Configuring Oracle RAC on IP4G

Configure AIX environments on IBM Power for Google Cloud (IP4G) to support Oracle database installations, including Real Application Clusters (RAC).

Overview

When migrating Oracle RAC to IP4G, you may need to adjust network interface ordering and storage device configuration to match the environment requirements.

Prerequisites

  • Root access to the AIX Virtual Machine (VM).
  • Familiarity with AIX system administration tools (smitty, chdev, rendev).

Network Interface Configuration

IP4G VMs assign eth0 for the customer IP address and eth1 for the Resource Monitoring and Control (RMC) interface. Default Oracle RAC configurations may require specific interface ordering which can cause conflicts.

Resolving Interface Conflicts

Choose one of the following methods to resolve interface ordering issues:

  • Reconfigure RAC: Update your Oracle RAC configuration to use the Ethernet interfaces in the order they are detected by AIX.
  • Rename Interfaces: Use the rendev command to rename Ethernet interfaces to the order expected by your RAC configuration.

Storage Volume Configuration

Storage volumes (hdisks) on IP4G may be detected in a different order than on-premises environments, and will appear as new devices.

Managing Storage Volumes

  1. Resolve Ordering Conflicts:

    • Use rendev to rename hdisks to match your expected layout.
    • Alternatively, configure Oracle RAC to use the hdisk identifiers as detected by the system.

  2. Update Permissions:

    • Because hdisks are detected as new devices, you must reset ownership and permissions (e.g., chown oracle:dba /dev/rhdisk*) to allow Oracle access.