Chapter 1, Getting Started, provides an introduction to Oracle GoldenGate by describing the key components, processes, and considerations required to build and implement a GoldenGate solution. The topics covered include the evolution of the GoldenGate software, including the architecture behind the technology, followed by the solutions GoldenGate can provide along with its effective design. You will become accustomed with the concepts of the data replication and how GoldenGate provides robust enterprise-wide solutions.

Chapter 2, Installing and Preparing GoldenGate, helps you quickly learn the individual tasks needed to complete an end-to-end GoldenGate installation, including downloading, installing, and configuring the Oracle GoldenGate 12c software, the preinstallation steps for the OS and database, apart from the software and hardware requirements. The steps include the Oracle database setup and the configuration of GoldenGate, providing an overview that allows you to swiftly get up and running.

Chapter 3, Design Considerations, tells you how to address some of the issues that influence the decision-making process when you design a GoldenGate solution. This includes design considerations for performance, security, backup and recovery, and high availability. This chapter also helps you choose the appropriate hardware and topology to deliver a fast, robust, and scalable solution.

Chapter 4, Configuring Oracle GoldenGate, initially discusses the main GoldenGate configuration parameters and provides a methodical approach to the configuration process, stepping through each task to give in-depth information necessary to successfully implement Oracle GoldenGate 12c. In this chapter, you will learn the basic steps necessary to configure one-way replication in a GoldenGate environment, including data synchronization between the source and target.

Chapter 5, Configuration Options, focuses on the additional configuration options available in Oracle GoldenGate 12c. The powerful options discussed in this chapter allow you to extend your configuration to increase functionality and performance. Starting with a performance enhancing option to exploring the security features, data compression and encryption, heterogeneous environments, and finally discussing the DDL support and the tools available to monitor the DDL replication, this chapter covers an extensive array of configuration topics.

Chapter 6, Configuring GoldenGate for HA, explores how to configure GoldenGate in a RAC environment and talks about the various components that effectively enable HA for data replication and integration. The discussion topics include shared storage options, load balancing, and failover, apart from GoldenGate on Exadata.

Chapter 7, Advanced Configuration, gives you a deeper understanding about how to configure GoldenGate. By the time you are done with this chapter, you will be able to explore and realize each parameter specification and further develop your GoldenGate configuration. You will also learn how GoldenGate is used with Oracle Data Integrator to deliver real-time data synchronization solutions.

Chapter 8, Managing Oracle GoldenGate, focuses on the management features already built-in the GoldenGate Command Interpreter (GGSCI). This chapter discusses and implements a number of utilities, including tips and tricks that allow you to manage your GoldenGate environment effectively at no extra cost. This includes a step-by-step guide to configure a Metric Extension in Oracle Enterprise Manager 12c to monitor your GoldenGate Enterprise.

Chapter 9, Performance Tuning, covers the main areas that lend themselves to tuning, especially parallel processing and load balancing, enabling high data throughput and very low latency. In this chapter, you will learn how to leverage the performance enhancing new features that are available in GoldenGate 12c, including batch replication latency reduction and data delivery optimization through integrated processes.

Chapter 10, Troubleshooting GoldenGate, tells you how to investigate and resolve some of the common issues faced by the GoldenGate administrator. This chapter has captured some of the most common failure scenarios, offering help and guidance to wards a successful resolution. From using LOGDUMP to drilling into the GoldenGate trail files to automatic exception handling, you will quickly understand the importance of a methodical approach to troubleshooting.

Chapter 11, The Future of GoldenGate, takes you through the new technology and concepts where GoldenGate plays a role. It discusses cloud computing, Software as a Service (SaaS), and advances in integration, such as on-premise to cloud migrations and big data as well.

Appendix A, GGSCI Commands, provides a quick reference guide to all the available GGSCI commands.

Appendix B, GoldenGate Installed Components, lists the GoldenGate-installed components and their descriptions.

Appendix C, Acronyms, lists the acronyms with their fully qualified names that have been used throughout this book.

At the minimum, you will require the following elements to run the code featured in this book. Starting with the hardware, you can configure a simple GoldenGate solution on just one personal computer that acts as a database server, running Oracle or Red Hat Enterprise Linux x86 Version 5.2. These can be native Linux or Linux virtual machines hosted on Microsoft Windows 7 or 8.

The same PC may be used as a client that supports terminal emulation software for logging in to the database server.

The following list provides the minimum hardware specification for the PC that will host the virtual machines:

The virtual machine specification is as follows; for 2VMs, each has:

To implement a simple point-to-point data replication solution, you will need two Oracle 12c Release 1 databases. Both source and target databases can reside on the same machine.

Refer to the preinstallation requirements found on the Oracle website at https://docs.oracle.com/database/121/LADBI/pre_install.htm#LADBI7487.

The following list provides the software requirements:

This book is for solution and database architects, who wish to learn about the functionality and efforts required in implementing a data replication, migration, or integration solution using GoldenGate. It is also designed for system administrators and database administrators, who want to implement, or who have already implemented GoldenGate, and who want to explore its advanced features. An intermediate understanding of Oracle's database technology is assumed.

In this book, you will find a number of text styles that distinguish between different kinds of information. Here are some examples of these styles and an explanation of their meaning.

Code words in text, database table names, folder names, filenames, file extensions, pathnames, dummy URLs, user input, and Twitter handles are shown as follows: "We can include other contexts through the use of the include directive."

A block of code is set as follows:

pdb2=
  (DESCRIPTION =
    (ADDRESS = (PROTOCOL = TCP)(HOST = db12server02)(PORT = 1521))
    (CONNECT_DATA =
      (SERVER = DEDICATED)
      (SERVICE_NAME = pdb2)
    )
  )

Any command-line input or output is written as follows:

[oracle@db12c ogg_src]$ oerr ora 1466
01466, 00000, "unable to read data - table definition has changed"
// *Cause: Query parsed after tbl (or index) change, and executed
//         w/old snapshot
// *Action: commit (or rollback) transaction, and re-execute

New terms and important words are shown in bold. Words that you see on the screen, for example, in menus or dialog boxes, appear in the text like this: "This provides all GoldenGate INFO, WARNING, and ERROR messages."

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