[wplug] Oracle on RH 8 (was: Entertaining)

[Bob Schmertz]

On Sun, 2003-02-09 at 15:00, Vanco, Donald wrote:
> Bob Schmertz wrote:
> > On Sat, 2003-02-08 at 18:53, Vanco, Donald wrote:
> >> At the risk of again asserting myself...
> >> 
> >> Oracle is not supported on RH 8.0, so there's not much point in
> >> discussing the functionality.  That being said - you can run
> >> multiple versions of libraries and provide functionality for (some
> >> apps). Oracle does quite a bit of re-linking, so this might not be
> >> the case. 
> >> 
> >> J. Aaron made a better point with his comment re: RH AS and SuSE -
> >> that's all current & future versions of Oracle are going to be
> >> supported on. 
> >> 
> >> A far as what the next release of Advanced Server will be based on
> >> (3.1 - due mid/late summer) I would be astounded to see it _not_
> >> come out based on 
> >> 3.x.  While I don't know a whole lot aboot it yet, I do know among
> >> it's many new features will be a clustered filesystem.
> >> 
> >> You can rest assured that Oracle will be supported at release time.
> > 
> > "Oracle will be supported"... would that be the current version or a
> > new for-RHAS3 version?  I know you don't work for Oracle, so wild
> > speculation is welcome... 
> 	Well, Oracle has a lifespan timeline for all of their products.  I
> would expect at a minimum that the current database, application server, and
> cluster products will be supported.  I would further expect that efforts
> would be in place to support all "currently supported" (legacy) Linux
> products Oracle has available within a short time.  I would be surprised to
> see Oracle release an "Advanced Server" only product, but they have stated
> clearly that Advanced Server is the only product from RH they will certify
> against.  Likewise for SuSE's server product.
> 
> > 
> >> 
> >> Red Hat is also currently baking Advanced Workstation (IA-32 only)
> >> and Advanced Server ES (IA-32 only) which will be aimed at the
> >> "network edge" device - it has no clustering capability as AS does.
> >> 
> >> The coming RH AS 3.1 will support IA-32 and IA-64, and I am really
> >> hoping PowerPC as well.
> > 
> > Red Hat has so far never released anything for PowerPC... have you
> > heard any rumors?  
> Oh boy.....
> BZZZT!
> The current product offerings from Red Hat Linux include (but are not
> limited to): 
>  Red Hat Linux 8.0 Personal 
>  Red Hat Linux 8.0 Professional 
>  Red Hat Linux Advanced Server (with several iterations of support) 
>  Red Hat Linux 8.0 Manuals 
>  Red Hat Linux 7.1 for iSeries (partitioned)
>  Red Hat Linux 7.1 for pSeries (PowerPC native and partitioned)

I guess when someone says PowerPC, I'm thinking Apple machines.  Will
this run on my iBook, or is it only for 64-bit PPC chips, or what?

>  Red Hat Linux 7.1 for zSeries (partitioned)
>  Red Hat Linux for S/390 (same as above, but not zOS)
>  Red Hat Linux 7.2 for the Itanium Processor 
>  Red Hat Database 
>  Red Hat Stronghold Secure Web Server 
> 
> ...that being said, several of these you cannot get off the shelf at
> MicroCenter, the PPC release being one of them.
> 
> 
> > I'd bet they'd make it for Sparc before they do PPC
> 	Been there, done that, got the ISOs.  RH dropped the SPARC port
> circa 6.1 or 6.2.  Sun were being buttholes.

I probably heard this, but lost track.  I didn't realize it was that
long ago.

> 
> 
> >> 
> >> The product that is RH8.0 today is heading for support / sales as a
> >> desktop only product.  Don't expect to see a lot of Enterprise class
> >> apps being supported on it. 
> >> 
> >> Bob - you can recompile the kernel even in Advanced Server - so there
> >> shouldn't be any reason you can't get what you need working unless
> >> it's totally fringe or only part of the development kernel.
> > 
> > I've already done that, but once you do that your OS is no longer a
> > certified Advanced Server,
> ...OOOOH - there's juicy tidbit our RH marketing guy never passed on.  So -
> lemme guess - to get a patch supported you have to pay Red Hat Consulting
> Services 5 figures to run "make" for you?

