4 Installing Products Using Oracle Universal Installer

Getting Help While Installing Oracle Products

At any time while installing your product, click Help for information about the screens specific to your installation.

Oracle Universal Installer provides two kinds of online help

• Generic online help provided with every copy of Oracle Universal Installer.

  These topics describe the screens and dialog boxes that every Oracle Universal Installer user sees, regardless of the product they are installing.

• Online help specific to a particular installation.

  These topics are created by the product developer and describe the screens and dialog boxes specific to the product you are installing. For example, the help topic for the Installation Types page is often a custom help topic created by the installation developer that describes the specific installation types for the product you are installing.

After you view an online help topic, choose Navigator from the Tools menu to display the navigator pane. From the navigator pane, you can browse the table of contents, select other topics, or search for a particular word or phrase in the online help.

About the ORAPARAM.INI File

The oraparam.ini file is the initialization file for Oracle Universal Installer. This file includes information that defines the behavior of certain Oracle Universal Installer features. Each product installation possesses a unique oraparam.ini file.

In general, you should not have to edit the contents of this file, but in certain situations, understanding the contents of this file can help you troubleshoot problems and understand certain aspects of the Oracle Universal Installer product.

For example, for most installations, Oracle Universal Installer provides a default value on the File Locations page that points to the location of the product's installation kit or stage. This default value is stored in the oraparam.ini file. The oraparam.ini file also identifies the location of the Java Runtime Environment (JRE) required for the installation.

In the staging area, it is located in the same directory as the executable file. For example:

For UNIX systems:

cd/<Product_Shiphome_Location>/install/solaris/runInstaller
cd/<Product_Shiphome_Location>/install/solaris/OraParam.ini

For Windows systems:

cd\<Product_Shiphome_Location>\install\win32\setup.exe
cd\<Product_Shiphome_Location>\install\win32\OraParam.ini

In the staging area, the default OUI_LOCATION is relative to the location of the oraparam.ini file, as follows:

../../stage/

Once installed, the oraparam.ini file is located in the /oui directory.

The following table describes the parameters in the oraparam.ini file and how to use them.

Modes of Installation

You can use Oracle Universal Installer to install Oracle products in any of the three following modes:

• Interactive: Use Oracle Universal Installer's interactive mode to use the graphical user interface to walk through the installation, providing information in the installation dialogs when prompted. This method is most useful when installing a small number of products in different setups on a small number of hosts.

• Suppressed: Use Oracle Universal Installer's suppressed mode to supply the necessary information by using a combination of a response file or command line entries with certain interactive dialogs. You can choose which dialogs to suppress by supplying the information at the command line when you invoke Oracle Universal Installer. This method is most useful when an installation has a common set of parameters that can be captured in a response file, in addition to custom information that must be input by hand.

• Silent: Use Oracle Universal Installer's silent installation mode to bypass the graphical user interface and supply the necessary information in a response file. This method is most useful when installing the same product multiple times on multiple hosts. By using a response file, you can automate the installation of a product for which you know the installation parameters. For more information refer to Chapter 4, "Customizing and Creating Response Files", for detailed information on using response files and installing in silent mode.

  Note:

  You can use the -noConsole flag on Windows platform to suppress the display of messages in the console.

Installation Media

For each of these three installation modes, you can install from three different media:

• Installing from a Single CD-ROM

• Installing from Multiple CD-ROMs

• Installing from a staged HTTP location

Refer to the following sections to learn more about these different installation approaches.

../install/<platform>

./runInstaller &

http://otn.oracle.com/documentation

http://www.oracle.com/product/ouiinstall/stage/products.xml

Special Instructions for UNIX Users

The following sections describe special instructions that apply when you are installing certain products on a UNIX system.

%setenv DISPLAY <machine name>:0.0

%xhost +

Removing Oracle Products and Oracle Homes With Oracle Universal Installer

A de-installation can be performed before selecting products to install or after a successful installation.

To remove an Oracle product or Oracle home using interactive mode, perform the following steps:

1. Start Oracle Universal Installer from a CD-ROM or:

   • For Windows platforms, launch Oracle Universal Installer from the Start menu by selecting Start, Installation Products, Oracle Universal Installer.

   • For UNIX platforms, at the command line, run the script called runInstaller from the directory where it is stored, which is by default at the same level as the first Oracle home created on that host.

2. Click Deinstall Products on the "Welcome" screen.

   The Inventory panel appears.

