What's New in Oracle Database 11g

The following is a list of new features or enhancements provided with Oracle Database 11g:

• New Components Available for Installation

• Changes in the Install Options

• Database Configuration Assistant

• Database Upgrade Assistant

• Active Directory Security Enhancements

• Automatic Storage Management Fast Mirror Resync

• Oracle Data Provider for .NET

• Oracle Volume Shadow Copy Service (VSS) Writer

• SYSASM Privilege for Automatic Storage Management Administration

• Automatic Maintenance Tasks Management

• Automatic Diagnostic Repository

• Enhanced Optimal Flexible Architecture

• Oracle Direct Network File System Client

• Windows Vista Support

• Deprecated Components in Oracle Database 11g Release 1 (11.1)

New Components Available for Installation

The following are the new components available while installing Oracle Database 11g:

• Oracle Application Express: This feature is installed with Oracle Database 11g. It was previously named HTML DB, and was available as a separate Companion CD component. Oracle Application Express is now installed by default with any Oracle Database 11g installation.

• Oracle Configuration Manager: This feature is offered during installation. It was previously named Customer Configuration repository (CCR). It is an optional component for database installation and can be installed with any Oracle Database 11g installation. Oracle Configuration Manager gathers and stores details relating to the configuration of the software stored in database Oracle home directories.

• Oracle Database Vault: This feature is installed with Oracle Database 11g. It is an optional component for database installation.

• Oracle Real Application Testing: This feature is installed by default with the Enterprise Edition installation type of Oracle Database 11g.

• Oracle SQL Developer: This feature is installed by default with template-based database installations, such as General Purpose/Transaction Processing, and Data Warehousing. It is also installed with database client Administrator, Runtime, and Custom installations.

• Oracle Warehouse Builder: This feature is installed with Oracle Database 11g.

  Note:

  With Standard Edition and Enterprise Edition of Oracle Database 11g Release 1, Oracle Warehouse Builder with basic features is installed. However, with Enterprise Edition, you can purchase options that extend Oracle Warehouse Builder.

Changes in the Install Options

The following are install option changes for Oracle Database 11g:

• Oracle Configuration Manager: Oracle Configuration Manager is integrated with Oracle Universal Installer. However, it is an optional component for database installation and can be installed with any Oracle Database 11g installation.

• Oracle Data Mining: Enterprise Edition installation type selects Oracle Database Mining option by default. In Oracle Database 11g, the Data Mining metadata is created with SYS metadata when you select the Create Database option.

• Oracle Database Vault: Oracle Database Vault is integrated with Oracle Universal Installer. However, it is an optional component with database installation. To install this product, you have to select the Custom Installation.

  To install Oracle Database Vault with Enterprise Edition, complete the Enterprise Edition installation and then perform a custom installation. Select Oracle Label Security and Oracle Database Vault, and install these products on the same Enterprise Edition database.

• Oracle HTTP Server: Starting with Oracle Database 11g, Oracle HTTP Server is available on a separate media shipped with Oracle Database. In the previous releases, this product was available as a Companion CD component.

• Oracle Ultra Search: Starting with Oracle Database 11g, Oracle Ultra Search is integrated with Oracle Database. In the previous releases, this product was available as a Companion CD component.

• Oracle XML DB: Starting with Oracle Database 11g, Oracle XML DB is no longer an optional feature. Database Configuration Assistant installs and configures it for all database installations.

Database Configuration Assistant

The following additions and enhancements are made to Database Configuration Assistant:

• Added Support to Configure New Database Options

• Automatic Memory Management

• Oracle Base and Diagnostic Destination Configuration

• Oracle Data Mining

• Secure Database Configuration

• Switching a Database from Database Control to Grid Control Configuration

Added Support to Configure New Database Options

The following options in Oracle Database 11g can be configured using Database Configuration Assistant:

• Oracle Application Express

• Oracle Database Vault

• Oracle Warehouse Builder

Automatic Memory Management

This is a new initialization parameter in Oracle Database 11g to automate the memory allocation. By default, Database Configuration Assistant now uses MEMORY_TARGET instead of specifying individual values for SGA_TARGET and PGA_AGGREGATE_TARGET. The Memory management page of Database Configuration Assistant has a new option to select automatic memory management.

