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An Oracle White Paper March 2010

Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework: A Foundation for Next-Generation Telecom Appliances

Oracle White Paper—Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework: A Foundation for Next-Generation Telecom Appliances

Executive Overview............................................................................. 1 Introduction ......................................................................................... 1 Deploying Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework on Sun Hardware from Oracle ......................................................................................... 3

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Industry Trends ............................................................................... Oracle’s Products at the Core of Modern Telecom Applications.....

Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework Components .................................. Oracle TimesTen In-Memory Database 11g ................................... Oracle RAC ................................................................................... Oracle Data Guard ........................................................................

Oracle’s Sun Hardware Platforms for Oracle Carrier-Grade Frame work...................................................................................................

Oracle’s Sun Netra CT900 ATCA Blade Server............................ Oracle’s Sun Netra CP3260 ATCA Blade Server ......................... Oracle’s Sun Storage 7410 System ..............................................

Running Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework on Oracle’s Sun Platforms....................................................................................

Workload Description .................................................................... Test System Configuration............................................................ Hardware Configurations, Software Versions ............................... Test Execution, Results, and Conclusions....................................

Conclusion ........................................................................................ Appendix 1: References....................................................................


Executive Overview

Trends in the telecom market create an increasing demand for expanded and flexible services, across multiple networks and media types. At the same time, the profitability of the industry’s basic offerings is increasingly under pressure. To fulfill the demand for service agility and retain competitiveness, communications service providers (CSPs) must expand their offerings by developing new services rapidly and cost effectively and by collaborating with other providers. Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework running on Oracle’s standards-based Sun systems supports the needs of CSPs and their suppliers and partners by helping them develop reusable and flexible platforms to support new and existing applications.

Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework includes a stack of integrated Oracle software products including the Oracle TimesTen In-Memory Database 11g, Oracle In-Memory Database Cache 11g, Oracle Database 11g Release 2, Oracle Real Application Clusters (Oracle RAC), and Oracle Data Guard. When combined and deployed on Sun systems, these products provide a fast, reliable, scalable, and flexible platform for the deployment of a wide range of telecom applications.

Introduction

The increased competitiveness of the telecom industry has resulted in increased pressure on providers to deliver service agility and new revenue-generating services, while controlling costs. To meet these requirements, telecom providers are moving away from proprietary and highly customized hardware and software and toward flexible and standards-based solutions. This shift is resulting in providers’ preference for using cost-effective commercial off-the-shelf (COTS) solutions that support the rapid deployment of solutions and services.

To address this trend, Oracle has developed the Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework. This white paper details the Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework, the industry needs it supports, a test environment, and a simulated workload. This test environment uses Oracle’s Sun Netra

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Advanced Telecommunications Computing Architecture (ATCA) platform and components, and a Sun Storage 7000 Unified Storage System from Oracle. The test environment is exercised with a simulated application workload typical to a CSP environment.

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Deploying Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework on Sun Hardware from Oracle

Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework running on Oracle’s Sun platforms delivers superior performance, standards-based interfaces, modular scalability, and proven availability. CSPs, telecom equipment manufacturers (TEMs), and network equipment providers (NEPs) can all utilize Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework running on Oracle’s Sun Netra servers and Sun open storage from Oracle to provide reusable and flexible platforms and frameworks capable of supporting both new and existing applications.

Industry Trends

The telecom industry is expanding again after periods of consolidation and cost cutting. The current market is affected by several concurrent trends, driving innovation and change. These trends are described in the sections to follow.

Increased Significance of Developing Economies

To service users in developing economies, CSPs must invest heavily in core network infrastructure to support a customer base with a limited ability to pay, and the potential revenue is low. The increasingly competitive environment can only be addressed by advanced, cost-effective services. As a result, CSPs must develop services with limited resources, and they cannot simultaneously invest heavily in core network infrastructure.

Growing Adoption of Cloud Computing

Cloud computing requires new data-intensive services and service models—infrastructure, platform, communications, and software as a service, known collectively as SaaS. To exploit these services, businesses require ubiquitous access to high-bandwidth, low-latency long-distance network connectivity to their everything as a service (XaaS) providers, creating a rapidly increasing load on telecom networks.

Focus on Subscriber Retention

In a relatively saturated market, CSPs are increasingly focusing on customer retention rather than recruitment. At the same time, CSPs are investing in developing and deploying high-margin services to increase their profitability. To succeed, CSPs must select attractive new services and develop and deploy them cost effectively. The industry continues to seek highly attractive applications, and vendors must react rapidly to subscriber behavior and changing market trends, creating competitive advantage by delivering services that satisfy customers.

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Demand for Flexibility

CSPs are moving from a small number of services to varied services—each highly customizable, tailored to specific demographic groups, and delivered on demand. The ability to personalize a customer experience can increase satisfaction and loyalty. These capabilities require a high level of flexibility from CSPs, their networks, and administrative infrastructure.

