Oracle Grid Computing AchievedService-oriented HP Adaptive Infrastructure offerings for Oracle Grid Computing and SOA

Technology for better business outcomes

Evolution of the next generation data centerEnterprises around the world are seeing diminishingreturns from traditional IT approaches, where the proliferation of departmental or application-specificcomputing silos has resulted in under utilization, spiraling administrative costs, and major impediments to change. In an attempt to break out of this cycle,many organizations are rushing to consolidate IT buttoo often end up with nothing more than larger silos in fewer locations. While this may produce some economic value, it does little to improve IT agility.

Another important trend in both enterprise-applicationarchitecture and governance is adoption of a service-oriented architecture (SOA), in which services can beeasily assembled into new, composite applications. SOAmay be viewed as a consolidation response to the software redundancies often created by silo applications.Fundamentally, SOA changes the traditional monolithicapplication development model to one in which business functions are developed once and thenshared across multiple business processes, dramaticallyimproving efficiency, interoperability, and agility whiledriving standardization.

Maximize flexibility with shared IT resourcesTogether HP and Oracle® deliver the core elements of a broader service-oriented IT strategy. One that supports consolidation but goes further to embracenext-generation data center capabilities—a 24 x 7lights-out computing environment in which standardization,automation, and virtualization break down silos andenable a supply chain of IT services. To help you movetoward this new model, HP and Oracle offer a set ofcomplementary strategies—the HP Adaptive Infrastructureand Oracle Grid Computing.

Oracle’s vision of the next-generation data center is the Oracle Grid Computing architecture, which provides the software building blocks for creating a service-oriented, shared-resource environment. At the database tier, Oracle Real Application Clustersenable multiple servers and shared storage devices towork collaboratively to support diverse workloads. Thismodular approach is inherently flexible, enablingdynamic resource allocation in response to changingworkloads. In addition, Oracle Fusion Middlewareprovides a full suite of industry-leading tools thatenable you develop a service-oriented architecturewhere business process functionality is shared andstandardized, resulting in significant improvementsin development efficiency. For the business as a whole, the resulting IT agility means greater business flexibility, faster time-to-market, and accelerated growth.

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“When we consolidated in the [Oracle] gridenvironment, we came across several greatbenefits: flexibility is number one, ease ofmoving our processing to where it’s needed,we have much better uptime now …we attribute one day of revenues saved every year for business we didn’t lose.”David Milne, Director of Database Technologies, Chicago Stock Exchange

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Service-oriented IT is a powerful way to transform yourdata center and your enterprise architecture. But as youexamine the implications of SOA and Oracle Grid,you’ll soon recognize the critical part your underlyingtechnology infrastructure will play. In the early phasesof implementing an SOA strategy, the quickest returnsare generally realized by creating services based onexisting application functions and database definitions—for example, defining a single customer record functionto be used across all business processes. Suddenly, thisparticular element of one existing application has anincreased workload. Increasing workloads in oneapplication silo will be matched by declining use inothers, resulting in a mismatch of resources under thesilo infrastructure model. That’s where HP AdaptiveInfrastructure offerings combined with Oracle Gridcomputing capabilities come in. By implementing anAdaptive Infrastructure, you can ensure that service-level commitments to business users are met throughdynamic reallocation of resources across the grid inresponse to changing application workloads and business priorities.

So, how do you move from your current infrastructureto an Adaptive Infrastructure that fully leverages OracleGrid Computing and the vision of SOA? The answer is with HP Reference Architectures for Oracle.

HP Reference Architectures forOracle GridHP has developed a set of reference architectures thatare integrated tightly with Oracle Grid and OracleFusion Middleware capabilities. The HP Reference Architectures for Oracle Grid on HP BladeSystem andthe HP Virtual Server Environment Reference Architecturefor Oracle Grid on HP-UX 11i enable you to supportOracle Grid in a highly dynamic SOA environment.

What are HP Reference Architectures for Oracle?

• Validated hardware and software integrations

• Repeatable configurations and administration

• Designed to deliver high availability and manageability

• Best practices knowledge transfer

• Modular, standardized building blocks for anAdaptive Infrastructure

• Target platform for HP and Oracle service offerings

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With HP Adaptive Infrastructure technologies you can achieve the full value of Oracle Grid—dynamic optimized alignment of IT resource with business priorities and the agility to maximize business opportunities and drive better business outcomes.

Oracle Grid on HP BladeSystemThe HP Reference Architecture for Oracle Grid Computing on HP BladeSystem is an architecturalspecification of a proven hardware and software environment that’s ideal for Oracle Grid computingwhere rapid growth and start-up costs are key decisioncriteria. At the core of this architecture is the HPBladeSystem, a fully self-contained infrastructure comprised of server blades, storage, and networking,all controlled by a unified infrastructure managementframework. Key to maximizing Oracle Grid is the HP Virtual Connect option that virtualizes the connectionsbetween the blade servers and your enterprise networkand storage area network (SAN). With VirtualConnect, changes in your infrastructure don’t requirechanges in your networks because connectivity isaggregated and virtualized at the server edge, whichmeans servers can be added, re-purposed, andreplaced in an Oracle Grid in minutes, not days.