Oracle Base and Diagnostic Destination Configuration

The directory that you specify when you are prompted for ORACLE_BASE by Oracle Universal Installer is stored in the Oracle home inventory. Database Configuration Assistant uses this value to derive the default database locations and the DIAGNOSTIC_DEST parameter. The diagnostic destination location contains all Automatic Diagnostic Repository directories (diagnostic files such as Alert logs and so on). Starting with Oracle Database Release 11g, the initialization parameter settings for background dump, user dump, and core dump destinations are replaced by the Diagnostic Destination.

Oracle Data Mining

In Oracle Database 11g, Data Mining metadata is created with the SYS metadata. It is created by the catproc.sql and other scripts that are run as the SYS user. You no longer configure the Data Mining option through the Database Features screen of Oracle Database Configuration Assistant.

Secure Database Configuration

Oracle Database 11g has new defaults for audit and password profiles. Database Configuration Assistant has a new screen to enable the new security settings during the database creation and existing database configuration.

If you install Oracle Database Vault when installing Oracle Database 11g, the database security settings are enabled by default.

Switching a Database from Database Control to Grid Control Configuration

In previous releases, Database Configuration Assistant contains the functionality to configure a database either with Database Control, or with Grid Control. You can configure a database either while creating it or later. However, reconfiguring a database from Database Control to Grid Control requires significant manual effort. With Oracle Database 11g, Database Configuration Assistant provides the Enterprise Manager Configuration plug-in, which automates the process to switch configuration of a database from Database Control to Grid Control.

Database Upgrade Assistant

The following additions and enhancements are made to Database Configuration Assistant:

• Command Line Option to Auto Extend System Files

• Express Edition Upgrade

• Integration with Oracle Database 11g Pre-upgrade Tool

• Moving Data Files into ASM, SAN, and Other File Systems

• Oracle Base and Diagnostic Destination Configuration

Command Line Option to Auto Extend System Files

The command line option AUTOEXTEND facilitates auto extending of the data files as a part of the upgrade. This option automatically extends the data files during the upgrade and turns the autoextend back to its original settings after the upgrade. This option is useful if there is enough space on the disk, and if you do not need to add new data files or manually increase the size of the files.

Express Edition Upgrade

For single-instance databases, Oracle Database Upgrade Assistant configuration utility enables you to upgrade from Oracle Database Express Edition (Oracle Database XE) to Oracle Database 11g. The XE database files reside under the path ORACLE_BASE\oradata\XE. These files must be copied to a new location as the user may remove the XE Home after upgrade.

Integration with Oracle Database 11g Pre-upgrade Tool

Database Upgrade Assistant uses the new pre-upgrade script for Oracle Database 11g. This script is used to estimate disk space, initialization parameters, statistics gathering, and providing feedback on possible problem areas.

Moving Data Files into ASM, SAN, and Other File Systems

You can move data files to ASM, OFS, or other storage devices, such as Storage Area Networks (SAN) and Network Area Storage (NAS), as part of the upgrade. If you move the database files during the upgrade, you can benefit from the typical downtime for this tablespace by rebalancing disks and moving files to a better storage device, such as SAN, NAS, or ASM.

Oracle Base and Diagnostic Destination Configuration

The directory that you specify when you are prompted for ORACLE_BASE by Oracle Universal Installer is stored in the Oracle home inventory. Database Upgrade Assistant uses this value to derive the default database locations and the DIAGNOSTIC_DEST parameter. The diagnostic destination location contains all ADR directories (diagnostic files, such as the alert logs, trace files, and so on). This diagnostic destination directory is required while upgrading an earlier Oracle Database release to Oracle Database 11g release of the database. If the Oracle base directory already exists, Oracle Database Upgrade Assistant automatically retrieves this information and populates its path. Starting with Oracle Database 11g Release 1, the initialization parameter settings for background dump (BACKGROUND_DUMP_DEST), user dump (USER_DUMP_DEST), and core dump (CORE_DUMP_DEST) destinations are replaced by the Diagnostic Destination (DIAGNOSTIC_DEST).