Innovation Through Partnerships

CSPs can improve their ability to develop and deploy new services and enhance their competitive advantage by partnering with technology, service, and content developers. Similarly, two or more CSPs who combine their networks can enhance coverage and deliver multiple types of media over both mobile and fixed networks.

Converging Networks

The trend toward fixed-mobile convergence (FMC) allows CSPs to provide services transparently across both fixed and mobile networks, which is driving the evolution of technical standards and new, collaborative business models. This trend is resulting in CSPs adopting standard methodologies, architectures, and technologies, and creating technological and business partnerships.

Accelerating the Delivery of New Services

The ability to rapidly develop and deploy innovative and cost-effective services, known as service agility, is a key requirement for CSPs if they are to remain competitive. To realize service agility, CSPs and their suppliers must take full advantage of standards-based COTS hardware and software components. These components offer significant price and performance benefits but require that CSPs adhere to new architectures and standards.

Emerging Telecom Hardware Standards

ATCA-compliant components help NEPs deliver integrated systems with excellent price/performance. Based on standard components, ATCA hardware offers short development cycles, lower development costs, and economies of scale. Although the telecom infrastructure market as a whole is still contracting, the ATCA market is robust—demonstrated by the success of the 250-member-strong Peripheral Interconnect (PCI) Industrial Computer Manufacturers Group (PICMG) that develops the ATCA standard.

New Telecom Architecture Standards

The Internet Protocol (IP) family of network protocols forms the basis for a growing array of increasingly advanced telecom standards. One example of such a standard is the IP Multimedia Subsystem (IMS) standard for streaming multimedia content. The growing availability of reusable IMS-compliant components helps CSPs quickly implement reusable platforms and frameworks cost effectively, avoiding vendor lock-in. At the same time, the adoption of standard implementations helps CSPs seamlessly integrate their networks with other CSPs.

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Growing Adoption of Computing-Industry Standards

Today the full range of telecom applications increasingly run on industry-standard platforms. To achieve service agility, the core network layer is evolving from proprietary platforms to standards-based, modular COTS platforms. Similarly, standards-based application programming interfaces (APIs) are increasingly replacing proprietary APIs, and open technologies such as the Java programming languages are used to implement telecom systems.

Oracle’s Products at the Core of Modern Telecom Applications

The industry trends described in the preceding sections and the associated demands they create from CSPs can best be serviced by an integrated, high-performance, resilient, and reliable hardware and software stack. Such a stack—comprised of Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework, Sun Netra ATCA Blades, and Sun Storage 7000 Unified Storage Systems—delivers cost-effective service agility and scalable performance. These components are introduced in the next sections and described in further detail later in this document.

Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework—A Telecom-Ready Software Platform

Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework (see Figure 1) is an integrated, standards-based, application-ready software platform with service agility at its core. Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework delivers superior performance, scalability, and high availability (HA), and helps accelerate the deployment of new networking infrastructure and applications needed to meet the increasingly demanding requirements of the telecom industry.

Figure 1. Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework is an integrated, standards-based, application-ready software platform with service agility at its core.

Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework includes the following Oracle products:

• Oracle TimesTen In-Memory Database 11g

• Oracle In-Memory Database Cache 11g

• Oracle Database 11g Release 2

• Oracle Real Application Clusters (Oracle RAC)

• Oracle Data Guard

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A carrier-grade operating system (OS), such as Oracle Solaris 10, coupled with HA services running on carrier-grade hardware can provide the Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework software stack with a reliable and resilient execution environment. Such an environment is a basic requirement for CSPs, where any unplanned downtime can potentially disrupt services to many thousands of subscribers with grave economic consequences. Combining these products meets the data management requirements of service agility, including

• Low-latency and batch performance

• Intelligent caching

• Failover and load balancing of distributed databases

• Comprehensive and flexible horizontal and vertical scalability

• Adherence to standard interfaces

• Low maintenance costs and easy manageability

• Nonstop operations capable of delivering carrier-grade availability

Sun Netra Platforms from Oracle

Oracle’s Sun Netra product line delivers a broad portfolio of Network Equipment Building System (NEBS) Level 3–certified carrier-grade servers to help ensure reliability and availability with a low environmental impact, very competitive total cost of ownership (TCO), and excellent return on investment (ROI). These systems can be deployed either in rackmount or ATCA blade form factors, using Intel Xeon, AMD Opteron, and UltraSPARC processors running Oracle Solaris 10, Microsoft Windows, or Linux.

The Sun Netra products feature a range of processors, form factors, and OSs suited to the range of requirements typical in a telecom environment. Their ultradense design coupled with space and power efficiency make Oracle’s Sun Netra servers optimal platforms for server consolidation and virtualization. In addition, Sun Netra platforms’ support for open standards make them well suited for many third-party, standards-based products.

