Public Network Hardware

• Public network switch (redundant switches recommended) connected to a public gateway and to the public interface ports for each cluster member node.

• Ethernet interface card.

  Redundant network cards recommended; use NIC teaming so they appear as one Ethernet port name.

• The switches and network interface cards must be at least 1 GbE.

• The network protocols are UDP and TCP/IP.

Private Network Hardware for the Interconnect

• Private dedicated network switch (redundant switches recommended, with NIC teaming so they appear as one Ethernet port name), connected to the private interface ports for each cluster member node.

• The switches and network interface adapters must be at least 1 GbE, with 10 GbE recommended. Alternatively, use InfiniBand for the interconnect.

• The interconnect must support the user datagram protocol (UDP).

Perform Windows-specific network configuration tasks

• Disable the Media Sensing Feature for TCP/IP. Media Sense allows Windows to uncouple an IP address from a network interface card when the link to the local switch is lost.

• Deselect Automatic Registration with DNS for the Public Network Interface. To prevent Windows Server from potentially registering the wrong IP addresses for the node in DNS after a server restart, you must deconfigure the "Register this connection's addresses in DNS" option for the public network adapters.

• Manually configure automatic metric values. Automatic Metric feature automatically configures the metric for the local routes that are based on link speed. If you use the default values for this feature, OUI sometimes selects the private network interface as the default public host name for the server when installing Oracle Grid Infrastructure.

  Ensure that your public network adapter is first in the binding order, and the private network adapter is second.

Oracle Flex ASM Network Hardware

Oracle Flex ASM can use either the same private networks as Oracle Clusterware, or use its own dedicated private networks. Each network can be classified PUBLIC or PRIVATE+ASM or PRIVATE or ASM. Oracle ASM networks use the TCP protocol.

Cluster Names and Addresses

Determine and configure the following names and addresses for the cluster:

• Cluster name: Decide a name for the cluster, and be prepared to enter it during installation. The cluster name should have the following characteristics:

  • Globally unique across all hosts, even across different DNS domains.

  • Must be between 1 and 15 characters in length.

  • Consist of the same character set used for host names, in accordance with RFC 1123: Hyphens (-), and single-byte alphanumeric characters (a to z, A to Z, and 0 to 9).

• Grid Naming Service Virtual IP Address (GNS VIP): If you plan to use GNS, then configure a GNS name and fixed address on the DNS for GNS VIP, and configure a subdomain on your DNS delegated to the GNS VIP for resolution of cluster addresses. GNS domain delegation is mandatory with dynamic public networks (DHCP, autoconfiguration).

• Single Client Access Name (SCAN) and addresses:

  • Using Grid Naming Service Resolution: Do not configure SCAN names and addresses in your DNS. SCANs are managed by GNS.

  • Using Manual Configuration and DNS resolution: Configure a SCAN name to resolve to three addresses on the domain name service (DNS).

If you are configuring a cluster with Grid Naming Service (GNS), then OUI displays the public and virtual host name addresses labeled as "AUTO" because they are configured automatically. To use this option, you must have configured a subdomain on your DNS that is delegated to GNS for resolution, and you must have a fixed GNS VIP address where the delegated service requests can be routed.

If you are not using GNS, then configure the following for each cluster node:

• Public node name and address, configured on the DNS and in the hosts (for example, node1.example.com, address 192.0.2.10). The public node name should be the primary host name of each node, which is the name displayed by the hostname command.

• Private node address, configured on the private interface for each node. The installer identifies addresses in the private range as private IP addresses by default. For example: 10.0.0.10

  The private subnet that the private interfaces use must connect all the nodes you intend to have as cluster members. Oracle recommends that the network you select for the private network uses an address range defined as private by RFC 1918.

• Public node virtual IP name and address (for example, node1-vip.example.com, address 192.0.2.11)

  If you are not using dynamic networks with GNS and subdomain delegation, then determine a virtual host name for each node. A virtual host name is a public node name that is used to reroute client requests sent to the node if the node is down. Oracle Database uses VIPs for client-to-database connections, so the VIP address must be publicly accessible. Oracle recommends that you provide a name in the format hostname-vip. For example: myclstr2-vip.