Patching the Oracle Software

Determining Your Oracle Database Software Environment

To select the appropriate patch set release for your environment, you need to know the following details about your Oracle environment:

• Oracle Database version

• Oracle home location

• Hardware configuration

Determining Your Oracle Database Version

You can determine your Oracle Database version at the Enterprise Manager Database Control (Database Control) Database Home page.

To determine the Oracle Database version:

• View the Version number under General on the Database Home page.

Description of the illustration general_11g.gif

Setting Your OracleMetaLink Credentials

You can obtain patches and patch sets from OracleMetaLink at the following URL:

https://metalink.oracle.com

To download patches and patch sets from OracleMetalink, you must register using your customer support identifier, which your company obtains when it signs a support contract with Oracle. When you register with OracleMetaLink, you are given a user name and password that enables you to log in to this site from a Web browser.

Before you begin using the patching features of Database Control, you must configure your OracleMetaLink credentials. After you specify your OracleMetaLink credentials, an automated process called the RefreshFromMetalink job can search OracleMetaLink every day for patches that are applicable to your installed software. You also receive notification about critical patch advisories.

To set your OracleMetaLink login credentials:

1. Click the Setup link located at the top and bottom of most Database Control pages.

   The Setup page appears.

2. Click Patching Setup.

   The Patching Setup subpage appears.

   
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3. Enter the user name and password for logging in to OracleMetaLink in the MetaLink Username and MetaLink Password fields.

4. (Optional) Enter the maximum size of your patch cache in the Patch Cache Maximum Size (MB) field.

   The patch cache is a temporary area where patches are stored. When the patch cache exceeds the specified maximum size, Database Control automatically performs a purge operation and tries to delete old patches until the patch cache is smaller than the specified maximum size.

5. Click Apply to set your OracleMetaLink credentials.

Staging and Applying Patches and Patch Sets

Applying a patch or patch set is the process of installing the staged, or locally stored, patch files in the Oracle home on the server. You must specify patching credentials before you can stage and apply a patch or patch set using Enterprise Manager.

To stage and apply patches and patch sets using the Patching wizard:

1. From the Database Home page, click Software and Support.

   The Database Instance: instance_name page appears.

   
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2. In the Database Software Patching section, select Apply Patch.

   The Select Patches page appears.

3. Click Add Patches to search for new patches to apply.

   The Search and Select Patches page appears.

   
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4. In the Search section, choose your current database release from the list of values in the Release list, for example, 11.1.0.5.0. From the Platform list choose the name that matches your installed operating system, for example, Linux x86. After you have made your selections, click Go.

   You can optionally limit your search further by choosing different values for Product Family, Product, Patch Type, and Language, and then clicking Go.

5. (Optional) Select a patch or patch set and click View to view the patch details.

6. Select a patch or patch set and start the Patching wizard by clicking Select in the top right corner of the page.

   The Select Patches page appears.

   
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7. If the patch or patch set you selected in Step 5 does not appear in the Patches table, click Add Patch and repeat the search to locate the patch. When the patch or patch set you have selected is displayed in the Patches table, click Next.

   The Credentials and Schedule page appears.

   
   Description of the illustration patch_wizard_2.gif
   
   

8. Enter the credentials for the operating system user that will perform the patching operation. If you have already configured Preferred Credentials, you can choose the Use Preferred option.

   For the Schedule Type option, use the default value of One Time (Immediately). Optionally, you can choose to schedule the patching for a later time using the One Time (Later) option. Click Next to continue.

   The Review page appears.

9. Review the information on this page. If any of the information is incorrect, you can click Back to return to a previous page and make corrections. When finished, click Finish to submit the job that patches the database.

   The Deployment Procedure Manager page appears.

   
   Description of the illustration patch_wizard_4.gif
   
   

10. (Optional) To view the progress of the recently submitted patching operation, click Patch Oracle Standalone Database.

    The Procedure Completion Status page appears.

    
    Description of the illustration patch_wizard_5.gif
    
    

    As part of the patching procedure, the database instance and Database Control are shut down and then restarted. After they have restarted, you must log in again and navigate to the Procedure Completion Status page to check the status.

11. After you have reviewed the status of each step, you can click Refresh to update the display if the procedure has not yet completed.

    When you have finished viewing the results, click Done.

12. Click the Database tab.