Sun Storage 7000 Unified Storage Systems from Oracle

The Sun Storage 7000 Unified Storage Systems product line provides the world’s first open storage appliances. These systems deliver a simple, cost-effective storage solution. Based on industry-standard components, Sun Storage 7000 Unified Storage Systems are fast to install and easy to configure and use.

As the volumes of data increase, Sun Storage 7000 Unified Storage Systems provide investment protection by allowing CSPs to grow easily to support a larger subscriber base and increased data volumes. In addition, Sun Storage 7000 Unified Storage Systems can be deployed rapidly and grow nondisruptively and transparently. Each product in the Sun Storage 7000 Unified Storage Systems product line seamlessly integrates technology such as flash memory with innovations such as Oracle

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Solaris Zettabyte File System (ZFS) hybrid storage pools and Sun Storage 7000 Unified Storage Systems DTrace Analytics.

Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework Components

The following sections provide detailed descriptions of Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework component products. When combined, these products deliver the data management foundation necessary to meet CSP requirements:

• Oracle TimesTen In-Memory Database 11g is a memory-optimized relational database that provides applications with low latency and high throughput for performance-critical functions that require predictable and rapid data access.

• Oracle In-Memory Database Cache 11g is an Oracle Database 11g Release 2 product option that caches performance-critical subsets of an Oracle database in the application tier.

• Oracle Real Application Clusters (Oracle RAC) allows Oracle Database 11g Release 2 to run any application unchanged across a set of clustered servers, promoting flexible and modular scalability.

• Oracle Data Guard provides disaster recovery and data protection.

Oracle TimesTen In-Memory Database 11g

Oracle TimesTen In-Memory Database 11g is a relational database management system (DBMS) that runs in the application tier and can function as a cache for a persistent-storage-based database or as a memory-resident DBMS. Oracle TimesTen In-Memory Database 11g provides low-latency data management and improves application responsiveness and data throughput.

In-Memory Database Overview

The Oracle TimesTen In-Memory Database 11g architecture (see Figure 2) and the in-memory data stores at its core (see Figure 3) implement a relational database where all data is kept in memory. An in-memory database (IMDB) is more efficient than a cached, persistent database, because an IMDB does not need to maintain coherency with persistent data. In an IMDB, storage devices are used for persistence and recovery, and not to store the DBMS data.

In addition to in-memory data management and the improved performance it offers, Oracle TimesTen In-Memory Database 11g supports transactions, persistence mechanisms, and recovery from system failures. Oracle TimesTen In-Memory Database 11g features include locking, multiuser isolation, and logging, and they accommodate a range of applications, from transient lookup caches to transactional systems.

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Figure 2. This figure illustrates an in-memory database architecture.

Data persistence is achieved in Oracle TimesTen In-Memory Database 11g by logging the changes from committed transactions to disk and periodically updating a disk image of the database (known as a checkpoint). The timing of the disk write to the log can be configured by the application to occur either synchronously at the end of each transaction, or asynchronously for improved performance. The higher throughput resulting from asynchronous logging is often preferred to synchronous logging, particularly in applications where the potential damage resulting from a lost transaction is low.

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Figure 3. This figure illustrates the architecture of in-memory data stores.

IMDB Data Replication

The Oracle TimesTen In-Memory Database 11g supports data replication between two instances of the IMDB (see Figure 4). This feature enables rapid data replication between servers, for HA and load balancing. Data replication is compatible with the Oracle In-Memory Database Cache 11g software, and it can be configured in either active-standby or active-active configurations. Data replication can be either by asynchronous or synchronous data transfer between instances, with conflict detection and resolution, and automatic resynchronization after a failed server is restored.

Figure 4. A replicated database is at the core of the IMDB data replication capability.

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In a replicated database, one instance is designated as the master database, and all transactions are executed against it. All the other instances are designated as subscriber databases (see Figure 5), and the results of the transactions are propagated to them.

Figure 5. This figure illustrates unidirectional replication to multiple subscriber databases.

Bidirectional replication can be configured by designating a data store as both a master and a subscriber simultaneously. Additionally, Oracle TimesTen In-Memory Database 11g supports multinode n-way replication (see Figure 6), offering a wide range of possible replication topologies, including hot-standby and active-active configurations.

Figure 6. This figure illustrates Oracle TimesTen In-Memory Database in a multinode n-way replication configuration.

As shown in Figure 7, active-active configurations are implemented as split workloads (where each replicated database table has one master) or distributed workloads (where a replicated database table has several masters). In a distributed workload configuration, the application is responsible for avoiding conflicting transactions, or collisions, when distributing the work. When collisions do occur, a time-stamp-based collision detection and resolution mechanism prevents inconsistent replicas.

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Figure 7. This figure illustrates split workload and distributed workload active-active configurations that enable load balancing.