3. Select the product(s) you want to remove from the Contents tab of the Inventory panel and click Remove. Oracle homes may also be removed in the same manner. Once an Oracle home has been removed, you can reuse its name and location to install other products.

4. The Remove Confirmation Dialog appears, asking if you want to remove the products and their dependent components. Click Yes.

Oracle Universal Installer warns you of any product dependencies that might cause problems if particular products are removed, and prompts you to confirm the de-installation.

Pay special attention to the full list of products being removed before proceeding. Oracle Universal Installer computes this list based on the dependencies of each component.

De-installing Top Level Products that Have Dependents

A top level component is the most important component of an installation. It is the installable product you see at the first installation screen. You can only install one top level component for each installation session.

When you select a specific component for removal, Oracle Universal Installer analyzes the dependency information to determine if there are other components that should be removed along with it. In general, if a component is selected for removal, the following components will be removed with it:

• All components that have a required dependency on the selected component.

• Dependents of the selected component that have no other dependents. A dependent is a component on which the top level component (dependent) has a dependency.

Silent De-installation

Not only can you perform command line installations, as described in section "Installing and Using a Response File", you can also perform command line de-installations. A command line de-installation enables you to remove Oracle products or Oracle homes from your system without using the Oracle Universal Installer graphical user interface.

You can choose to display no dialog boxes or prompts to the user, or you can selectively avoid displaying certain dialog boxes that are normally used during a de-installation.

setup.exe -deinstall -silent (on Windows)
./runInstaller -deinstall -silent (on UNIX)

./runInstaller -deinstall -silent DEINSTALL_LIST={"component1","1.0.1.2"}

setup.exe -deinstall -silent session:SHOW_DEINSTALL_PROGRESS=false
   session:SHOW_DESINSTALL_CONFIRMATION=false

./runInstaller -deinstall -silent session:SHOW_DEINSTALL_PROGRESS=false
   session:SHOW_DESINSTALL_CONFIRMATION=false

Starting Oracle Universal Installer

Oracle Universal Installer is installed on your system during the installation of your Oracle products:

\Program Files\Oracle\oui (on Windows)
At the same level as <oraInventory> (on UNIX)

For all platforms, the executable file (setup.exe or runInstaller.sh) is located in the following directory:

<oui_location>/bin

A new version of Oracle Universal Installer replaces its older version.

Oracle Universal Installer is placed under "Independent Products" in the Inventory panel as a "non-Oracle home" product.

To start Oracle Universal Installer:

• On Windows platforms, select Start, Programs, Oracle Installation Products, Oracle Universal Installer.

• On UNIX, execute ./runInstaller from the directory where it is installed.

  For example: if the <oraInventory> is /u01/oracle/oraInventory, then, Oracle Universal Installer will be at /u01/oracle/oui.

A runInstaller.sh script is also available, so that users can launch Oracle Universal Installer directly from a different directory.

When Oracle Universal Installer is first installed and run, it checks for the JRE path (the location from which it runs), using the location specified in the oraparam.ini file's JRE_LOCATION parameter. If Oracle Universal Installer cannot find the JRE specified, an error is returned.

Command Line Arguments

Following is the output from the runInstaller -help command, which gives you the full list of command line options and their descriptions, as well as command line variables usage:

Usage:
runInstaller [-options] [(<CommandLineVariable=Value>)*]
Where options include:
-clusterware oracle.crs,<crs version> Version of Cluster ready services installed.
-crsLocation <Path> Used only for cluster installs, specifies the path to the crs home
location. Specifying this overrides CRS information obtained from central inventory.
-invPtrLoc <full path of oraInst.loc> Unix only. To point to a different inventory location.The orainst.loc file contains:

