Expert Oracle Exadata - Parent Directory

IntroductionThank you for purchasing this book. We worked hard on it for a long time. Our hope is that you find ituseful as you begin to work with Exadata. We’ve tried to introduce the topics in a methodical mannerand move from generalizations to specific technical details. While some of the material paints a verybroad picture of how Exadata works, some is very technical in nature, and you may find that havingaccess to an Exadata system where you can try some of the techniques presented will make it easier tounderstand. Note that we’ve used many undocumented parameters and features to demonstrate howvarious pieces of the software work. Do not take this as a recommended approach for managing aproduction system. Remember that we have had access to a system that we could tear apart with littleworry about the consequences that resulted from our actions. This gave us a huge advantage in ourinvestigations into how Exadata works. In addition to this privileged access, we were provided a greatdeal of support from people both inside and outside of Oracle for which we are extremely grateful.The Intended AudienceThis book is intended for experienced Oracle people. We do not attempt to explain how Oracle worksexcept as it relates to the Exadata platform. This means that we have made some assumptions about thereader’s knowledge. We do not assume that you are an expert at performance tuning on Oracle, but wedo expect that you are proficient with SQL and have a good understanding of basic Oracle architecture.How We Came to Write This BookIn the spring of 2010, Enkitec bought an Exadata V2 Quarter Rack. We put it in the tiny computer room atour office in Dallas. We don’t have a raised floor or anything very fancy, but the room does have its ownair conditioning system. It was actually more difficult than you might think to get Oracle to let uspurchase one. They had many customers that wanted them, and they were understandably protective oftheir new baby. We didn’t have a top-notch data center to put it in, and even the power requirementshad to be dealt with before they would deliver one to us. At any rate, shortly after we took delivery,through a series of conversations with Jonathan Gennick, Randy and I agreed to write this book forApress. There was not a whole lot of documentation available at that time, and so we found ourselvespestering anyone we could find who knew anything about it. Kevin Closson and Dan Norris were bothgracious enough to answer many of our questions at the Hotsos Symposium in the spring of 2010. Kevincontacted me some time later and offered to be the official technical reviewer. So Randy and I struggledthrough the summer and early fall attempting to learn everything could.I ran into Tanel at Oracle Open World in September, 2010, and we talked about a client usingExadata that he had done some migration work for. One thing led to another, and eventually he agreedto join the team as a co-author. At Open World, Oracle announced the availability of the new X2 models,so we had barely gotten started and we were already behind on the technology.xix