Oracle Trainer

The map first, then the internals. Where the database, Oracle Linux, OCI, middleware and applications sit relative to each other, followed by the instance architecture every later module depends on: memory structures, background processes, the physical and logical storage hierarchy, and multitenant containers.

Topics: Portfolio map: database, Linux, OCI, middleware, applications · Instance architecture: SGA, PGA and background processes · Datafiles, control files, redo logs and the tablespace hierarchy · Multitenant: CDB, PDB, cloning and relocation · Startup and shutdown states and what each allows · Undo, redo and read consistency · Licensing shapes that drive architecture decisions

• Assignments: (1) Create a CDB with two PDBs and clone one between them; (2) Trace a transaction from SQL through redo to datafile
• Capstone: Document the architecture of an existing database including its failure domains

Day-to-day database administration done properly. Storage management, users and privileges, the parameter files that decide behaviour, auditing, and the maintenance jobs that quietly keep a database healthy — plus the ones that quietly cause outages when they run at the wrong time.

Topics: Tablespace and datafile management, autoextend and resize · Users, roles, privileges and profiles · SPFILE, PFILE and parameter scope · Automatic maintenance tasks and the scheduler · Auditing: unified audit trail and policy design · Character sets, NLS and the mistakes that are hard to reverse · Patching: RU, RUR and out-of-place patching strategy

• Assignments: (1) Design a privilege model for three application accounts with least privilege; (2) Apply a release update out-of-place and roll it back
• Capstone: Write an administration runbook for a production database with named owners

The module that justifies the job. RMAN configuration and the recovery catalog, incremental strategies, the fast recovery area, and then the restore scenarios rehearsed in order of increasing stress — lost datafile, lost control file, lost SPFILE, complete media loss, and recovery to a point in time before a bad change.

Topics: RMAN configuration, channels and the recovery catalog · Full, incremental and block-change-tracking backups · Fast recovery area sizing and retention policies · Restore and recover: datafile, tablespace, control file, SPFILE · Point-in-time recovery and tablespace point-in-time recovery · Flashback Database, Flashback Table and restore points · Backup validation, preview and restore testing discipline · Duplicating a database for a test environment

• Assignments: (1) Recover from a deliberately deleted datafile with the database open; (2) Perform a point-in-time recovery to undo a bad DML change
• Capstone: Prove a documented RTO and RPO by executing a full loss-of-server recovery

Keeping the database up when the machine underneath is not. Data Guard architecture, protection modes and the redo transport that determines data loss, then switchover and failover as rehearsed operations. Then Real Application Clusters: Grid Infrastructure, ASM, interconnect, services and the diagnosis of node eviction.

Topics: Data Guard architecture: physical, logical and snapshot standby · Protection modes and redo transport: sync, async, far sync · Switchover, failover, reinstatement and the Broker · Active Data Guard and read-only offloading · Grid Infrastructure, Clusterware and ASM disk groups · RAC services, load balancing and connection failover · Node eviction: causes, evidence and diagnosis · Rolling patching across a cluster

• Assignments: (1) Perform a switchover and a failover, then reinstate the old primary; (2) Diagnose a node eviction from cluster and OS logs
• Capstone: Design and prove a high-availability topology meeting a stated RPO of near zero

Method before tools. Finding where time is actually spent using the wait interface, AWR and ASH, then reading execution plans properly — cardinality estimates, join methods, access paths — and changing the right thing: statistics, indexes, SQL, or the plan itself through baselines.

Topics: The wait interface and time model · AWR reports: reading them in the right order · Active Session History for short-lived problems · Execution plans: access paths, join methods, cardinality misses · Optimizer statistics, histograms and stale statistics · SQL Plan Management, baselines and plan stability · Indexing strategy and when an index makes things worse · Real-Time SQL Monitoring for long-running statements

• Assignments: (1) Take a slow report from minutes to seconds using evidence, not guesswork; (2) Stabilise a plan that flips between two shapes using a baseline
• Capstone: Deliver a tuning report on a real workload with before-and-after measurements

The host underneath. Oracle Linux and the Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel, kernel parameters and huge pages that the database genuinely needs, storage and multipathing, Ksplice for patching without reboot, and Enterprise Manager Cloud Control for fleet-wide monitoring and job automation.

