D Oracle Interface Configuration Tool (OIFCFG) Command Reference

Starting the OIFCFG Command-Line Interface

Before you invoke OIFCFG, ensure that you have started Oracle Clusterware on at least the local node and preferably on all nodes if you intend to include the -global option on the command.

Run OIFCFG from the Grid_home/bin/ directory as the user who installed the Oracle Clusterware software. For example:

$ ./oifcfg

Run the oifcfg -help command to display online help for OIFCFG.

$ ./oifcfg -help

Name:  oifcfg - Oracle Interface Configuration Tool.

Usage:  oifcfg iflist [-p [-n]]
        oifcfg setif {-node node_name | -global} {interface_name
 /subnet:interface_type}...
        oifcfg getif [-node node_name | -global] [ -if interface_name[/subnet]
 [-type interface_type]]
        oifcfg delif [{-node node_name | -global} [interface_name[/subnet]]]
        oifcfg [-help]
 
 node_name       - name of the host, as known to a communications network
 interface_name  - name by which the interface is configured in the system
 subnet          - subnet address of the interface
 interface_type  - type of the interface {cluster_interconnect | public}

Summary of the OIFCFG Usage

This section contains the following topics:

• OIFCFG Command Format

• OIFCFG Commands

• OIFCFG Command Parameters

• OIFCFG Usage Notes

• OIFCFG Examples

OIFCFG Command Format

oifcfg iflist [-p [-n]]
oifcfg setif {-node node_name | -global} {interface_name/subnet:interface_name}...
oifcfg getif [-node node_name | -global] [ -if interface_name[/subnet] [-type interface_type]]
oifcfg delif [-node node_name | -global] [interface_name[/subnet]]
oifcfg [-help]

OIFCFG Commands

You can enter any of the OIFCFG commands listed in Table D-1.

OIFCFG Command Parameters

This section lists the parameters for the OIFCFG commands. Note that some parameters are optional, depending on which command you run.

-node node_name

The name of the Oracle Clusterware node as listed in the output from the olsnodes command. Appendix C, "OLSNODES Command Reference" describes the OLSNODES command.

-global

A network interface can be stored as a global interface (as reported by the iflist command) or as a node-specific interface:

• An interface is stored as a global interface when all of the nodes of an Oracle Real Application Clusters (Oracle RAC) cluster have the same interface connected to the same subnet. The global interface (and configuring all nodes with the same network interface for each public subnet and the same network interface for each private subnet) is not only the recommended configuration, but it is also the default installation configuration.

• An interface can be stored as a node-specific (local) interface.

  Note:

  Oracle currently does not support having different network interfaces for each node in the cluster. The best practice is to configure all nodes with the same network interface for each public subnet and the same network interface for each private subnet.

-if interface_name

The name by which the interface is configured in the system. Interface names can contain wildcard characters, for example, an asterisk (*) matches any string. However, interface names that contain wildcards should be surrounded with quotes.

Note:

If you use wildcards on pre-11.2 databases, then Oracle resolves the interface name by expanding the wildcard on the local node. Therefore, using wildcards is not recommended on clusters with pre-11.2 databases. If you use wildcards on pre-11.2 databases, then those databases must use the CLUSTER_INTERCONNECTS parameter instead.

subnet

The subnet number of the interface.

-type interface_type

The type of interface: public or cluster_interconnect.

-help

Display online help for OIFCFG commands.

OIFCFG Usage Notes

• A network interface specification takes the following form:

  interface_name/subnet:interface_type
  

  The specification uniquely identifies the network interface using the:

  • Interface name

  • Associated subnet

  • Interface type

    The interface type indicates the purpose for which the network is configured. The supported interface types are:

    • public—An interface that can be used for communication with components external to Oracle RAC instances, such as Oracle Net and Virtual Internet Protocol (VIP) addresses.

    • cluster_interconnect—A private interface used for the cluster interconnect to provide interinstance or Cache Fusion^Foot 1  communication.

    If you set the interface type to cluster_interconnect, then it affects instances as they start and changes do not take effect until you restart the instances.

  For example, the following specification identifies qfe0 as a cluster interconnect located at the address 204.152.65.0:

  qfe0/204.152.65.0:cluster_interconnect
  

• The Oracle Universal Installer uses OIFCFG to identify and display available interfaces.

• The effect of changing the interface names depends on which name you are changing, and whether you are also changing the IP address. In cases where you change only the interface names, the ramifications are minor. If you change the name for the public interface that is stored in the Oracle Cluster Registry (OCR), you must modify the nodeapps for each node. Therefore, you must stop the nodeapps for this change to take effect.

• You must restart Oracle Clusterware on all members of the cluster when you make global changes. For local changes, you need only to perform a node restart. Interconnect changes for the database occur at instance startup. However, the interconnect for Oracle Clusterware might be different.

• Because interconnects are chosen when instances start, just issuing OIFCFG commands does not have an immediate effect on the running system. Instead, changes take effect after restarting the component that might be affected by the command.

OIFCFG Examples

The following examples show some common uses for the OIFCFG commands.

Example 1   Listing the Names of Network Interfaces

You can use OIFCFG to list the interface names and the subnets of all of the interfaces available on the local node by executing the iflist keyword, as shown in this example:

oifcfg iflist
hme0     139.185.141.0
qfe0     204.152.65.0

Example 2   Retrieving Network Information

You can also retrieve specific OIFCFG information with a getif command.

oifcfg getif [ [-global | -node node_name] [-if interface_name[/subnet]]
[-type interface_type]]

For example, after you install Oracle Clusterware, you can verify that the public and cluster interconnect have been set to the desired values by entering the following commands as root:

$ oifcfg getif

This command should return values for global public and global cluster_interconnect. For example:

en0 144.25.68.0 global public
hme0 139.185.141.0 global cluster_interconnect

Example 3   Storing a Global Interface

To store an interface, use the setif keyword. For example, to store the interface hme0, with the subnet 139.185.141.0, as a global interface (to be used as an interconnect for all of the Oracle RAC instances in your cluster and Oracle Clusterware), use the command:

oifcfg setif -global hme0/139.185.141.0:cluster_interconnect

Note:

Ensure that all nodes are running when you run the setif command because Oracle cannot update Grid Plug and Play profiles on nodes that are not running.

Example 4   Deleting the Stored Interface

Use the oifcfg delif command to delete the stored configuration for global or node-specific interfaces. A specific node-specific or global interface can be deleted by supplying the interface name, with an optional subnet, on the command line.

Note:

If you only enter oifcfg delif, with no other arguments given on the command line, then OIFCFG deletes all interfaces on all nodes in the cluster.

For example, the following command deletes the global interface named qfe0 for the subnet 204.152.65.0:

oifcfg delif -global qfe0/204.152.65.0

The following command deletes all of the global interfaces assigned with OIFCFG:

oifcfg delif -global