data

• Manage and plan changes over the life of the database and its applications

Oracle Diagnostic Pack

The Oracle Diagnostic Pack provides automatic performance diagnostic and advanced system monitoring functionality. The Diagnostic Pack includes the following features:

• Automatic Workload Repository

• Automatic Database Diagnostic Monitor (ADDM)

• Performance monitoring (database and host)

• Event notifications: notification methods, rules, and schedules

• Event history and metric history (database and host)

• Blackouts

In order to use the features listed above, you must purchase licenses to the Diagnostic Pack. The list that follows itemizes the Enterprise Manager links and the database server APIs and command-line interfaces that require licensing of the Diagnostic Pack.

• Almost all Enterprise Manager pages have a Related Links section at the bottom of the page. The All Metrics, Alert History and Blackouts links are part of the Diagnostic Pack. If the Advisor Central link appears, it takes you to the Advisor Central page. On that page, in the Advisors section, the ADDM link is part of this pack. In the Results section, table rows containing "ADDM" in the Advisory Type column are part of this pack.

• Some components of the Diagnostic Pack are accessed only when you are in Grid Control mode. You can navigate to these components in several ways. The list that follows assumes that you begin from the main Grid Control page.

  • When you click the Preferences link, the navigation bar contains a Notification section, where the Rules and Schedule links are part of this pack.

  • When you click the Setup link, the navigation bar contains links for Notification Methods and Blackouts, both of which are part of this pack.

  • When you click the Alerts tab, the resulting table contains a Message column which is part of this pack.

  • When you click the Targets tab and then the Groups subtab, the resulting Wait Time chart and Alert History chart are part of this pack.

  • When you click the Targets tab and then the Databases subtab, the resulting table has four columns with names beginning with Sessions: and an Instance CPU column, all of which are part of this pack.

  • When you click the Targets tab and then the Groups subtab, the Alerts and Policy Violations columns of the resulting table are part of this pack.

  • In the same table, if you click a link in the Name column, you reach the Group home page. In the General section, the Up link is part of this pack. In the Alerts section, links in the Metric column are part of this pack. If you click the Components link on this page, links in the Availability, Alerts, and Policy Violations columns are part of this pack.

  • When you click the Targets tab and then the All Targets tab, links in the Availability column of the table are part of this pack.

• Some components of the Diagnostic Pack can be accessed in either Grid Control or Database Control mode. You can navigate to these components in several ways. The list that follows assumes that you begin on the main Database home page.

  • In the General section of the home page, the Availability % link is part of this pack.

  • The entire Active Sessions section and all of its links are part of this pack.

  • In the Diagnostics Summary section, the Performance Findings link is part of this pack.

  • In the Alerts section, the links in the Message column of the table are part of this pack.

  • In some circumstances a Performance Analysis section appears on the Database home page. Links in the Recommendations column to "ADDM" are part of this pack.

  • The entire Database Performance page, which you reach by clicking the Performance subtab from the Database home page, is part of this pack.

  • The Database Administration page is reached by clicking the Administration subtab of the Database home page. In the Enterprise Manager Administration section, the Notification Schedules and Blackouts links are part of this pack. In the Workload section, the Automatic Workload Repository link takes you to the Workload Repository page, where the Snapshots and Preserved Snapshot Sets links are part of this pack.

  • On the Database home page, in the General section the Host link takes you to the top-level Hosts page. In the table on that page, links in all table columns except Alerts are part of this pack.

  • From the top-level Hosts page, clicking the name of a host takes you to the Host home page. In the General section, the Availability link is part of this pack. In the Alerts section, the Metric Name column is part of this pack.

  • On the Host home page, the entire Performance subtab is part of this pack.

  • From the Host home page, the Targets tab takes you to the Host Targets page, where the links in the Availability column of the table are part of this pack.

• Some Diagnostics Pack features are accessed by way of database server APIs and command-line interfaces:

  • The DBMS_WORKLOAD_REPOSITORY package is part of this pack.

  • The DBMS_ADVISOR package is part of this pack if you specify ADDM as the value of the advisor_name parameter, or if you specify for the value of the task_name parameter any value starting with the ADDM prefix.

  • The V$ACTIVE_SESSION_HISTORY dynamic performance view is part of this pack.

  • All data dictionary views beginning with the prefix DBA_HIST_ are part of this pack, along with their underlying tables.

  • All data dictionary views with the prefix DBA_ADVISOR_ are part of this pack if queries to these views return rows with the value 'ADDM' in the ADVISOR_NAME column or a value of 'ADDM*' in the TASK_NAME column or the corresponding TASK_ID.

  • The following reports found in the /rdbms/admin/ directory of the Oracle home directory are part of this pack: awrrpt.sql, awrrpti.sql, addmrtp.sql, addmrpti.sql, awrrpt.sql, awrrpti.sql, addmrpt.sql, addmrpti.sql.

Oracle Tuning Pack

The Oracle Tuning Pack provides database administrators with expert performance management for the Oracle environment, including SQL tuning and storage optimizations. The Oracle Diagnostic Pack is a prerequisite product to the Oracle Tuning Pack. Therefore, to use the Tuning Pack, you must also have a Diagnostic Pack. The Tuning Pack includes the following features:

• SQL Access Advisor

• SQL Tuning Advisor

• SQL Tuning Sets

• Reorganize objects

In order to use the features listed above, you must purchase licenses to the Tuning Pack. The lists that follow itemize the Enterprise Manager links and the PL/SQL packages that require licensing of the Tuning Pack.

