Throughout history, advances in technology have come in spurts. A single great idea can often spur rapid change as the idea takes hold and is propagated, often in totally unexpected directions. Exadata embodies such a change in how we think about and manage relational databases. The key change lies in the concept of offloading SQL processing to the storage layer. That concept is a huge win, and its implementation in the form of Exadata is truly a game changer.

Expert Oracle Exadata will give you a look under the covers at how the combination of hardware and software that comprise Exadata actually work. Authors Kerry Osborne, Randy Johnson, and Tanel Poder share their real-world experience, gained through multiple Exadata implementations with the goal of opening up the internals of the Exadata platform. This book is intended for readers who want to understand what makes the platform tick and for whom—"how" it does what it is does is as important as what it does. By being exposed to the features that are unique to Exadata, you will gain an understanding of the mechanics that will allow you to fully benefitfrom the advantages that the platform provides.

• Will changes the wayyou think about managing SQL performance and processing
• Provides a roadmap to laying out the Exadata platform to best support your existing systems
• Dives deeply into the internals, removing the “black box” mystique and showing how Exadata actually works
What you’ll learn
• Configure Exadata from the ground up
• Optimize for mixed OLTP/DW workloads
• Migrate large data sets from existing systems
• Connect Exadata to external systems
• Support consolidation strategies using the Resource Manager
• Configure high-availability features of Exadata, including real application clusters (RAC) and automatic storage management (ASM)
• Apply tuning strategies utilizing the unique features of Exadata
Who this book is for
Expert Oracle Exadata is for database administrators and developers who want to understand what makes Exadata unique so that they can take advantage of all the platform has to offer. It is also for anyone who needs to plan and execute migrations of systems to the Exadata platform. Finally, the book will be invaluable to those who support and maintain such systems.
Table of Contents
17. What Is Exadata?
18. Offloading / Smart Scan
19. Hybrid Columnar Compression
20. Storage Indexes
21. Exadata Smart Flash Cache
22. Exadata Parallel Operations
23. Resource Management
24. Configuring Exadata
25. Recovering Exadata
26. Exadata Wait Events
27. Understanding Exadata Performance Metrics
28. Monitoring Exadata Performance
29. Migrating to Exadata
30. Storage Layout
31. Compute Node Layout
32. Unlearning Some Things We Thought We Knew