Weblog for the AMIS Technology corner
Technical Architecture
UKOUG 2011 – Drag, Drop and other Stuff. Using your Database as a File Server
Dec 12th
Last Thuesday, Mark Drake, Senior Product Manager and I, delivered a good presentation during UKOUG in Birmingham about how to use your database, via XMLDB functionality, as a file server. The presentation demonstrated as well how you could extent the “standaard” file server (aka your database) functionality with features like, WebDAV driven ACL Security and XDB Repository Events, which enable you to automatically trigger event driven actions based on, for example, file naming, content, creator or others.
You can find the presentation on Slideshare or enjoy it here.
UKOUG 2011 – Drag, Drop and other Stuff. Using your Database as a File Server
View more presentations from Marco Gralike
During the demonstration in the second half of the presentation, we demonstrated how you can automatically consume the EXIF and KML information embedded in pictures to use it with the Google Earth API. All the code used for this Google Earth demonstration, and more, can be found on the Oracle XMLDB Sample Code page.
Have fun trying it out and if there any questions, post them on the OTN Oracle XMLDB forum.
WebLogic 12c released!
Dec 2nd
At December the 1st, 2011, Oracle announced it’s new major release, the 12c release. As Oracle added the i (internet) at its 8 release, the g(gridcomputing) at its 10 release, now the focus will be on the c(cloudcomputing).
Many new features come out of the fact that Oracle has made its key application server ready for the cloud, that is, ready for to run on enigineered systems, in fact its own Exalogic machine, Oracle’s solution for implementing the cloud.
So let’s take a look what this new release brings us, in this blogpost. There are several new features available in the 12c
New or enhanced WebLogic 12c features
- JAVA EE 6 support all kinds of JEE6 specifications are implemented like :
- JSF 2.0,Java Servlets 3.0 JPA 2.0 and EJB 3.1.
- Managed Beans 1.0
- WebLogic 12c also supports supports Java SE 7 (and Java SE 6).
- Java language optimizations and Internationalization
- Client and server support
- SSL/TLS 1.2 in JSSE to support JAVA Socket Transport security
- Converged Java VM:JRockit and HotSpot are incorporated with the best features from both.The JVM convergence will be a multi-year process, which was confirmed during my presence at Oracle’s Publisher Seminar 2011 during OOW
I won’t discuss the full list in this blog because there’s more about WebLogic than only (although very important of course!) the JAVA EE 6 specifications.
- Support for IDE’s. WebLogic already supported JDeveloper 11.1.1.5, but will come out with the 11.1.1.6 later on. Also suported are Eclipse and NetBeans 7.1 IDE. As said, the JDeveloper 11.1.1.6 and IntelliJIdea IDE will be supported in a later timeframe.
- New enhanced WebLogic Maven Plug-in See the various new options below in this scheme
UKOUG 2011: Using your Database as a Fileserver
Nov 21st
UKOUG 2011 is nearby and one of the coolest things in Oracle 11g and onwards is, IMHO, a functionality called XDB Repository Events. Most of you probably know that based on XMLDB functionality in the database, the database also can be used in a File server kind of way by enabling the XDB Repository HTTP/FTP or WebDav functionality via DBMS_XDB. XDB Repository Events are a kind of “triggers” that enable you to automatically trigger/do something based on the events triggered in this file/folder environment. For example, it is possible to automatically create duplicate files in the XDB Repository or secure them. Other possibilities are to read the content of such a file and insert that content, on the fly during the copy/paste action, into a relational table.
Most APEX enthousiast know of the PL/SQL Gateway, which is a small part of the functionality that is called the XDB Protocol Listener. Besides PL/SQL support, it also enables you to secure your data, as mentioned, trigger actions based, for example on MIME type, mount your database as a Logical Volume (currently only via WebDAV, eg. DAVFS) of your operating system. The XDB Protocol Listener can support your own solutions based on PL/SQL (like REST WebServices), but also C or Java based methods, and, out-of-the-box, Native Database Web Services (SOAP support) or direct XML content access via other “servlets” like the “ORADB/DBUriServlet” servlet method.
Oracle WebLogic 12c has been announced
Nov 18th
Yesterday I received the announcement of the new Oracle WebLogic 12c, on the 1st of December 2012. You can register for a webcast on
So, what’s there to be expected. Personally I think WebLogic has been made Exalogic ready, according to Mike Lehmann, Director of Product Management for Oracle WebLogic.
Some of the few features I expect:
More Exalogic features like:
- Parallel muxers with Java NIO APIs for low-level I/O based operations
- An optimized work scheduler providing improvements to the Increment Advisor used to manage the size of WebLogic Server’s Self-Tuning Thread Pool
- “Lazy” de-serialization of session data on the replica server until required.
- Multiple replication channels for synchronous in-memory session replication between servers in a WebLogic cluster
- Adjustments for supporting the Infiniband and SDP
Furthermore: Java EE 6 (finally!), GridLink for RAC, Oracle Traffic Director, Oracle Virtual Assembly Builder plus tight integration with Enterprise Manager Console 12c. The Administration console will stil be there to server earlier BEA customers.
Timeouts in Oracle SOA Suite 11g
Nov 18th
Some time ago… at a Oracle SOA 11g project, we had to call an external webservice which took 1 to 5 minutes to respond. The composite calling this webservice was called by another composite from a BPEL process. As you might guess, we got an timeout resulting in faulted instances.
Increasing the timeout time wasn’t as easy as I expected, because it’s not one timeout setting that had to be increased, but a total of five timeout settings! To document this for myself in case I run into it again and to help others with the same problem I’ve written it down in this blogpost.