Active Directory Security Enhancements

In Oracle Database 11g Release 1, you have the option to secure the Net Services data in the Active Directory. This data is generally considered to be public, but sites with greater security needs may need to protect it. You can make the Net Services data read-protected, and allow only specified users to access the data. To enable meaningful access control, the Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) naming adapter for 11g can be configured to the require clients to authenticate to the directory during name lookup.

If you are considering implementing the authenticated Lightweight Directory Access Protocol (LDAP) name lookup in the site, then you should be aware that clients of the earlier releases cannot access Net Services, because these clients are only capable of using anonymous binds for directory name lookup.

The following are the enhancements made to secure the directory:

• Read-Access Control on Net Services

• Authenticated Bind for LDAP Naming

Read-Access Control on Net Services

Directory administrators may want to eliminate anonymous access to the Active Directory, and (or) define specific groups of people who are allowed to read Net Service data during name lookup.

At present, there are no pre-defined groups or procedures in Oracle configuration tools for defining read-access restrictions on this data. Therefore, administrators need to use standard object management tools from their directory system to manually create any necessary groups and access control lists (ACLs).

Because the access definitions for objects are complex and may involve security properties, which are inherited from parent nodes in the Directory Information Tree (DIT), Oracle recommends that administrators refer to the relevant tools and documentation for the directory system they are using, and formulate or integrate access management for Net Service objects into a directory-wide policy and security implementation.The dsacls.exe command line tool displays and changes permissions, access control entries, in the access control list (ACL) of objects in Active Directory. The dsacls command-line tool is included in Support Tools on the Oracle Database 11g product media.

Additionally, you can use ADSI EDIT. This GUI tool is a Microsoft Management Console (MMC) snap-in that acts as a low-level editor for Active Directory. Network administrators can use Active Directory Service Interfaces (ADSI) for common administrative tasks, such as adding, deleting, and moving objects with a directory service. Attributes for each object viewed can be changed or deleted. ADSI EDIT can be installed from Support Tools on product media.

Authenticated Bind for LDAP Naming

Oracle Database clients 10g or earlier cannot access Net Services and you need to install Oracle Database client 11g or later for the authentic binds. Windows clients, which use Active Directory, can be configured for authenticated binds during LDAP name lookup by adding the following parameters to their sqlnet.ora:

names.ldap_authenticate_bind= 1

The client's identity is derived from the Windows operating system and used during the directory bind to authenticate.

Automatic Storage Management Fast Mirror Resync

Automatic Storage Management fast mirror resync quickly resynchronizes Automatic Storage Management disks within a disk group after transient disk path failures, as long as the disk drive media is not corrupted. Any failures that render a failure group temporarily unavailable are considered transient failures. Disk path malfunctions, such as cable disconnections, host bus adapter or controller failures, or disk power supply interruptions, can cause transient failures. The duration of a fast mirror resync depends on the duration of the outage. The duration of a resynchronization is typically much shorter than the amount of time required to completely rebuild an entire Automatic Storage Management disk group.

Oracle Data Provider for .NET

The following enhancements have been made to Oracle Data Provider for .NET after Oracle Database 10g release 2 (10.2):

• Performance Enhancements for Oracle Database 11g Release 1 (11.1)

  The following performance enhancements have been made:

  • ODP.NET Configuration

    Developers can configure ODP.NET using configuration files, including the application config, web.config, or machine.config files. Settings in the machine.config file override the registry settings. The settings in the application config or the web.config file override the values in the machine.config.

  • Improved Parameter Context Caching

    This release enhances the existing caching infrastructure to cache ODP.NET parameter contexts. This enhancement is independent of database version and it is available for all the supported database versions. This feature provides significant performance improvement for the applications that execute the same statement repeatedly.