IMDB Interfaces

The interfaces supported by Oracle TimesTen In-Memory Database 11g are standards compliant and compatible with other standards-compliant relational databases. Applications interface with Oracle TimesTen In-Memory Database 11g using standard SQL commands, through either Java Database Connectivity (JDBC) or Open Database Connectivity (ODBC) interfaces. The non-SQL statements for defining data stores and replication configurations use SQL syntax conventions. The Simple Network Management Protocol (SNMP) is used for system management alerts.

Oracle TimesTen In-Memory Database and Oracle In-Memory Database Cache also support the Oracle Call Interface (OCI) and Oracle Pro*C/C++ Precompiler for C and C++ applications. The precompiler allows C/C++ applications to execute embedded SQL and PL/SQL statements that access Oracle TimesTen In-Memory Database.

An open transaction log API called XLA with a standard Java Message Service (JMS) interface is provided for reading the transaction log and providing notification. This mechanism is used for creating applications that react to database updates. XLA also supports building custom data replication where the Oracle TimesTen In-Memory Database 11g is the master and other database systems are subscribers.

IMDB Cache Grid

An Oracle In-Memory Database Cache 11g Grid (see Figure 8) consists of multiple instances of Oracle In-Memory Database Cache 11g distributed on several servers—or grid members—that manage a distributed data cache. The data in the data cache is available to application components running on any grid member regardless of their location, and transactional consistency and cache coherency are maintained across the grid members. Grid members are added or removed from the grid without interrupting applications using it. By using the Oracle In-Memory Database Cache 11g Grid, systems can scale horizontally while maintaining high performance.

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Figure 8. An Oracle In-Memory Database Cache 11g Grid consists of multiple instances of Oracle In-Memory Database Cache 11g distributed on

several servers—or grid members—that manage a distributed data cache.

The Oracle In-Memory Database Cache 11g Grid can be configured in different ways:

• Read-only caches where updates are performed in the underlying, persistent Oracle Database 11g Release 2 and propagated to the cache

• Read/write caches where updates are performed in the cache and propagated to the underlying, persistent Oracle Database 11g Release 2

• Preloaded caches where data can be loaded before it is used, and can be shared across the cache grid members or reside on a specific grid member

• Location-specific caches where data partitions are placed on a specific set of grid members to optimize access for locally executing components

Synchronizing Data with the Oracle Database

Synchronizing data between the Oracle In-Memory Database Cache 11g Grid and the Oracle database is automatic. However, the Oracle In-Memory Database Cache 11g Grid can be configured either to update the Oracle database asynchronously (for better performance) or to write every transaction through to the Oracle database (for better data reliability).

If the Oracle In-Memory Database Cache 11g Grid is configured to write the data synchronously, when the write request to the Oracle database fails, the transaction is rolled back from the cache database, maintaining cache coherency. However, to optimize for performance, the Oracle In-Memory Database Cache 11g Grid can be configured to first commit transactions locally, and update the Oracle database asynchronously. When the cache grid is configured as read only, updates to the Oracle database

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originating from systems that are not grid members are propagated to the cache at user-specified intervals.

High Availability and Resilience

Telecom applications require a high level of availability and resilience. The Oracle In-Memory Database Cache provides HA for in-memory cache tables through synchronous or asynchronous replication of the transactions executed on the master database, to the subscriber databases. The transaction replication mechanism has the following characteristics:

• Asynchronous replication is quick and transparent to the application. However, if the replication fails for any reason, the state of the affected subscriber database will not be consistent with the master database.

• Synchronous replication causes the application to block until the replicated transaction is completed on the subscriber database. At the same time, the risk of data inconsistency between the master and subscriber databases due to a failure of the replicated transaction on the subscriber database is reduced significantly.

The Oracle In-Memory Database Cache implements efficient resource usage and improved performance by using the subscriber database to service read transactions. If the application needs to increase its read capacity, additional read-only Oracle cache grid members can be added. The Oracle In-Memory Database Cache 11g implements failure detection and failover to the subscriber database with Oracle Clusterware1, and high availability is implemented with Oracle RAC and Oracle Data Guard. When required, the Oracle In-Memory Database Cache 11g can sustain a temporary loss of its connection to the Oracle database. Once the connection to the Oracle database is restored, the transactions committed to the Oracle In-Memory Database Cache 11g are automatically applied to the Oracle database. Similarly, transactions committed to the Oracle database are automatically propagated to the Oracle In-Memory Database Cache 11g to help ensure cache coherency.

Oracle RAC

Oracle RAC (see Figure 9) implements a distributed, scalable, and highly available database server clustered across multiple hardware systems, providing applications with a range of benefits. These benefits include flexible and cost-effective scaling that allows systems to scale to any capacity on demand as business needs change, with no single point of failure for any clustered subsystem.

1Oracle Clusterware implements the clustering of multiple servers into a consolidated system. Oracle Clusterware provides the required infrastructure for Oracle RAC.

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Figure 9. Oracle RAC implements a distributed, scalable, and highly available database server clustered across multiple hardware systems,

providing applications with a range of benefits.

