Oracle Database 12.2 released for Exadata on-premises

We live in exciting times, Oracle Database 12.2 for Exadata was released earlier today.

The 12.2 database was already available on the Exadata Express Cloud Service and Database as a service for a few months now.

Today, it has been released for Exadata on-premises, five days earlier than the initial Oracle announcement of 15th Feb.

The documentation suggests that to run 12.2 database you need to run at least 12.1.2.2.1 Exadata storage software but better go with the recommended version of 12.2.1.1.0 which was released just a few days ago. Here are few notes on running 12.2 database on Exadata:

Recommended Exadata storage software: 12.2.1.1.0 or higher

Supported Exadata storage software: 12.1.2.2.1 or higher

Full Exadata offload functionality for Database 12.2, and IORM support for Database 12.2 container databases and pluggable databases requires Exadata 12.2.1.1.0 or higher.

Exadata Storage Server version 12.2.1.1.0 will be required for full Exadata functionality including  ‘Smart Scan offloaded filtering’, ‘storage indexes’ and’

Current Oracle Database and Grid Infrastructure version must be 11.2.0.3, 11.2.0.4, 12.1.0.1 or 12.1.0.2.  Upgrades from 11.2.0.1 or 11.2.0.2 directly to 12.2.0.1 are not supported.

There is a completely new note on how to upgrade to 12.2 GI and RDBMS on Exadata:

12.2 Grid Infrastructure and Database Upgrade steps for Exadata Database Machine running 11.2.0.3 and later on Oracle Linux (Doc ID 2111010.1)

The 12.2 GI and RDBMS binaries are available from MOS as well as edelivery:

Patch 25528839: Grid Software clone version 12.2.0.1.0

Patch 25528830: Database Software clone version 12.2.0.1.0

The recommended Exadata storage software for running 12.2 RDBMS:

Exadata 12.2.1.1.0 release and patch (21052028) (Doc ID 2207148.1)

For more details about 12.2.1.1.0 Exadata storage software refer to this slide deck and of course a link to the 12.2 documentation here as we all need to start getting familiar with it.

Also, last week Oracle released the February version of OEDA to support the new Exadata SL6 hardware. It does not support 12.2 database yet and I guess we’ll see another release in February to support the 12.2 GI and RDBMS.

Happy upgrading!