Changes in This Release for Oracle Database Installation Guide

New Features

• Root Scripts Automation

  Starting with Oracle Database 12c Release 1 (12.1), Oracle Universal Installer provides options to automatically run root configuration scripts required during a grid infrastructure installation. You also have the option to manually run the root configuration scripts.

  See "Determining Root Script Execution Plan"

• Oracle Flex ASM

  Oracle Flex ASM enables an Oracle ASM instance to run on a separate physical server from the database servers. Many Oracle ASM instances can be clustered to support a large number of database clients.

  Oracle Database instances can be set up as clients to Oracle Flex ASM where metadata is provided to the database instance by an Oracle Flex ASM instance that may be on a different node than the database instance.

  Note that Oracle Flex ASM can apply to a collection of databases, each one a single instance but running in a Flex ASM Cluster.

  See Oracle Automatic Storage Management Administrator's Guide for more information about Oracle Flex ASM

• Deinstallation Tool Integrated with Installation Media

  Starting with Oracle Database 12c, the deinstallation tool is integrated with the database installation media and is no longer provided on a separate installation media.

  See "About the Deinstallation Tool" and "Change for Standalone Deinstallation Tool" in Oracle Database Upgrade Guide.

• Simplified Oracle Label Security Installation

  Starting with Oracle Database 12c, Oracle Label Security is installed by default as part of the Oracle Database installation. You can no longer select Oracle Label Security as a custom component during an Enterprise Edition database installation.

  See "Configuring Oracle Label Security" and Oracle Label Security Administrator's Guide.

• Simplified Oracle Database Vault Installation

  Starting with Oracle Database 12c, Oracle Database Vault is installed by default as part of the Oracle Database installation. However, you can configure, enable, or disable Oracle Database Vault after the Oracle Database installation, either using Oracle DBCA, or by running SQL statements as described in the "Disabling and Enabling Oracle Database Vault" section in Oracle Database Vault Administrator's Guide.

  See "Registering Oracle Database Vault with an Oracle Database" in Oracle Database Vault Administrator's Guide

• Unified Database Audit Configuration

  Starting with Oracle Database 12c, you can create named audit policies. An audit policy contains a set of audit options, which is stored in the database as an object. The advantage of creating a named audit policy is that it reduces the number of commands that are required to create a database audit policy, and it simplifies the implementation of an audit configuration for security and compliance with conditional auditing.

  This new audit policy framework is included with the database installation.

  See "Auditing Activities with Unified Audit Policies and the AUDIT Statement" in Oracle Database Security Guide

• Oracle Enterprise Manager Database Express 12c

  Oracle Database 12c introduces Oracle Enterprise Manager Database Express 12c, a web-based management tool built into Oracle Database without any need for special installation or management. Using Oracle Enterprise Manager Database Express, you can perform basic administrative tasks such as user, performance, memory, and space management. You can also view performance and status information about your database.

  See "Introduction to Oracle Enterprise Manager Database Express" in Oracle Database 2 Day DBA and "Getting Started with Oracle Database"

  Note that starting with Oracle Database 12c, Oracle Enterprise Manager Database Control is no longer available. See Oracle Database Upgrade Guide for more information.

• Multiprocess and Multithreaded Oracle Database

  Starting with Oracle Database 12c, Oracle Database may use operating system threads to allow resource sharing and reduce resource consumption.

  See "Introduction to Processes" in Oracle Database Concepts.

• Support for Separation of Database Administration Duties

  Oracle Database 12c provides support for separation of database administration duties for Oracle Database by introducing task-specific and least-privileged administrative privileges that do not require the SYSDBA administrative privilege. These new privileges are: SYSBACKUP for backup and recovery, SYSDG for Oracle Data Guard, and SYSKM for encryption key management.

  See "Creating Required Operating System Groups and Users" and "Managing Administrative Privileges" in Oracle Database Security Guide.

• Oracle DBCA Support for CDBs and PDBs

  Starting with Oracle Database 12c, Oracle Database Configuration Assistant (Oracle DBCA) allows you to create a a multitenant container database (CDB) or a non-CDB. You can create the CDB with zero, one, or more user-created pluggable databases (PDBs).

  You can also create a CDB with one PDB during the database installation.

  See the "Specify Database Identifiers" screen in "Running Oracle Universal Installer", and Oracle Database Administrator's Guide.

  See "About Common Users and Local Users", "Managing Common Roles and Local Roles" and "Managing Commonly and Locally Granted Privileges" in Oracle Database Security Guide for information on users, roles, and privileges in a CDB and PDB.

• Support for NFS Version in Direct NFS Client

  Starting with Oracle Database 12c, you can specify the NFS protocol version to be used by Direct NFS Client.

  See "Enabling Direct NFS Client."

Deprecated Features

The following features are deprecated in this release, and may be desupported in a future release. See Oracle Database Upgrade Guide for a complete list of deprecated features in this release.

• Deprecation Announcement for Oracle Restart

  Oracle Restart is a feature provided as part of Oracle Grid Infrastructure. Oracle Restart monitors and can restart Oracle Database instances, Oracle Net Listeners, and Oracle ASM instances. Oracle Restart is currently restricted to manage single instance Oracle Databases and Oracle ASM instances only, and is subject to desupport in future releases. Oracle continues to provide Oracle ASM as part of the Oracle Grid Infrastructure installation for Standalone and Cluster deployments.

  See Also:

  My Oracle Support Note 1584742.1 for more information about the Oracle Restart deprecation announcement and its replacement:

  https://support.oracle.com/epmos/faces/DocumentDisplay?id=1584742.1&displayIndex=1
  

• Change for Standalone Deinstallation Tool

  The deinstallation tool is now integrated with the database installation media.

  See "Deinstallation Tool Integrated with Installation Media"

• Deprecation of -cleanupOBase

  The -cleanupOBase flag of the deinstallation tool is deprecated in this release. There is no replacement for this flag.

Desupported Features

The following features are no longer supported by Oracle. See Oracle Database Upgrade Guide for a complete list of desupported features in this release.

• Oracle Enterprise Manager Database Control

• CLEANUP_ORACLE_BASE Property Removed

Other Changes

The following are additional changes in the release:

• Document Structure Changes

  Some preinstallation tasks are redesigned into category topics. For more details, continue to read this section in its entirety, and refer to the chapters that subdivide preinstallation tasks into category topics.

• Preinstallation Task Changes

  • Fixup scripts do not replace system tuning, but they do reduce the amount of manual system configuration required for an initial deployment. For this reason, some manual tasks that fixup scripts perform are now moved to an appendix. If you choose to, see Appendix D, "How to Complete Preinstallation Tasks Manually" to continue to configure your servers manually.

  • Oracle Database, and Oracle Grid Infrastructure for a standalone server hardware and system requirements are now subdivided into category topics:

    "Configuring Servers for Oracle Database"

    "Operating System Requirements for HP-UX Itanium Systems"

    "Configuring Servers for Oracle Grid Infrastructure for a Standalone Server"

  • Configuring users, groups, and environments for Oracle Database are now moved to a separate chapter:

    Chapter 4, "Configuring Users, Groups and Environments for Oracle Database"

  • Configuring networks for Oracle Database is now moved to a separate appendix:

    Appendix E, "Configuring Networks for Oracle Database"