Read the rest of this entry »
Some WebLogic Administration Essentialsbook reviews
Nov 10th
Some people were asked to review my book, here are some links:
- Edwin Biemond
- Jurgen Kress
- Markus Eisele
http://blog.eisele.net/2011/11/review-oracle-weblogic-server-11gr1-ps2.html
- Frank Muntz
Oracle Tuxedo… A renewed acquaintance
Oct 27th
Years ago, when I worked as an Application Support Analyst for a big triple-A Bank, I got acquainted with the BEA product stack.
One of those products was BEA Tuxedo, at that time at the release of 6. I worked at a settlements project, and Tuxedo was used for as distributed transaction processing, to process settlements an clearing messageg from the bank to an international Clearing an Settlements Project, called CLS. It used the SWIFT network to connect; CLS was an international and timezone independent settlements and clearance platform to overcome timezone and bankrupt issues, and prevent a domino effect when an important bank in the chain becomes bankrupt.
Tuxedo is a transaction processing system or transaction-oriented middleware, or enterprise application server for a variety of systems and programming languages.
Tuxedo was designed for high availability and to provide scalable applications to support a lot transactions per second on commonly available distributed systems. It was developed and designed by AT&T if that required online transaction processing (OLTP) capabilities.
Tuxedo is a message routing and queuing system. Requests are sent to named services and Tuxedo uses memory based inter-process communication facilities to queue the requests to servers. The requester is unaware of where the server that actually processes the request is located or how it is implemented. In fact, Tuxedo was already implementing the SOA, in the early days before even the concept of SOA was familiair to any one.
Oracle acquired it in 2008, along with all other products from the BEA stack. I was really curious how Oracle would position this product, but during Oracle OpenWorld 2011 it became clear to me.
Oracle Tuxedo 12c will be part of the new Exabus stack, a component embedded in the Exalogic solution Oracle launched some earlier.
In this picture, you can see the position of the Exabus stack and in particular Tuxedo:
How to switch datafiles to FRA and back again
Oct 14th
If you, like me, like to use (rman) incrementally updated backups, a copy of all datafiles will be present in the Fast Recovery Area. That becomes quite handy if you are in sudden need of extra disk space for your database, and the FRA still has ample space left. By switching one or more datafiles to the copy in FRA, you can very quickly use this extra disk space for your database, while not even having to shut down.
I developed a view to generate all the rman commands to execute the switch to FRA, and the switch back to it’s original location and name. Use it at your own discretion.
CREATE OR REPLACE FORCE VIEW rman_switch_datafiles
AS
SELECT tablespace_name
, file_name
, file_id
, '================================================'||chr(10)
||' switch datafile '||file_id||' to copy in FRA '||chr(10)
||'================================================'||chr(10)
||'run'||chr(10)
||'{'||chr(10)
||'sql ''alter tablespace '||tablespace_name||' offline'';' ||chr(10)
||'switch datafile '||file_id||' to copy;' ||chr(10)
||'recover datafile '||file_id||';' ||chr(10)
||'sql ''alter tablespace '||tablespace_name||' online'';'||chr(10)
||'}'||chr(10) rman_switch2copy
, '========================================================='||chr(10)
||' switch datafile '||file_id||' in FRA back to original '||chr(10)
||'========================================================='||chr(10)
||'run'||chr(10)
||'{'||chr(10)
||'backup as copy datafile '||file_id||' format '''||file_name||''';'||chr(10)
||'sql ''alter tablespace '||tablespace_name||' offline'';' ||chr(10)
||'switch datafile '||file_id||' to copy;' ||chr(10)
||'recover datafile '||file_id||';' ||chr(10)
||'sql ''alter tablespace '||tablespace_name||' online'';' ||chr(10)
||'}'||chr(10) rman_switchback2original
FROM dba_data_files
WHERE tablespace_name IN ( select tablespace_name
from dba_tablespaces
where contents = 'PERMANENT'
AND TABLESPACE_NAME != 'SYSTEM' )
ORDER BY 1,2,3
/
One remark… if a datafile is switched to the FRA copy, your controlfile is updated , and the original path and filename is lost. So, before switching the datafile to FRA, it’s prudent to save the ‘back to original” stat.
OOW 2011 – Oracle Enterprise Manager Cloud Control 12c
Oct 4th
After a long wait Oracle Enterprise Manager 12c, aka Oracle Enterprise Manager Cloud Control 12c is about to make it’s appearance. You can find information about the EM12c environment via following this link: http://www.oracle.com/technetwork/oem/grid-control/overview/index.html
This will not only bring you to the documentation and download URL’s but also to some ELearning YouTub movies that demonstrate some functionality like, Active Session History Analytics, Real Time ADDM, how to manage and view Coherence, SOA environments, Identity management and Database Cloud Self Service Portal demonstrations (see demos on demand link). In all Oracle Enterprise Manager Cloud Control 12c has become the overall “Red Stack” configuration and management tool for all Oracle products.
The direct link to this is (you will need an OTN login account):
Enterprise Manager 12c webcasts
Some first glance pictures here (via YouTube Oracle E-Learning):
Click picture to enlarge
ADF 11g R2 : Using the ActiveRowKey property
Aug 31st
In ADF 11g Release 2, the ADF Table component has a property called ‘ActiveRowKey’. According to documentation, this represents the row that is currently active on the client. In click-to-edit mode, the active row will be made editable and is brought into view (if not already visible). Upon initial display, the click-to-edit component defaults the active row to the first visible row. In this post I will show you how to use the activeRowKey programmatic Read the rest of this entry »