• Almost all Enterprise Manager pages have a Related Links section at the bottom of the page. In that section, the Advisor Central link takes you to the Advisor Central page. On that page, in the Advisors section, the SQL Tuning Advisor and the SQL Access Advisor links are part of this pack. In the Results section, table rows containing "SQL Tuning Advisor" or "SQL Access Advisor" in the Advisory Type column are part of this pack.

• In Enterprise Manager, the links that access Tuning Pack components can be reached in either Grid Control or Database Control mode. You can navigate to these components in several ways. The list that follows assumes that you begin on the main Database home page.

  • When you click the Administration subtab, in the Workload section, the SQL Tuning Sets link is part of this pack.

  • When you click the Maintenance subtab, in the Utilities section, the Reorganize Objects link is part of this pack.

  • In some circumstances, the Database home page has a Performance Analysis section at the bottom of the page. Clicking a link in the Findings column of the table takes you to the ADDM Finding Details page. If the recommendation on that page is to run either the SQL Tuning Advisor or the SQL Access Advisor, then the button that runs either of those advisors is part of this pack.

• Use of the following PL/SQL packages requires a license for the Oracle Tuning Pack:

  • DBMS_SQLTUNE

  • DBMS_ADVISOR, when the value of the advisor_name parameter is either 'SQL Tuning Advisor' or 'SQL Access Advisor'.

Oracle Configuration Management Pack

The Oracle Configuration Management Pack enables database administrators to track hardware and software configuration information for hosts and databases managed by Enterprise Manager. That information can then be browsed, searched, compared, exported, and tracked historically. The pack also offers policy management and patch management capabilities based on the configuration information. Finally, to facilitate deployments, cloning functionality for database instance and Oracle home is also provided. The Configuration Management Pack includes the following features:

• Extensive searching on configuration data, such as Oracle home patch status, versions deployed, parameter settings, database feature use, and so forth.

• Ability to compare the configuration of two databases

• Host-to-host and host-to-multiple-hosts configuration comparison

• Exporting of host configuration information on the same or a different instance of Enterprise Manager for later browsing or comparison

• Patch management, including automated determination of what patches apply to a given Oracle home, using data obtained directly from MetaLink, as well as mass deployment of patches

• Database and Oracle home cloning

• Policy management to alert the administrator to deviations from best practices

• Automated in-context Critical Patch advisory assessment

In order to use the features listed above, you must purchase licenses to the Configuration Management Pack. The lists that follow itemize the Enterprise Manager links that require licensing of the Configuration Management Pack.

• Almost all Enterprise Manager pages have a Related Links section at the bottom of the page. In that section, the Deployments link is part of this pack.

• Some components of the Configuration Management Pack are accessed only when you are in Grid Control mode. You can navigate to these components in several ways. The list that follows assumes that you begin from the main Grid Control home page.

  • In the All Target Alerts section of the Grid Control page, links take you to various Alert tables. In those tables, links in the Message column are part of this pack.

  • All of the links in the Critical Patch Advisories section are part of this pack.

  • All links in the Deployments Summary section are part of this pack.

  • When you click the Setup link, the navigation bar link for Patching Setup is part of this pack.

  • When you click the Targets tab and then the Groups subtab, you reach the Grid Control Groups page. In the table on that page, the links in the Policy Violations column are part of this pack.

  • In the Grid Control Groups page, when you click the name of a group, you reach the Database Group home page. On that page, all links in the Deployments Summary and Advice sections are part of this pack.

  • From the Database Group home page, you can click a database name to go to the Database home page. Clicking on the Maintenance tab takes you to the Database Maintenance page. In the Utilities section, the Clone Database link is part of this package.

  • The entire Deployments tab on the Grid Control home page is part of this pack.

• Some components of the Configuration Management Pack can be accessed in either Grid Control or Database Control mode. You can navigate to these components in several ways. The list that follows assumes that you begin on the main Database home page.

  • In the General section, the Oracle Home link is part of this pack.

  • In the Space Usage section, the Policy Violations link is part of this pack.

  • In the Diagnostics Summary section, the All Policy Violations link is part of this pack.

  • The Administration subtab takes you to the Database Administration page. All links in the Configuration Management section are part of this pack.

  • The Maintenance subtab takes you to the Database Maintenance page. All links in the Deployments section are part of this pack.

  • When you click the Targets tab and then the Hosts link, a table is displayed. The links in the Policy Violation column are part of this pack.

  • In the General section, the Host link takes you to the top-level Hosts page. Clicking on a host name takes you to the Host home page. All links in the Configuration section are part of this pack. In the General section, the Policy Violations link is part of this pack.

  • From the Host home page, clicking the Targets link takes you to the Host Targets table. Links in the Oracle Home and Policy Violations columns are part of this pack.

  • From the Host home page, the Configuration link takes you to the Host Configuration page. All links on this page are part of this pack.

Other Oracle Products

In addition to the options and packs described in this chapter, Oracle provides two additional products for specific customer environments.