Installation of Oracle SOA 10.1.3.4 on Weblogic 9.2: Part 1

Oracle SOA suite 10.1.3.4 installer has been traditionally available with Oracle Application Server. Post BEA acquisition Oracle has been trying to run most of its products on Weblogic and SOA suite 10g is no different. I will be writing about all the steps and related issues for installing Oracle SOA 10.1.3.4 with Weblogic 9.2.

We will start with single server installation. In the coming forth posts I will be talking about Oracle SOA 10.1.3.4 on Weblogic High Availability/Clustered installations. Though the install guide for Oracle SOA/ Weblogic 9.2 is available ,the guide does not mention certain patch numbers and steps. I would try to jot down all those missing steps too. Also I will be discussing some issues we faced during installation.


In order to install Oracle SOA suite 10.1.3.4 on Weblogic 9.2 MP3 we basically need to follow the below steps:

1. Creation of SOA related schemas on Database
2. Installation of Oracle SOA Suite Basic 10.1.3.1.0 for OC4J
3. Upgrade of Oracle SOA suite 10.1.3.1.0 to 10.1.3.4.0 version
4. Installation of Weblogic server 9.2 MP3
5. Configuring Oracle SOA suite on Weblogic 9.2 MP3
6. Installation of latest MLR patch
7. Verification of Installation

Let me discuss all these steps in detail:

1. Creation of SOA related schemas on Database.

The database used by SOA suite is also known as Dehydration store. The database stores schemas related to SOA suite. The major schemas stored are orabpel, oraesb, orabpel etc. In case of AIA Foundation pack installation the database would also store the aia schema.

- In order to install SOA suite a 10g R2 database needs to be in place.(For other versions check the certification matrix on metalink).

- Install the database and make sure you configure the listener. The listener should be up and running without issues and so should be the database.

- You should have details like hostname for the Database, Database listener port and Database SID

- Create a user with dba privileges or else you can use the sys user. In case you are using sys user make sure you procure the password from the DBAs

- Once you are ready with all the database related prerequisites as mentioned above its time to create the SOA related schemas in the database.

- For this we need to run the irca.sh file that is provided along with the SOA installer itself.

- The file can be found in /install/soa_schemas/irca/ location where is the directory you get after unzipping the SOA Installer that you have downloaded from oracle site.

- Go to the /install/soa_schemas/irca/ loacation and run the schema creation script ./irca.sh

- The installer would prompt for DB info like hostname for the Database, Database listener port ,Database SID, user with DBA priviledges and its password.Enter the required info and proceed.

- The script then would create the orabpel/oraesb/orawsm schemas and also would prompt you to assign the passwords for the schemas formed. Make sure you remember/store the passwords for future use. That’s very important!

- Now the Database configuration is complete and you are ready to start SOA installation.

- Sample irca script run:

[soauser@myappserver irca]$ pwd
/u01/software/install/soa_schemas/irca
[soauser@myserver irca]$./irca.sh
Integration Repository Creation Assistant (IRCA) 10.1.3.1.0
(c) Copyright 2006 Oracle Corporation. All rights reserved.

Enter database "host port serviceName" [localhost 1521 orcl]: mydbserver.learnoracle.com 1525 aia
Enter sys password:
Running IRCA for all product(s):
connection=" mydbserver.learnoracle.com 1525 aia", , orabpelUser=ORABPEL, esbUser=ORAESB, orawsmUser=ORAWSM

Validating database ...
Validating database character set ...


Running prerequisite checks for ORABPEL ...
Enter password for ORABPEL:
Loading ORABPEL schema (this may take a few minutes) ...


Running prerequisite checks for ORAESB ...
Enter password for ORAESB:
Loading ORAESB schema (this may take a few minutes) ...

Running prerequisite checks for ORAWSM ...
Enter password for ORAWSM:
Loading ORAWSM schema (this may take a few minutes) ...


INFO: ORABPEL schema contains 225 valid objects.


INFO: ORAESB schema contains 180 valid objects.


INFO: ORAWSM schema contains 90 valid objects.


IRCA completed.
Please check for any ERROR message above and also check the log file
irca2009-10-08_01-56-29PM.log for any error or other information.


Passwords:
- ORABPEL : xxxxxx
- ORAESB : xxxxxx
- ORAWSM : xxxxxx
-

- Incase you need to change/reset the SOA schema password please follow the below link:
http://onlineappsdba.com/index.php/2009/04/14/how-to-reset-orabpel-oraesb-password-in-soa-suite-1013x/

- In case you need to re install the SOA suite again on the same DB, make sure you re run the irca.sh script again. This will overwrite the existing SOA schemas and form new ones.