inventory_loc=<location of central inventory>
inst_group=<>
-jreLoc <location> Path where Java Runtime Environment is installed. OUI cannot be run
 without it.
-logLevel <level> To filter log messages that have a lesser priority level than <level>.
 Valid options are: severe, warning, info, config, fine, finer, finest, basic, general,
 detailed, trace. The use of basic, general, detailed, trace is deprecated.
-paramFile <location of file> Specify location of oraparam.ini file to be used by OUI.
-responseFile <Path> Specifies the response file and path to use.
-sourceLoc  <location of products.xml> To specify the shiphome location.
-addLangs To add new languages to an already installed product.
-addNode For adding node(s) to the installation.
-attachHome For attaching homes to the OUI inventory.
-cfs Indicates that the Oracle home specified is on cluster file system
(shared). This is mandatory when '-local' is specified so that Oracle
Universal Installer can register the home appropriately into the inventory.
-clone For making an Oracle Home copy match its current environment.
-debug For getting the debug information from OUI.
-deinstall For deinstall operations.
-detachHome For detaching homes from the OUI inventory without deleting
inventory directory inside Oracle home.
-enableRollingUpgrade Used in cluster environment, to enable upgrade of a product on a
subset of nodes (on which the product was installed).
-executeSysPrereqs Execute system pre-requisite checks and exit.
-force Allowing silent mode installation into a non-empty directory.
-help Displays above usage.
-ignorePatchConflicts Ignore all conflicts with existing interim patches during an
upgrade. The conflicting interim patches are removed from the home.
-ignoreSysPrereqs For ignoring the results of the system pre-requisite checks.
-local Performs the operation on the local node irrespective of the
cluster nodes specified.
-printdiskusage Log debug information for disk usage.
-printmemory Log debug information for memory usage.
-printtime Log debug information for time usage.
-record -destinationFile <Path> For record mode operation, information is recorded in the
destination file path.
-removeallfiles For removing the home directory after deinstallation of all the components.
-removeAllPatches Remove all interim patches from the home
-silent For silent mode operations, the inputs can be a response file or a
list of command line variable value pairs.
-updateNodeList For updating node list for this home in the OUI inventory.
-waitforcompletion For windows. setup.exe will wait for completion instead of
spawning the java engine and exiting.
-nobackground Do not show background image
-noclusterEnabled No cluster nodes specified.
-noconsole For suppressing display of messages to console. Console is not
allocated.
-nowarningonremovefiles To disable the warning message before removal of home directory.
-nowait For windows. Do not wait for user to hit Enter on the console
after the task (install etc.) is complete.
-formCluster To install the Oracle clusterware in order to form the cluster.
-remotecp <Path> Unix specific option. Used only for cluster installs, specifies
the path to the remote copy program on the local cluster node.
-remoteshell <Path> Unix specific option. Used only for cluster installs, specifies
the path to the remote shell program on the local cluster node.

Command Line Variables Usage
Command line variables are specified using <name=value>; for example:
[ session: | compName: | compName:version: ]variableName="valueOfVariable"]

Session/Installer variables are specified using:
[session:]varName=value
Ex 1: session:ORACLE_HOME_NAME="OraHome"
Ex 2: ORACLE_HOME_NAME="OraHome"
The lookup order is session:varName then just varName).
The session prefix is used to avoid ambiguity.

Component variables are specified using:
[compInternalName:[Version:]]varName
Ex 1: oracle.comp1:1.0.1:varName="VarValue"
Ex 2: oracle.comp1:varName="VarValue"
Ex 2: oracle.comp1:varName="VarValue"
The lookup order is compInternalName:Version:varName, then compInternalName:varName, then just varName.

Using Oracle Universal Installer Exit Codes

If you are starting and stopping Oracle Universal Installer programmatically (for example, by invoking Oracle Universal Installer using a response file), you may need to consider the exit codes generated by Oracle Universal Installer and perform a particular action depending on the code Oracle Universal Installer returns.

Oracle Universal Installer returns one of the following exit codes:

Note that:

• This feature will not work if Oracle Universal Installer is running in "bootstrap" mode. In this case setup.exe/runInstaller will just launch the JRE process and return immediately without waiting for the exit code. Oracle Universal Installer will be running in "bootstrap" mode if the following line exists in the oraparam.ini file:

  BOOTSTRAP=TRUE
  

• If you exit without installing any products (for example if you exit from the "Welcome" screen), the exit code will be -1.

Cloning Considerations

You can copy an existing Oracle home, then configure it for its new environment. This process is called "cloning."

Invoke Oracle Universal Installer in clone mode using the following command:

./runInstaller -clone ORACLE_HOME="<target location>" ORACLE_HOME_NAME="<unique name on node>" [-responseFile <full path>]

Use setup.exe instead of runInstaller for Windows machines. The -responseFile parameter is optional. Clone-time parameters may be supplied on the command line or through the response file named on the command line.

Clone-time activity is logged in the cloneActions<timestamp>.log file at installation time.

For more information on cloning refer to Chapter 6, "Oracle Software Cloning Using Oracle Universal Installer".