Application Deployment on Grids

Compute and storage grids are comprised of multiple instances of standardized components. Oracle RAC–based grid configurations can dramatically reduce operational and capital costs and provide increased flexibility. Dynamic provisioning of storage, CPUs, and memory allows service levels to be maintained efficiently while improving utilization. Oracle RAC gives users the flexibility to add or remove nodes from clusters as the demand for capacity changes, scaling systems incrementally. In addition, Oracle RAC is completely transparent to applications, allowing their deployment on grids with minimal effort.

Fault Tolerance

Oracle RAC is fault tolerant. If one or more components fail, the others are not affected. The overall system is also fault tolerant, if it has sufficient capacity to support the required workload. This architecture allows components to be added or removed from the cluster transparently, while the rest of the cluster continues to function. Oracle RAC provides built-in integration with Oracle Application Server 11g for clustered connection pools, providing immediate failure notification to applications.

Cluster Management

Oracle RAC with Oracle Database 11g provides a comprehensive set of cluster management capabilities including managing node membership, messaging services, and locks. The cluster management software can be integrated into the Oracle Enterprise Manager framework.

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Oracle RAC Services

Oracle RAC supports the concept of services to represent distinct classes of database users or applications. Business policies are defined and automatically applied to services for performing tasks such as allocating nodes for peak processing times or automatically handling server failures. This mechanism helps ensure the application of system resources where and when they are needed to achieve business goals.

Runtime Schema and Data Reorganization

Oracle Database 11g allows the database administrator (DBA) to execute, reorganize, and change the schema and data without disrupting database operation. Indexes can be added, rebuilt, or maintained while the database is running and end users are reading or updating data. Similarly, tables can be relocated; defragmented; redefined; have their types changed; have columns added, dropped, or renamed; and have their storage parameters changed—all without interruption to end users using the underlying data.

Rolling Patch Updates and Software Upgrades

Oracle Database 11g supports the application of patches to the individual nodes of an Oracle RAC system without interrupting the applications—known as a rolling upgrade procedure. In the course of a rolling upgrade, the Oracle RAC system can run with one or more of its nodes at a different patch level than the other nodes in the cluster with no specific limitation. If it becomes necessary to revert a patched node to its previous state, the patches can be uninstalled, or rolled back, without affecting the rest of the cluster. Oracle Database 11g supports the rolling upgrade of the database software or applying multiple patches, or patchsets, to the nodes of an Oracle RAC system with almost no interruption. This upgrade is achieved with the SQL Apply feature of Oracle Data Guard.

If the subscriber database does not function properly after it has been upgraded, the upgrade can be aborted and the software downgraded without data loss. During the rolling upgrade, the subscriber database is available for disaster recovery. For additional data protection during these steps, a second subscriber database can be used.

Improved Availability with a Kernel-Resident File System

Oracle Automatic Storage Management, a feature of Oracle Database, provides an integrated file system and volume manager directly in the Oracle kernel. Oracle Automatic Storage Management enables the provisioning of database storage, with a high level of availability and without specialized storage products. Oracle Automatic Storage Management spreads the Oracle files across all available storage for optimal performance and provides data-file mirroring to protect from data loss. Oracle Automatic Storage Management extends the concept of stripe and mirror everything (SAME) by implementing mirroring at the database file level, instead of, or in addition to mirroring at the disk level—thereby increasing storage flexibility.

In addition, Oracle Automatic Storage Management enables automatic I/O load balancing by distributing the I/O load across all available storage devices, to optimize performance while removing

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the need for manual I/O tuning. Oracle Automatic Storage Management helps to manage a dynamic database environment by allowing the DBA to increase the database size without shutting down the database.

Oracle Data Guard

The Oracle Data Guard feature of Oracle Database manages, monitors, and automates the Oracle Database infrastructure. This infrastructure creates, maintains, and monitors subscriber databases to protect a master Oracle Database environment from failures, disasters, errors, and corruption.

Oracle Data Guard maintains up to nine subscriber databases as transactionally consistent copies of the master database. For disaster recovery, the subscriber databases should be located remotely, although they can be colocated with the master database. If the master database becomes unavailable due to an outage—whether planned or unplanned—Oracle Data Guard switches a subscriber database to the role of the master database, thus minimizing application downtime and avoiding data loss.

Oracle Data Guard is available in Oracle Database Enterprise Edition, and it can be used in combination with other Oracle HA solutions such as Oracle RAC and Oracle Recovery Manager to provide data protection and availability. The databases in an Oracle Data Guard–protected environment are connected by Oracle Net, which provides network communication between Oracle applications across different systems.

Updating the Subscriber Database

A subscriber database is initially created from a backup copy of the master database. Once created, Oracle Data Guard maintains the subscriber database as a transactionally consistent copy by sending the master database’s redo data—a log of all the changes made to the master database—to the subscriber system and then applying the redo data to the subscriber database.

