Re: Anyone used EMC Timefinder to replicate DB's

> hey guys -
>
> Working on some replication efforts.. And I haven't used EMC Timefinder
> to push data from one DB to another.. Are there any documents with the
> details available? I'm working on getting thru the EMC web site as well
> as metalink, but wanted to throw this out on the list since everyone is
> so helpful:-)
>
> And I'm also in too much of a hurry to RTFM:-) since I need to get
> something done by Wednesday..
>
>
> Thanks in advance!
> Greg Loughmiller
> Sr Manager - Enterprise Data Architecture
> gloughmiller (IPS)
> 678.893.3217 (office)
>

Aside from the excellent notes on the Oracle piece of it, there are some EMC-side things to remember:

-remember that whatever host you want to perform the BCV split/establish actions from needs to be able to see gatekeepers.

-The normal methodology is to create BCV groups based on functional purpose if you're not using software RAID and if you're using software RAID, make sure you match the BCV groups to the software RAID groups.

-If you're using Veritas or some other software volume manager, make absolutely sure that the BCVs are not exposed to the same host as the STD (source) volumes.

-Also, if you're using a software RAID layer atop the EMC devices (i.e. RAID-0 across EMC RAID-1 volumes), make sure you use instant splits rather than traditional splits. With traditional splits, the EMC volumes within the BCV group are separated like a zipper, which can create corruption in software RAID sets - instant splits quiesce all the volumes within the group and then split them at once.

-From a performance standpoint, while you leave the BCVs in ESTABLISHED state, the Symmetrix will use them as a third mirror for valid I/Os. Depending on the revision of microcode, I seem to recall that the BCV will be used for reads for all remaining valid tracks.

-Incremental establishes are much slower than full establishes - depending on the rate of changed data, it could actually be faster to do a full establish than an incremental. You probably want to time establishes both ways.

-Is this on a Sun server? If it is, make sure you never do a reconfigure reboot (touch /reconfigure or reboot -- -r or boot -r) while the BCVs are established. If its a Linux box, you'll need to manually reprobe the SCSI devices if you reboot during an established state. I don't know what to do on windows or any of the other UNIXes, but remember that established BCVs vanish from the SCSI channel, so avoid situations where the host is rescanning or reconfiguring while they're established.

Feel free to email me off-list if you have any other questions on any of this or if you run into any problems.

Thanks,
Matt

--
Matthew Zito
GridApp Systems
Email: mzito_at_gridapp.com
Cell: 646-220-3551
Phone: 212-358-8211 x 359
http://www.gridapp.com


-- 
Please see the official ORACLE-L FAQ: http://www.orafaq.net
-- 
Author: Matthew Zito
  INET: mzito_at_gridapp.com

Fat City Network Services    -- 858-538-5051 http://www.fatcity.com
San Diego, California        -- Mailing list and web hosting services
---------------------------------------------------------------------
To REMOVE yourself from this mailing list, send an E-Mail message
to: ListGuru_at_fatcity.com (note EXACT spelling of 'ListGuru') and in
the message BODY, include a line containing: UNSUB ORACLE-L
(or the name of mailing list you want to be removed from).  You may
also send the HELP command for other information (like subscribing).