>From what we're hearing from Red Hat, all we can do is sit and pray that
the next version comes out before our delivery date, and that it has a
fairly recent ethernet bonding driver.  I haven't talked to them myself;
others in my company who have talked to them either didn't ask about
special arrangements, or didn't like what they heard when they did.

> 
> > and if you need support from Oracle and
> > they find out you're not running a RHAS kernel provided/compiled by
> > Red Hat... well, you can guess the rest.
> 	Indeed.  Wow - that's a bite in the can.  I suppose I can appreciate
> that though - having spent many cycles trying to duplicate customer issues
> you have to draw the line somewhere when it comes to trying to work on a
> thoroughly tested / known base system.  We've got one customer right now
> that has a bunch of Intel based systems rebooting every 6 or 7 hours - a
> problem I have not been able to duplicate in-house on 2 of the systems they
> sent me.  Trying to match their system package-for-package is tough enough
> without trying to duplicate a "renegade kernel".  That being said, I can't
> see what the issue would be if you're trying to run a kernel built from
> pristine RH AS sources - the entire tree is supposedly tested.  I would
> think far more damage could be wrought by a user fiddling in /proc/kernel/~
> over building a kernel from RH source, but Oracle is Oracle I suppose.

I understand Oracle does a checksum on the running kernel; if true, it
wouldn't matter if you were using pristine AS source or 2.2.4ac, it'd
get rejected.  Anyway, as mentioned above, the AS kernel lacks certain
features of the bonding driver we need, so I built me a kernel from
pristine RH7.3 sources.

-- 
Cheers,
Bob Schmertz

> 
> 
> >> -----Original Message-----
> >> From: Bob Schmertz
> >> To: wplug at wplug.org
> >> Sent: 2/8/03 5:32 PM
> >> Subject: Re: [wplug] Oracle on RH 8 (was: Entertaining)
> >> 
> >> On Sat, 2003-02-08 at 14:55, J Aaron Farr wrote:
> >>> 
> >>> --- Bob Schmertz <rschmertz at speakeasy.net> wrote:
> >>>> On Fri, 2003-02-07 at 12:50, redtoade wrote:
> >>>> 
> >>>>> 8.0 is a dream.  I have no idea what people are
> >>>>> talking about when they consider it to be buggy.
> >>>> 
> >>>> Has anybody here tried to run any Oracle app -- or any
> > binary-only
> >> C++
> >>>> app that provides shared libraries -- on Red Hat 8.0?
> > From what I
> >> hear
> >>>> about gcc 3.x, there is a binary incompatibility when you try to
> >>>> mix shared object libraries from gcc3 with executables from 2.9x
> >>>> or vice versa.  This wouldn't be Red Hat's fault, as every
> >>>> distribution will have to deal with this compatibility glitch at
> >>>> some point, if they haven't done so already.  But it may be a
> >>>> disincentive 
> > for many to
> >> go to
> >>>> 8.0.
> >>>> 
> >>>> --
> >>>> Cheers,
> >>>> Bob Schmertz
> >>> 
> >>> If you're putting up the cash for an actual Oracle
> > instance then your
> >> probably
> >>> want to go with Red Hat's Advanced Server which will work
> > with Oracle
> >> and all
> >>> the other big guns.  Also, from what I understand SuSE
> > has pretty good
> >> Oracle
> >>> support.
> >>> 
> >> 
> >> Actually, what we're running on Linux are instances of Oracle
> >> Application Server, and custom-made Oracle clients that need the
> >> Oracle libraries.  We also need some features of the Kernel not
> >> found in the version that RHAS ships with, so we're already having
> >> difficulty meeting that option.  I was just wondering what would
> >> happen if the next version of RHAS was based on gcc 3.x.; would the
> >> Oracle libraries stop working? 
> >>