Oracle Data Guard Protection Modes

Different businesses have different considerations when weighing the value of data safety versus database performance. Oracle Data Guard provides three distinct modes of data protection to satisfy varied requirements in this context:

• The maximum protection mode offers the highest level of data protection. Data is synchronously transmitted to the subscriber database from the master database, and transactions are not committed on the master database unless the redo data is available on at least one subscriber database. If the last subscriber database becomes unavailable, processing stops on the master database, ensuring that no data loss can occur.

• The maximum availability mode is similar to the maximum protection mode in terms of preventing data loss. However, if a subscriber database becomes unavailable (for example, due to a network outage), processing continues on the master database. When the fault is corrected, the subscriber database is automatically resynchronized with the master database.

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• The maximum performance mode provides less data protection on the master database, with better performance compared to the maximum availability mode. Here, as the master database processes transactions, redo data is asynchronously sent to the subscriber database. Transactions on the master database are committed without waiting for the subscriber database to acknowledge receipt of the redo data. If any subscriber database becomes unavailable, processing continues on the master database, whose performance is not affected.

Active Data Guard

Oracle Active Data Guard, an Oracle Database option, enables the reading of data from a subscriber database while receiving updates from the master database. Active Data Guard implements mechanisms that help to ensure that the data read from an active subscriber database is always current:

• The real-time query feature enables read-only access to one or more physical subscriber databases for queries, sorting, reporting, access over the Web, and so on. When a read-only workload can be separated from read-write transactions, Active Data Guard can increase the resources available to applications by utilizing existing physical subscriber databases rather than allowing them to remain unused.

• Active Data Guard supports applications that require an upper limit to the time that can elapse between committing write transactions on the master database and reading the updated data from the subscriber databases.

• Active Data Guard automatically repairs corrupted disk blocks.

Oracle’s Sun Hardware Platforms for Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework

As CSPs continue to design and deploy improved service offerings that include voice, video, and data services, they require flexible and reliable components. These components must be resilient and scalable and offer simplicity of operational management and low TCO across their lifecycle. The Sun hardware platforms that fulfill these requirements and that were used in the test deployment described in this white paper are described in the sections to follow.

Oracle’s Sun Netra CT900 ATCA Blade Server

The Sun Netra CT900 ATCA blade server (see Figure 10) offers a standards-compliant platform to host today’s demanding telecom applications and support the next-generation network infrastructure and services. The Sun Netra CT900 ATCA blade server is an NEBS Level 3–certified, rackmountable, –48 V powered ATCA blade system that supports PICMG 3.1 options 1 and 9—1 Gigabit Ethernet (GbE) and 10 GbE. The Sun Netra CT900 ATCA blade server is an integrated platform that helps deliver HA to CSP applications and supports the following components and technologies:

• The entire line of Sun Netra CP3000 ATCA blade servers, including systems built on UltraSPARC T2, AMD Opteron, and Intel Xeon processors

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• Oracle Solaris 10, carrier-grade Linux, and Microsoft Windows, which can run simultaneously in the same server

• Third-party blades that can be used in the Sun Netra CT900 ATCA blade server if they conform to PICMG 3.1 Option 1 or 9.

• An ATCA hub switch blade that switches across the PICMG 3.1 Option 9 interconnect.

The Sun Netra CT900 ATCA blade server can help provide communication carriers and NEPs with a complete, end-to-end solution. For example:

• CSPs can move applications from proprietary servers onto a standard, compact form factor—with or without virtualization.

• NEPs can apply the UltraSPARC T2 processor’s 64 concurrent hardware threads to data plane applications, and the balanced processing capabilities of multicore Intel Xeon or AMD Opteron blades for the IMS control layer and other applications.

Figure 10. This figure depicts the Sun Netra CT900 ATCA blade server populated with blade servers and other ATCA-compliant components.

The virtualization capabilities of Oracle’s Sun blade servers allow a high level of compute density, while helping to ensure a high level of server utilization and server consolidation:

• The UltraSPARC T2 processor supports Oracle VM Server for SPARC (previously known as Sun Logical Domains)—a virtualization technology that allows multiple OS instances and their applications to run on a single ATCA processor blade.

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• Oracle Solaris 10 includes Oracle Solaris Containers that support applications running in multiple virtual OS environments on the same OS instance on both UltraSPARC T2 and x64 processor–based blades.

• Oracle Solaris 10 on x64 architectures supports a range of virtualization technologies.