The foundation of this Reference Architecture is the HP StorageWorks Enterprise Virtual Array (EVA) and its unique boot-from-SAN support. With this capability,system and database administrators can work togetherto anticipate and allow for changes in system workloadsby pre-provisioning operating system and applicationsoftware to the shared EVA storage. Servers are not committed until they are needed. To replace orexpand capacity a software profile that includes thepre-provisioned boot path is assigned to an availableserver through Virtual Connect Manager. On reboot, theserver immediately assumes a completely new identityand seamlessly joins the Oracle Grid. What previouslycould have taken hours or even days is completed inminutes. HP Rapid Deployment Pack scripting, anothercomponent of the Reference Architecture, can be used to further automate this process to a single step if required.

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HP Virtual Server Environment for Oracle GridThe HP Virtual Server Environment (VSE) ReferenceArchitecture for Oracle Grid on HP-UX 11i demonstrates the powerful integration of Oracle RAC,Oracle Fusion Middleware, and HP VSE technologiessuch as HP Global Workload Manager (gWLM)and HP Serviceguard Cluster File System for RAC. The architecture takes advantage of the Virtual Server Environment for the automatic migration of serverresources to meet workload needs and Oracle RAC to expand database services to additional servers tohandle increasing demands. Together, these technologiescreate an application infrastructure that demonstratesdynamic scale-up, -out, and -back as a powerful technique to share resources between workloads while meeting business requirements in real time.

The HP VSE Reference Architecture for Oracle Gridprovides a small working model of a potentially muchlarger Oracle RAC database utility. In this model,workloads with large peak requirements will benefitfrom the ability to quickly and automatically accesscompute resources within the server they are runningon (dynamic scale up) using gWLM. Workloads thatexceed the capacity of the server complex they are

running on can gain additional capacity by activatingthe required Oracle services on additional servers(dynamic scale out). As the database load declines,Oracle services will be deactivated on the overflowservers (dynamic scale back). When the load does not require the use of all available Oracle services,system resources can be distributed to where they are most needed. By sharing the same capacity across multiple workloads with different peak load timing, overall utilization of the utility computeresources is optimized. Thus, an environment based on the HP VSE Reference Architecture for Oracle Grid delivers peak capacity to each workload withmaximum utilization of compute resources and built in availability.

Simplify administration with unified infrastructure managementTying everything together is HP unified infrastructuremanagement, enabling administrators to monitor and proactively troubleshoot complex problems spanning servers, storage, and networks across anOracle Grid.

With HP Systems Insight Manager and optional Essentials software plug-ins, HP delivers a heterogeneous, multi-OS server and storage management solution that enables you to monitor and control holistically your environment to improveoperational efficiency and reduce costs. When combinedwith Oracle Enterprise Manager Grid Control, youhave all the tools necessary to optimally monitor andadminister a comprehensive adaptive infrastructure.Business process monitoring and governance is administered with the integration of a comprehensivesuite of Oracle and HP SOA tools.

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“We saw right away how resources in the [HP] Virtual ServerEnvironment, such as memory and CPU, were no longer fixed—that we could start allocating them in a much more granular way. So, the users get consistently high performance without everknowing anything is happening behind the scenes. It’s all veryfluid—we don’t have to get involved at all.”

Paul Briddon, technical consultant for UNIX and storage, Royal London

For more informationFor more information about HP Adaptive Infrastructure and Oracle Grid Computing visit the following sites:

HP Reference Architectures for Oracle: http://h71028.www7.hp.com/enterprise/cache/150368-0-0-0-121.html

HP and Oracle Fusion Middleware and Service-oriented Architectures:http://h71028.www7.hp.com/enterprise/cache/306020-0-0-0-121.html

Application Modernization Initiative: http://h71028.www7.hp.com/enterprise/cache/423701-0-0-225-121.html?jumpid=reg_R1002_USEN

Application Modernization Services: http://h20219.www2.hp.com/services/cache/123120-0-0-225-121.html?jumpid= reg_R1002_USEN

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Accelerate your Oracle Grid journeyAs you evaluate your options for implementing an Oracle Grid environment, consider the following:

• Oracle Grid is only as dynamic and flexible as your infrastructure—realizing the full value of a service- oriented architecture requires embracing the next-generation data center.

• To maximize infrastructure efficiencies, it takes morethan simply consolidating numerous small silos into fewer large silos.

• Changes at the application/service level can haveserious implications on your IT infrastructure.

• HP Adaptive Infrastructure helps customers achievebetter business outcomes.

• HP Reference Architectures for Oracle provide a proven roadmap for achieving Oracle Grid Computing and SOA.

To learn more about how HP Reference Architectures for Oracle Grid can help you accelerate adoption of a service-oriented architecture, contact your HP representative today or visit the HP and Oracle alliance at www.hp.com/go/oracle

© Copyright 2007 Hewlett-Packard Development Company, L.P. The information contained herein is subject to changewithout notice. The only warranties for HP products and services are set forth in the express warranty statementsaccompanying such products and services. Nothing herein should be construed as constituting an additional warran-ty. HP shall not be liable for technical or editorial errors or omissions contained herein. Oracle is a registered U.S.trademark of Oracle Corporation, Redwood City, California.

4AA0-xxxxENW, November 2007