    This enhancement is transparent to the developer. No code changes are needed to use this feature.

  • Efficient LOB Retrieval With SecureFiles

    This release improves the performance of small-sized LOB retrieval by reducing the number of round-trips to the database. This enhancement is available only with Oracle 11g Release 1.0 or later database versions.

    This enhancement is transparent to the developer. No code changes are needed to use this feature.

• The following enhancements have been made to 10.2.0.3:

  • Starting 10.2.0.3, ODP.NET natively supports the 64-bit .NET Framework for the following 64-bit Windows platforms:

    • Windows x64 for AMD64 and Intel EM64T processors

    • 64-bit Windows for Intel Itanium

    64-bit systems enables more scalable and better performing ODP.NET applications.

  • Configuring FetchSize through the Windows registry is added to ODP.NET 10.2.0.3. This feature enables applications to specify the default result set fetch size through the registry.

  • Local Transaction Support for System.Transactions feature is added to ODP.NET 10.2.0.3. This feature enables System.Transactions to use local transactions rather than distributed transactions. This can be specified either through the registry or through a connection string attribute.

• Support for Microsoft ADO.NET 2.0 is added to ODP.NET release 10.2.0.2 and includes the following:

  • Provider Factory Classes and Base Classes

    Simplifies data access code to access multiple data sources with a provider generic API.

  • Connection String Builder

    Makes creating connections strings less error-prone and easier to manage.

  • Data Source Enumerator

    Enables the application to generically obtain a collection of the Oracle data sources that the application can connect to.

  • Support for Schema Discovery

    Permits application developers to find and return database schema information, such as tables, columns, and stored procedures.

  • System.Transactions Support

    ODP.NET supports implicit and explicit transactions using the System.Transactions namespace models.

  • Batch Processing Support

    Enables batch processing when the OracleDataAdapter.Update method is called.

Oracle Volume Shadow Copy Service (VSS) Writer

Volume Shadow Copy Service is an infrastructure on Windows 2003 platforms that enables the users to create snapshots called shadow copies. The infrastructure consists of the following components that participate in the creation of snapshots using COM interfaces:

• Requestors: These are the backup applications that initiate snapshot or restore operations, and coordinate these operations with the writers and providers.

• Writers: These are the Windows applications, such as Oracle Database, whose data composes the snapshot. Typically, writers ensure that their data is in a consistent state prior to the snapshot.

• Providers: These are the software or hardware providers, which perform the physical creation of the snapshots to disk. Providers can be software-based, such as a generic Windows filesystem provider, or hardware-based, which are specialized for a particular storage system.

The interoperability of Oracle Database as a writer with Volume Shadow Copy Service infrastructure enables frequent snapshots of the database files and their restoration with a choice of backup applications and storage systems.

When you install Oracle database 11g Release 1, Oracle Volume Shadow Copy Service Writer is installed automatically. You can also install the writer to use with the earlier releases of Oracle Database from the Oracle Database 11g Release 1 installation media.

SYSASM Privilege for Automatic Storage Management Administration

Oracle Database 11g introduces an optional system privilege, SYSASM, to secure privileges to perform Automatic Storage Management administration tasks. Oracle recommends that you use SYSASM instead of SYSDBA for Automatic Storage Management administration, to separate Automatic Storage Management administration from database administration. In a future release, Oracle may restrict access to Automatic Storage Management only to operating system users that are members of the OSASM operating system group, and require the use of SYSASM to administer Automatic Storage Management.

Automatic Maintenance Tasks Management

This feature provides out-of-the-box management of scheduling and resource allocation, such as CPU time, among the various database maintenance tasks, such as Automatic Optimizer Statistics Collection and Automatic Segment Advisor. Maintenance tasks are regulated to the extent that end-user activity gets the necessary resources to finish its work.