Oracle’s Sun Netra CP3260 ATCA Blade Server

An important part of our continuing commitment to chip multithreading (CMT) technology–based computing for CSPs, the Sun Netra CP3260 ATCA blade server (see Figure 11) is a second-generation telecom blade that meets ATCA standards with top performance for network infrastructure. The Sun Netra CP3260 ATCA blade server provides a high level of ATCA blade computational performance and density. This blade server is powered by the UltraSPARC T2 processor and can handle numerous workloads, including

• Application server computing

• Control plane processing

• Data plane processing using Oracle’s Sun Netra Data Plane Software Suite

• Media processing, benefiting from the UltraSPARC T2 processor’s floating-point units

• Security processing, benefiting from the UltraSPARC T2 processor’s cryptography processors

The Sun Netra CP3260 ATCA blade server has both PCI Express (PCIe) and 10 GbE controllers integrated into the processor’s memory architecture, speeding the flow of data from main memory to the network and allowing extremely tight coupling between processor threads and the multiple flows supported by the 10 GbE interface.

Figure 11. The Sun Netra CP3260 ATCA blade server provides a high level of ATCA blade computational performance and density.

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Oracle’s Sun Storage 7410 System

The Sun Storage 7410 system (see Figure 12) is a cost-effective, multiprotocol, network-attached storage (NAS) device. The storage system includes a large and adaptive cache with both DRAM and optional solid-state drives (SSDs). Oracle Solaris Zettabyte File System, included with the unit, supports optional flash-based ZFS hybrid storage pools (HSPs) that provide automatic data placement, data protection, and data services such as RAID, error correction, and system management. These capabilities help to insulate applications from failures in the underlying storage hardware.

Like the other products in the Sun Storage 7000 Unified Storage Systems product line, the Sun Storage 7410 system is based on an open storage system architecture that provides enterprise-class data services, scalability, and excellent cost/performance. The Sun Storage 7410 system is ideal for the demanding requirements of CSPs, where reliable, scalable storage is essential. The system can scale up to 288 TB. The unit includes simple-to-use DTrace Analytics that allow the administrators to easily monitor the state of the appliance and increase uptime, while the storage device includes an HA cluster option to protect against downtime. The Sun Storage 7410 system supports an SSD Read Flash Accelerator of up to 600 GB and a Write Flash Accelerator option using write-optimized SSD. The unit includes four 10/100/1,000Base-T Ethernet ports, with a total of 4 Gb of network capacity.

Figure 12. The Sun Storage 7410 system is a cost-effective, multiprotocol, network-attached storage device.

Running Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework on Oracle’s Sun Platforms

A simulation based on a typical CSP application workload was used to test Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework on Oracle’s Sun hardware, to evaluate its performance and scalability.

Workload Description

The workload used to test Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework measured the performance of a relational DBMS, OS, and hardware combination in a typical CSP application servicing 2,000,000 subscribers. To this end, the workload was designed to create the highest possible load that the database server could sustain by simulating concurrent remote applications running transactions on the target database. The workload and target database schema represented a typical home location register (HLR) application, as used in a mobile phone network to maintain subscriber and services data.

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The workload consisted of seven predefined transactions that inserted, updated, deleted, and queried the database. The tests were run for two hours at a time, and the number of times each transaction was executed followed a predefined probability assigned to that transaction in the transaction mix. Before each run of the benchmark, the database’s schema tables were repopulated according to strict rules for data granularity, distribution, and integrity constraints. This approach helped to ensure that each test-run consistently began with the same data.

The test used the number of successful transactions per second (TPS), and the response time distributions per transaction type for all seven types of transactions. The response time was measured for each individual transaction and reported by transaction type. The maximum response time recorded was 10 seconds, with longer response times discarded. The main measurement used was the 90th-percentile response times—the value that is greater than or equal to the response times of 90 percent of the response times measured.

Test System Configuration

Each of the configurations was comprised of a combination of Sun Netra CP3260 ATCA blade servers housed in a Sun Netra CT900 ATCA blade server and using a Sun Storage 7410 system, running a combination of Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework software components. The tests were conducted on three distinctly different configurations as follows:

• A single instance of Oracle Database 11g, running on a blade server, with an additional blade server used for load generation, and the storage subsystem connected to the blade server running Oracle Database 11g (see Figure 13)

Figure 13. This figure illustrates a single-instance Oracle Database 11g test configuration.

• A two-node Oracle RAC running on two blade servers, with two additional blade servers used for load generation and the storage subsystem connected to the blade servers running Oracle RAC (see Figure 14)

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Figure 14. This figure illustrates a two-node Oracle RAC test configuration.

• The Oracle In-Memory Database Cache 11g, running on two blade servers that were also used for load generation, with a third blade server used to run Oracle Database 11g and the storage subsystem connected to the blade server running Oracle Database 11g (see Figure 15)

Figure 15. This figure illustrates the Oracle In-Memory Database Cache 11g test configuration.

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Hardware Configurations, Software Versions

The hardware and software components were as follows:

• Each Sun Netra CP3260 ATCA blade server had an eight-core 1.2 GHz UltraSPARC T2 processor that had eight hardware threads per core and 32 GB of RAM and ran Oracle Solaris 10.

• The Sun Storage 7410 system had 128 GB RAM, twenty-two 300 GB serial-attached SCSI (SAS) disks, a 186 GB Read Flash Accelerator SSD, and a 32 GB Write Flash Accelerator using a write-optimized SSD.

