Monitoring External Oracle Database in OCI

The  OCI Observability & Management (O&M) platform gives you the ability to also manage your Oracle Database targets that reside on-premise or hosted on an external platform to OCI.

In order to deploy this, please ensure you have met the prerequisites:

• Install the O&M Management Agent
• Enable the Services for Agent Plugin :
  1. DB Management
     –  lifecycle database management capabilities for monitoring, performance management, tuning, and administration
  2. Operations Insights
     – analyze and forecast database performance and resource consumption

There are 2 Types of Deployments are available that can be Registered as External Databases

• Option 1: Multitenant Architecture – Register Container Databases (CDB) and Pluggable Databases (PDB)
• Option 2: Non-Multitenant Architecture – Register Non-Container Database (NCDB)

In this example we will show you how to register for:

Option 1: External Databases for the Multitenant Architecture.

1 – REGISTER EXTERNAL DATABASE – CONTAINER DATABASE

1. Login to OCI Console and navigate to:
ORACLE DATABASE > EXTERNAL DATABASE

2. Then select CONTAINER DATABASE > REGISTER EXTERNAL CONTAINER DATABASE

3. Then Specify the following inputs and click on REGISTER

• Compartment to deploy External Database
• Display Name for the Container Database

4. The External Container Database (ECD) entity has now been created.

5. Login to the database host where External Container Database resides to confirm:

• Service name and Port to connect to External Container Database (ECD)
• Pluggable Databases (PDB) are in READ WRITE mode.
• DBSNMP user account is active (and not locked)

emrep:oracle@emcc:~> lsnrctl status |egrep "PORT|Service"
Connecting to (DESCRIPTION=(ADDRESS=(PROTOCOL=TCP)(HOST=dbhost.xxx.xxx)(PORT=1521)))
  (DESCRIPTION=(ADDRESS=(PROTOCOL=tcp)(HOST=dbalias.xxx.xxx)(PORT=1521)))
Services Summary...
Service "db19c.xxx.xxx" has 1 instance(s).
Service "db19cXDB.xxx.xxx" has 1 instance(s).

emrep:oracle@emcc:~> sqlplus sys@dbhost.xxx.xxx:1521/db19c.xxx.xxx  as sysdba

SQL*Plus: Release 19.0.0.0.0 - Production on Fri Jul 9 05:07:32 2021
Version 19.10.0.0.0

Copyright (c) 1982, 2020, Oracle.  All rights reserved.

Enter password:

Connected to:
Oracle Database 19c Enterprise Edition Release 19.0.0.0.0 - Production
Version 19.10.0.0.0

SQL>


SQL> show pdbs

    CON_ID CON_NAME                       OPEN MODE  RESTRICTED
---------- ------------------------------ ---------- ----------
         2 PDB$SEED                       READ ONLY  NO
         3 OLTP_CL2                       READ WRITE NO
         4 PSAL_CL1                       READ WRITE NO

SQL> select username, account_status from dba_users where username = 'DBSNMP';

USERNAME             ACCOUNT_STATUS
-------------------- --------------------
DBSNMP               OPEN

6. Return to OCI Console and click CONNECT TO EXTERNAL CONTAINER DATABASE

7. Please specify inputs and then click on CONNECT TO EXTERNAL CONTAINER DATABASE:

• Connector Agent ID (Management Agent) in Compartment (eg. shared_resources)
• DNS Hostname or SCAN Name
• Database Port
• Service Name
• DBSNMP user account and password

8. Wait for Work Request Operation to complete and state shows as “Succeeded” and then return to EXTERNAL CONTAINER DATABASE DETAILS page

9. Then click on SCAN FOR PLUGGABLE DATABASES

10. Wait for status for Connectors to change from “Updating” to “Available”. Then under Associated Services enable the Database Management Service.

11. Verify that you have existing Oracle Database License and Support by selecting the BYOL option.

12. Wait for a min to the service to enable

13. When completed, the status will say available and Database Management service as being ENABLED.

2 – REGISTER EXTERNAL DATABASE – PLUGGABLE DATABASE

1. Login to OCI Console and navigate to:
ORACLE DATABASE > EXTERNAL DATABASE

2. Then select PLUGGABLE DATABASE > REGISTER EXTERNAL PLUGGABLE DATABASE

3. Then Specify the following inputs and click on REGISTER

• Compartment to deploy External Database
• Display Name for the Pluggable Database
• External Container Database

4. The External Pluggable Database (EPD) entity has now been created and then click CONNECT TO EXTERNAL PLUGGABLE DATABASE

5. Specify the inputs and click on CONNECT TO EXTERNAL PLUGGABLE DATABASE

6. Wait for Pluggable Database Connector to be completed.

7. Connector should be completed when status show as being available. Return to the External Pluggable Details page.

8. On the External Pluggable Databas Details page, click on ENABLE link for the Associated Services for Database Management

9. Click on ENABLE

10. Wait a minute until it completes. After Database Management has been enabled. Now click on the ENABLE link for Operations Insights

13. Click on ENABLE

14. Wait a minute until it completes. The Operations Insight service will show as being enabled.

3 – REVIEW EXTERNAL DATABASE IN DATABASE MANAGEMENT SERVICE

To verify the External Container Database and External Pluggable Databases has registered for Database.

1. For Database Management Service navigate to:

OBSERVABILITY & MANAGEMENT > DATABASE MANAGEMENT > FLEET SUMMARY

2. For Operations Insights Service navigate to:

OBSERVABILITY & MANAGEMENT > OPERATIONS INSIGHTS> CAPACITY PLANNING

This now completes the post for External Database Monitoring from OCI Observability & Management. You can also monitor database logs from Observability & Management by checking out this post.