Applying Oracle Enterprise Manager 13.4 RU 8

Oracle Enterprise Manager (EM) Release Update (RU) 8 for 13.4 version was released at the end of last month. Follow the link below to find out what’s included in this RU.



In this post, I want to show you how to apply this RU to your Oracle Enterprise Manager environment.

Let me start by describing the environment that I’m using for this. Oracle Enterprise Manager 13.4 can be deployed both on-premises or in the Oracle Cloud (OCI). Oracle Enterprise Manager 13.4 is available in the OCI’s Marketplace. You have the ability to choose from both single-instance and multi-node EM deployment. This makes the process really straightforward and you can have an environment up and running with couple of clicks.



For this example I’m going to be using the on-premises option. This means that Oracle EM 13.4 is also available for download as a VirtualBox image. This image comes as a single-instance EM deployment. Is worth to mention that this image is not recommended for anything but for testing.



I assigned 16 Gb of RAM and 2 virtual CPUs to this VirtualBox VM. Follow the instructions in the README file and start your environment. I also downloaded patch 32071974 from MOS Doc ID 2647078.1

For this RU, there are specific instructions about OPatch and OMSPatcher that we need to take attention to. The first one is that we need to upgrade OPatch and immediately after that apply the RU. If you are not planning to apply RU8 right away the advice is not to upgrade OPatch as the MOS note mentions that it may disrupt the environment.

Go ahead and download patch 28186730. Unzip the patch file into an staging area and execute the OPatch upgrade tool. Be sure that you have a valid backup of both, the Oracle Home and the EM configuration (export config).

$ $ORACLE_HOME/oracle_common/jdk/bin/java -jar /home/oracle/patches/6880880/opatch_generic.jar -silent oracle_home=$ORACLE_HOME
Launcher log file is /tmp/OraInstall2020-12-07_04-35-38PM/launcher2020-12-07_04-35-38PM.log.
Extracting the installer . . . . Done
Checking if CPU speed is above 300 MHz.   Actual 2245.782 MHz    Passed
Checking swap space: must be greater than 512 MB.   Actual 17151 MB    Passed
Checking if this platform requires a 64-bit JVM.   Actual 64    Passed (64-bit not required)
Checking temp space: must be greater than 300 MB.   Actual 25737 MB    Passed
Preparing to launch the Oracle Universal Installer from /tmp/OraInstall2020-12-07_04-35-38PM
Installation Summary


Disk Space : Required 34 MB, Available 37,853 MB
Feature Sets to Install:
        Next Generation Install Core 13.9.4.0.1
        OPatch 13.9.4.2.5
        OPatch Auto OPlan 13.9.4.2.5
Session log file is /tmp/OraInstall2020-12-07_04-35-38PM/install2020-12-07_04-35-38PM.log

Loading products list. Please wait.
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Updating Libraries



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Install pending
...
Saving the inventory oracle.glcm.opatch.common.api.classpath

The install operation completed successfully.

Logs successfully copied to /u01/app/oraInventory/logs.

Now is time to upgrade OMSPatcher to the latest version. Follow the instructions from MOS Doc ID 2646080.1.

$ omspatcher version
OMSPatcher Version: 13.9.4.4.0
OPlan Version: 12.2.0.1.16
OsysModel build: Tue Nov 03 18:16:07 PST 2020

OMSPatcher succeeded.

After that, you will be ready to start patching.

Let’s now go to the directory where we are staging our patch and execute the OMSPatcher analyze command. For this RU, I downloaded patch 32071974 and extracted into a staging directory in the server.

$ omspatcher apply -analyze
OMSPatcher Automation Tool
Copyright (c) 2017, Oracle Corporation.  All rights reserved.


OMSPatcher version : 13.9.4.4.0
OUI version        : 13.9.4.0.0
Running from       : /u01/app/oracle/product/em134/middleware
Log file location  : /u01/app/oracle/product/em134/middleware/cfgtoollogs/omspatcher/opatch2020-12-07_16-49-21PM_1.log

OMSPatcher log file: /u01/app/oracle/product/em134/middleware/cfgtoollogs/omspatcher/32071974/omspatcher_2020-12-07_16-49-26PM_analyze.log

...

OMSPatcher Session completed with warnings.
Log file location: /u01/app/oracle/product/em134/middleware/cfgtoollogs/omspatcher/32071974/omspatcher_2020-12-07_16-49-26PM_analyze.log

OMSPatcher completed with warnings.

Those warnings are expected as I don’t have some of those plug-ins deployed in this environment.

After you validate that there are no conflicts. Proceed to shutdown the Oracle Management Service (OMS).

$ emctl stop oms
Oracle Enterprise Manager Cloud Control 13c Release 4
Copyright (c) 1996, 2020 Oracle Corporation.  All rights reserved.
Stopping Oracle Management Server...
Oracle Management Server Successfully Stopped
Oracle Management Server is Down
JVMD Engine is Down

And now let’s execute the OMSPatcher command to apply the RU patch.