• The Oracle In-Memory Database Cache 11g version used was 11.1.4.0.0.

• The Oracle Database 11g version used was 11.2.1.0.0.

Test Execution, Results, and Conclusions

A two-hour test run was executed for each of the three test configurations. Table 1 details the results of the test runs.

TABLE 1. ORACLE CARRIER-GRADE FRAMEWORK TEST RESULTS

TRANSACTION RESPONSE TIME (MILLISECONDS) RATIO

SINGLE INSTANCE TWO-NODE

ORACLE RAC

ORACLE

TIMESTEN

IN-MEMORY

DATABASE

Delete call-forwarding 8 9 0.23 2%

Insert call-forwarding 11.6 12.2 0.37 2%

Update location 6.9 7.7 0.17 14%

Update subscriber data 8.5 11.1 0.24 2%

Get access data 2.8 2.8 0.05 35%

Get new destination 2.9 4.6 0.1 10%

Get basic subscriber data 2.9 4.3 0.07 35%

Weighted average

response time

3.8 4.7 0.09 100%

TPS 19,641 34,947 80,005

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Close examination of the test results provides several insights:

• As expected, the response times of the single-instance database and the clustered database were comparable, while the Oracle In-Memory Database Cache 11g accelerated the response time per transactions by an average factor of 47.

• The average TPS of the single-instance database configuration is roughly half that of the Oracle RAC configuration. This result can be explained by the larger processing power of the Oracle RAC configuration, which is double that of the single-instance configuration.

• The Oracle In-Memory Database Cache 11g configuration has a massive advantage in terms of response time, while its throughput, as measured in TPS, is roughly four times that of the single-instance database.

Conclusion

Capitalizing on industry trends is a key prerequisite to the ongoing and future success of CSPs and their solution vendors. To this end, CSPs must effectively utilize standards-based architectures and components.

When deploying Oracle platforms, CSPs can benefit from industry-standard COTS-based building blocks to develop reliable, scalable, upgradeable, and maintainable application platforms, speeding time to market and saving resources. At the same time, CSPs do not need to compromise on application functionality or performance and can meet the stringent demands of the telecom industry.

These benefits help CSPs reduce capital and operational costs and enable improved margins and ROI. A leader in several industry categories, Oracle provides the technology, expertise, and products to support CSPs and help them achieve and maintain leadership.

Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework running on Oracle’s Sun Netra ATCA CT900 blade server and using Oracle’s Sun Storage 7000 Unified Storage Systems represents a perfect combination to meet the increasing demands of the worlds telecom applications, both today and into the future.

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Appendix 1: References

TABLE 2. WEB LINKS FOR MORE INFORMATION

DESCRIPTION URL

“Extreme Performance Using Oracle TimesTen In-Memory

Database,” Oracle white paper, July 2009

oracle.com/technology/products/timesten/pdf/wp/wp_timesten_tech.pdf

“Using Oracle In-Memory Database Cache to Accelerate

the Oracle Database,” Oracle white paper, July 2009

oracle.com/technology/products/timesten/pdf/wp/wp_imdb_cache.pdf

“Database Rolling Upgrade Using Data Guard SQL Apply,

Oracle Database 11g and 10g R2,” Oracle Maximum

Availability Architecture white paper, July, 2009

oracle.com/technology/deploy/availability

/pdf/maa_wp_10gr2_rollingupgradebestpractices.pdf

Oracle Database 11g Release 2 Website oracle.com/technology/products/database/oracle11g

Oracle TimesTen In-Memory Database 11g Website oracle.com/technology/products/timesten

Oracle Carrier-Grade Framework: A Foundation for Next-Generation Telecom Appliances March 2010 Oracle Corporation World Headquarters 500 Oracle Parkway Redwood Shores, CA 94065 U.S.A. Worldwide Inquiries: Phone: +1.650.506.7000 Fax: +1.650.506.7200 oracle.com

Copyright © 2010, Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved. This document is provided for information purposes only and the contents hereof are subject to change without notice. This document is not warranted to be error-free, nor subject to any other warranties or conditions, whether expressed orally or implied in law, including implied warranties and conditions of merchantability or fitness for a particular purpose. We specifically disclaim any liability with respect to this document and no contractual obligations are formed either directly or indirectly by this document. This document may not be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, for any purpose, without our prior written permission. Oracle and Java are registered trademarks of Oracle and/or its affiliates. Other names may be trademarks of their respective owners. AMD, Opteron, the AMD logo, and the AMD Opteron logo are trademarks or registered trademarks of Advanced Micro Devices. Intel and Intel Xeon are trademarks or registered trademarks of Intel Corporation. All SPARC trademarks are used under license and are trademarks or registered trademarks of SPARC International, Inc. UNIX is a registered trademark licensed through X/Open Company, Ltd. 0110

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