Topics: Oracle Linux, UEK and dnf/yum repository management · Kernel parameters, huge pages and memory configuration for Oracle · Storage, multipathing, udev rules and ASM device preparation · Ksplice and patching without downtime · Enterprise Manager Cloud Control architecture and agents · Targets, metrics, incident rules and blackouts · EM jobs, compliance standards and reporting

• Assignments: (1) Prepare a host correctly for a database install using huge pages; (2) Build an EM incident rule that pages only on real conditions
• Capstone: Onboard a fleet of databases into Enterprise Manager with tuned alerting

Oracle Cloud Infrastructure as an engineer uses it. The compartment model and the IAM policy language that is unlike other clouds, VCN design with security lists and network security groups, gateways and routing, compute and storage options, and the managed database services.

Topics: Tenancy, compartments, and the IAM policy language · Users, groups, dynamic groups and instance principals · VCN, subnets, route tables, security lists and NSGs · Internet, NAT, service and dynamic routing gateways · Compute shapes, images and instance configurations · Block, object and file storage, and lifecycle policies · Base Database, Exadata Cloud Service and Autonomous Database · Vault, secrets and key management

• Assignments: (1) Write IAM policies that give a team exactly the access it needs, no more; (2) Build a VCN with private database subnets and a working service gateway
• Capstone: Design an OCI landing area for one production and two non-production environments

Making the cloud reproducible and moving workloads onto it. Resource Manager and the Terraform oci provider, OKE for containers, the OCI DevOps service, then migration routes for existing databases — Data Pump, GoldenGate, RMAN duplication, ZDM — and the middleware that comes along with them.

Topics: Resource Manager stacks and the Terraform oci provider · OCI CLI, SDKs and instance-principal authentication · OKE clusters, node pools and OCI-native ingress · OCI DevOps service and build pipelines · Migration paths: Data Pump, transportable tablespaces, RMAN, ZDM · GoldenGate for near-zero-downtime migration and replication · WebLogic Server on OCI and Fusion Middleware placement · MySQL HeatWave and Autonomous for analytics workloads

• Assignments: (1) Provision a full environment through a Resource Manager stack; (2) Migrate a database to OCI with GoldenGate keeping the source live
• Capstone: Deliver a migration plan and executed cutover rehearsal with a rollback path

The applications track, for teams whose Oracle work is CPQ rather than infrastructure. Product configuration with parts, attributes and rules; the commerce process with steps, participant profiles and approval sequences; BML scripting; Document Designer for quote output; and the integration surface back to Sales Cloud and downstream systems.

Topics: Configuration: parts, data tables, attributes, rules and library functions · Configuration layouts and recommendation, constraint and hiding rules · Commerce overview: the difference between quote and line level · Process invocation rules, process manager and data columns · Commerce flow, commerce actions and configuration round-tripping · Workflow steps, participant profiles, transition rules and approval sequences · Formulas, printer-friendly and XSL views · Document Designer: XSL snippets, loops, conditions, PDF merge, multi-language, DOCX · Email Designer and generated correspondence · BML: coding practices, troubleshooting and transaction locking · Performance best practices and migration between environments · Style sheets and JavaScript: enabling CSS and scripted UI behaviour · Integrations: integration centre, Sales Cloud to CPQ, part and commerce integration · Web services: SOAP and REST APIs, JSON objects and testing with Postman · Implementations with BOM and ABO

• Assignments: (1) Build a configuration model with attributes, rules and a working layout; (2) Generate a multi-language quote document from a commerce transaction
• Capstone: Deliver a working quote-to-document flow with approvals and a Sales Cloud integration