Automatic Diagnostic Repository

The Automatic Diagnostic Repository is a feature added to Oracle Database 11g. It is a new system managed repository for storing and organizing trace files and other error diagnostic data. The Automatic Diagnostic Repository provides a comprehensive view of the critical errors encountered by the database. This feature also enables you to maintain the relevant data needed for problem diagnostics and their eventual resolution. The Automatic Diagnostic Repository reduces the time to resolve errors and code defects. The repository is stored as a directory structure under the ADR base directory that contains the diag directory. The default location of the ADR base directory is set by DIAGNOSTIC_DEST. If the ORACLE_BASE variable is set, then the default value of DIAGNOSTIC_DEST is equal to the value of the ORACLE_BASE variable. If the value of the ORACLE_BASE variable is not set, then the default value of DIAGNOSTIC_DEST is set to ORACLE_HOME\log. However, this location can be changed by using the DIAGNOSTIC_DEST parameter of the init.ora.

Enhanced Optimal Flexible Architecture

The following enhancements are made to the Optimal Flexible Architecture in Oracle Database 11g:

• Oracle Base and Oracle Home

• Flash Recovery Area and Data File Location

Oracle Base and Oracle Home

In Oracle Database 11g, Oracle Universal Installer prompts you to specify the Oracle base. You can share this Oracle base across all of the Oracle homes you create on the system. Oracle recommends that you share an Oracle base for all of the Oracle homes created by the same user.

Oracle Universal Installer has a list box where you can edit or select the Oracle base. The installer derives the default Oracle home from the Oracle base location you provide in the list box. However, you can change the default Oracle home by editing the location.

Oracle recommends that you create the flash recovery area and data file location under Oracle base in Oracle Database 11g to make it Optimal Flexible Architecture compliant.

Flash Recovery Area and Data File Location

In Oracle Database 10g, the default locations for the flash recovery area and data files are one level above the Oracle home directory. However, in Oracle database 11g, Oracle base is the starting point to set the default locations for flash recovery and data files. However, Oracle recommends that you keep the flash recovery area and data file location on separate disks. To mount the disks you can use the following mount points for flash recovery area and data file location respectively:

ORACLE_BASE\flash_recovery_area
ORACLE_BASE\oradata

Oracle recommends you use separate disks for oradata, flash recovery, and the Oracle home.

If you install Oracle RAC, you must share flash recovery area and data file location among all the nodes.

Oracle Direct Network File System Client

This feature is implemented as a Direct Network File System (NFS) client as a part of Oracle Kernel in Oracle Disk Manager library. NAS-based storage systems use NFS to access data. In Oracle Database 10g, NAS storage devices are accessed using the operating system provided kernel NFS driver, which require specific configuration settings to ensure its efficient and correct usage with Oracle. The following are the major problems that arise in correctly specifying configuration parameters:

• NFS clients are very inconsistent across platforms and vary across operating system releases.

• The configuration parameters are difficult to tune. There are more than 20 NFS parameters and they have subtle differences across platforms.

• NFS client stack is designed for general purpose. Therefore, it contains features like file attribute management that are not required for Oracle.

• Oracle Direct NFS implements NFS version 3 protocol within the Oracle kernel.

The following are the main advantages of implementing Oracle Direct NFS client functionality in Oracle kernel:

• It enables complete control over input-output paths to network file servers, resulting in predictable performance, simplified configuration management, and superior diagnostics.

• Its operations avoid the kernel NFS layer bottlenecks and resource limitations. However, the kernel is still used for network communication modules.

• It provides a common NFS interface for Oracle for potential use on all host platforms and supported NFS servers.

• It enables improved performance through load balancing across multiple connections to NFS servers and deep pipelines of asynchronous input-output operations with improved concurrency.

Windows Vista Support

This release is supported on Windows Vista.

Deprecated Components in Oracle Database 11g Release 1 (11.1)

The following is a list of components that were part of Oracle Database 10g release 2 (10.2), and are not available for installation with Oracle Database 11g:

• iSQL*Plus

• Oracle Workflow

• Oracle Data Mining Scoring Engine

• Oracle Enterprise Manager Java console

• SQL*Plus Graphic User Interface