Sunday, August 29, 2010

Time synchronization in Oracle clusterware 11gR2

Oracle clusterware 11gR2 requires time synchronization across all nodes within a cluster when Oracle RAC is deployed. Through two ways you can do time synchronization across the cluster.
1) An operating system configured network time protocol (NTP)
2) Oracle Cluster Time Synchronization Service (ctss).

While installing Oracle Grid Infrastructure, if you don't have NTP daemons then (Oracle Cluster Time Synchronization daemon)ctssd starts up in active mode and synchronizes time among cluster members without contacting an external time server.

When Oracle sees there is NTP, then the Oracle Cluster Time Synchronization daemon (ctssd)
starts up in observer mode and no active time synchronization is performed by
Oracle Clusterware within the cluster.

In fact Oracle Cluster Time Synchronization Service is designed for organizations whose cluster servers are unable to access NTP services. For example your RAC database does not have way to access any external time server, then you can use ctssd for your clusterware installation.

If you have NTP daemons on your server but you cannot configure them to synchronize time with a time server, and you want to use Cluster Time Synchronization Service to provide synchronization service in the cluster then do the following steps.

1) Stop the existing ntpd service
# /sbin/service ntpd stop

2) Disable ntpd service from the initialization sequences
# chkconfig ntpd off

3) Remove or move the ntp.conf file.
# rm /etc/ntp.conf
or,
# mv /etc/ntp.conf /etc/ntp.conf.org

4) Also remove the ntpd.pid file which maintains the pid for the NTP daemon.
# rm /var/run/ntpd.pid

However if you are using NTP and you you prefer to continue using it instead of Cluster Time
Synchronization Service, then you need to modify the NTP configuration to set the -x flag, which prevents time from being adjusted backward.

1) Edit the /etc/sysconfig/ntpd file to add the -x flag
# vi /etc/sysconfig/ntpd
OPTIONS="-x -u ntp:ntp -p /var/run/ntpd.pid"

2) Restart the NTP service.
# /sbin/service ntp restart

Note that on SUSE systems, you have to modify the configuration file /etc/sysconfig/ntp with the
following settings:
NTPD_OPTIONS="-x -u ntp"

Related Documents
ORA-15018, ORA-15072 on 11gR2 grid node 2 when running root.sh
In 11gR2 RAC after server reboot crsd fails to startup on 2nd node
PRKP-1001, CRS-0215 while starting instance using srvctl
NTP and csstd time synchronization option to install Oracle Clusterware 11gR2
cluvfy fails with PRVF-5436 PRVF-9652 Cluster Time Synchronization Services check failed
In 11gR2 Grid root.sh fails with CRS-2674: Start of 'ora.cssd' failed
What to do after failure of Oracle 11gR2 Grid Infrastructure (CRS) Installation
Enable Archive log Mode for RAC database
List of Parameters that must have identical in RAC database
CRS Stack Fails to Start After Reboot ORA-29702 CRS-0184

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