OCA / OCP / EXAMS

Installing Oracle Database Software

The Oracle Database software is installed with the Oracle Universal Installer (OUI).

Supported Platforms

sources for software download are the Oracle Technology Network (OTN) and the Oracle Software Delivery Cloud.

User Accounts

On any version of Unix or Linux, it is not possible to install the software as the root user

Best practice is to create one account that will own the database software and a second account that will own the Grid Infrastructure software

Traditionally, this account is named oracle and given the primary group of oinstall. A secondary group will be dba.

These groups should be created before installing and should be assigned to the oracle account.

Disk Space and Directories

The installation requires about 5GB for the database Oracle Home. An Oracle Home is the location of an Oracle product installation—a set of files in a directory structure.

The recommended directory structure is known as Optimal Flexible Architecture (OFA).

The general idea is that each product should be installed into its own Oracle Home, beneath an Oracle Base.

he Oracle Base is a directory that will contain one or more Oracle Homes as well as various other directories for administration purposes and also the actual databases. 

The directory containing the OUI inventory exists outside the Oracle Base, which makes sense because it should be independent of any other product.

The recommended naming convention of Oracle Base is based on three variables:

/mount_point/directory_name/OS_user

And for each Oracle Home, add a literal and more variables:

/mount_point/directory_name/OS_user/product/software_version/type_[n]

The files that make up each database are in the Oracle Base, plus two variables:

/mount_point/directory_name/OS_user/content_name/Dbname