2. Installation of Oracle SOA Suite Basic 10.1.3.1.0 for OC4J:

Now we are ready to start the installation of Oracle SOA Suite Basic 10.1.3.1.0 for OC4J. For newbies this term can be quite confusing. Let me explain

Oracle SOA Suite comes with two install options Basic and advanced.

We have to choose the Basic Install option which is a mandatory requirement if you intend to install SOA on Weblogic Application Server.

DO NOT CHOSE ADVANCED INSTALL:

The following components are installed during the Basic Installation


1. Oracle Containers for J2EE
This component provides a complete Java 2 Enterprise Edition (J2EE) environment for developing Java applications.


2. Oracle SOA Suite
This component provides Oracle SOA Suite, which enables services to be created, managed, and orchestrated into composite applications and business processes. Oracle SOA Suite includes Oracle BPEL Process Manager, Oracle Enterprise Service Bus (ESB), Oracle Web Services Manager (OWSM), and Oracle Business Rules.


3. Oracle Enterprise Manager 10g Application Server Control
This component is used for Web-based management of Oracle Application Server.


4. Oracle Process Manager and Notification Server
This component provides process control and monitoring for Oracle Application Server instances and their components.


5. OC4J Java Single Sign-On
This component allows users to log in to all SSO-based applications with a single username and password.

Installation of SOA suite:

The installations of SOA suite 10.1.3.1.0 is pretty straight and for instructions please refer to the install guide from Oracle. Make sure you choose the basic install.

Common issues during SOA suite Install:

On some platforms like Linux 5.4 one might encounter problems like prerequisite check failed. In order to resolve this proceed with following steps:

1. Run the pre-check manually
./runInstaller -executeSysPrereqs

2.Run the installer in ignore Warnings mode because of the Linux OS version – 5.4 is not known by the installer.
./runInstaller –ignoreSysPrereqs

Validation of Installed SOA:

Once you have successfully installed SOA suite 10.3.1.0 Basic you can check the following urls:

Enterprise Manager Console: http://:8888/em
BPEL Console: http://:8888/BPELConsole
ESB Console : http://:8888/esb

- Here is the hostname of the machine where you have installed SOA application. For eg: myappserver.learnoracle.com
- 8888 is the default port used by SOA suite.

Once you are done with all these steps its time to upgrade the SOA to 10.1.3.4.0 version.


3. Upgrade of Oracle SOA suite 10.1.3.1.0 to 10.1.3.4.0 version

Upgrade of SOA suite can be done by application of patch # 7272722.This patch is applied through Oracle Universal Installer (GUI).The process consists of two steps:

1. Upgrade of SOA schemas in the database:
Before applying the upgrade patch make sure you upgrade the BPEL and ESB schemas present in the database. This can be done using SQL scripts provided along with the 7272722 upgrade patch.

1. Shutdown the SOA application (Go to $SOA_HOME/opmn/bin directory and issue the command ./opmnctl stopall)

2. Login to the database as orabpel user and run the script <7272722_Upgrade_Patch>/Disk1/install/soa_schema_upgrade/bpel/scripts/upgrade_10131_10134_oracle.sql

3. Now logout of the database

4. Login to the database as oraesb user and execute the sql script <7272722_Upgrade_Patch>/Disk1/install/soa_schema_upgrade/esb/sql/oracle/ upgrade_10133_10134_oracle.sql

5. Schema upgrade is complete.

6. If you miss this step and upgrade the SOA application you will not be able to access the BPEL screen. If you have such an issue simply shut down the SOA application and run the upgrade scripts as mentioned above. Restart the application and check the logins.

2. Upgrade the SOA Application by applying patch 7272722

Application of upgrade patch is quite straight forward. Please refer to the readme provided with the patch. In case you require the screen shots please mail me for it.

Here we complete our session on Steps to install Oracle SOA 10.1.3.4 on Weblogic 9.2: Part 1 . In the next part we will be covering important topics like


- Installation of Weblogic server 9.2 MP3
- Configuring Oracle SOA suite on Weblogic 9.2 MP3
- Installation of latest MLR patch
- Verification of Installation


Stay tuned….and Happy Learning :-)

Soumya...

Why try fitting in when Iam born to stand apart...!!!