$ omspatcher apply
OMSPatcher Automation Tool
Copyright (c) 2017, Oracle Corporation.  All rights reserved.


OMSPatcher version : 13.9.4.4.0
OUI version        : 13.9.4.0.0
Running from       : /u01/app/oracle/product/em134/middleware
Log file location  : /u01/app/oracle/product/em134/middleware/cfgtoollogs/omspatcher/opatch2020-12-07_16-52-59PM_1.log

OMSPatcher log file: /u01/app/oracle/product/em134/middleware/cfgtoollogs/omspatcher/32071974/omspatcher_2020-12-07_16-53-05PM_deploy.log

...

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The following warnings have occurred during OPatch execution:
1)  Sub-patch "31812958" skipped as it is already been applied to the OMS system.
2)  Could not apply the patch "31802583" because the "oracle.sysman.vt.oms.plugin with version 13.4.1.0.0" core component of the OMS or the plug-in for which the patch is intended is either not deployed or deployed with another version in your Enterprise Manager system.
3)  Could not apply the patch "31894733" because the "oracle.sysman.am.oms.plugin with version 13.4.1.0.0" core component of the OMS or the plug-in for which the patch is intended is either not deployed or deployed with another version in your Enterprise Manager system.
4)  Could not apply the patch "30851102" because the "oracle.sysman.vi.oms.plugin with version 13.4.1.0.0" core component of the OMS or the plug-in for which the patch is intended is either not deployed or deployed with another version in your Enterprise Manager system.
5)  Could not apply the patch "31894749" because the "oracle.sysman.bda.oms.plugin with version 13.4.1.0.0" core component of the OMS or the plug-in for which the patch is intended is either not deployed or deployed with another version in your Enterprise Manager system.
6)  Could not apply the patch "31894832" because the "oracle.sysman.ssa.oms.plugin with version 13.4.1.0.0" core component of the OMS or the plug-in for which the patch is intended is either not deployed or deployed with another version in your Enterprise Manager system.
7)  Could not apply the patch "31894720" because the "oracle.sysman.emfa.oms.plugin with version 13.4.1.0.0" core component of the OMS or the plug-in for which the patch is intended is either not deployed or deployed with another version in your Enterprise Manager system.
8)  Could not apply the patch "31889317" because the "oracle.sysman.csm.oms.plugin with version 13.4.1.0.0" core component of the OMS or the plug-in for which the patch is intended is either not deployed or deployed with another version in your Enterprise Manager system.
9)  Could not apply the patch "31802539" because the "oracle.sysman.smf.oms.plugin with version 13.4.1.0.0" core component of the OMS or the plug-in for which the patch is intended is either not deployed or deployed with another version in your Enterprise Manager system.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
OMSPatcher Session completed with warnings.
Log file location: /u01/app/oracle/product/em134/middleware/cfgtoollogs/omspatcher/32071974/omspatcher_2020-12-07_16-53-05PM_deploy.log

OMSPatcher completed with warnings.

Verify the output of OMSPatcher. Let’s start the OMS.

$ emctl start oms
Oracle Enterprise Manager Cloud Control 13c Release 4
Copyright (c) 1996, 2020 Oracle Corporation.  All rights reserved.
Starting Oracle Management Server...
WebTier Successfully Started
Oracle Management Server Successfully Started
Oracle Management Server is Up
JVMD Engine is Up
Starting BI Publisher Server ...
BI Publisher Server Already Started
BI Publisher Server is Up

Login now to the OEM console and verify that EM is showing the latest RU.

Happy patching,
Alfredo

Adobe Flash End-Of-Life and Oracle Enterprise Manager

Adobe announced the End-Of-Life (EOL) for the Flash technology and this is happening December 31, 2020. As a result, most of the popular Web browsers also announced that Flash will be blocked the same day.

I’ve been blogging about this for more than a year now, explaining how this impacts Oracle Enterprise Manager’s (EM) database performance pages.



If you are running EM on versions 13.3.1.0 and below you should upgrade now before browsers can’t display the database performance graphs.

After you upgrade to 13.3.2.0 (13.3 PG) or higher (13.4 is the recommended version), you have to get familiar with the fact that the Top Activity page has been deprecated. I also blogged about this last year.



If you are considering upgrading to Oracle EM 13.4, also consider applying the latest Release Update (RU), at the time of this blog RU8 is the latest one. Take a look at MOS Doc ID 2647078.1.

I recommend you take a look at the November Advisor Webcast for Oracle Enterprise Manager. Kurt from the Product Manager team did a great job explaining this change.

Advisor Webcast Recording: Enterprise Manager (EM) – New OEM JET Pages and Flash End Of Life held on November 19, 2020 (Doc ID 2729947.1)

Thanks,
Alfredo