Oracle RAC 11g creation

oracleoracle-11grac

I would like to play with RAC configuration.

Using virtual area (VMware or VirtualBox):

  1. RAC1 (Windows 2003 Server)
  2. RAC2 (Windows 2003 Server)
  3. Shared storage (Openfiler)
  4. DNS server (for using SCAN feature)

In process of RAC config I will need to insert static IP address, subnet mask, gateway. Is it possible to create RAC configuration in virtual area, not touching work Active Directory network (I mean not adding IP to working office network)?

Best Answer

This is definitely possible both with VMware and VirtualBox and any other mainstream virtualization product as well I guess.

On my VMware vSphere sandbox, I have created an additional virtual switch that is not mapped to any physical network adapters. This network is not visible/reachable from the outside world, but VMs attached to it can reach each other through interfaces using this switch, so it's perfect for a RAC private network with 1 host machine.

In VirtualBox, I use NAT Network (available since version 4.3) for RAC private network. It's a similar concept, a virtual network not visible/reachable from the outside world, but VMs with interfaces in this network can communicate each other through it.

You can use the above for RAC public networks as well, so you don't need to allocate any IP addresses on your real physical network. For example, in VirtualBox, you can use 1 NAT network interface as "management interface", and define port forwarding rules on it, so you can access the VM from your local machine thorugh RDP/SSH without using the VM console. Then use another NAT Network interface for the RAC public network, and another NAT Network interface for the RAC private network, so 3 interfaces in total.

I would not bother with openfiler, both VMware and VirtualBox support shared virtual disks.

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