How could complete reinstall of Solaris 10 affect Oracle install

We currently run Oracle V 10.2.0.3 with a few patches, and it is very stable. Our OS is Solaris 10, Generic_118833-36 patch level.

The Unix Ops group has increasingly reported various hardware and OS problems over the past year, to the point where they would like to now get the latest Solaris 10 distribution and do a total reinstall of the OS. They actually started to do that last Sunday on a second file system....if that had completed, they would have swapped the old with the new, and we would all ride off into the sunset. I thought that at most, I would just relink the executables and everything would be okay.

The Op reported to me that he encountered a number of directories and files owned by Oracle that were not part of the new Solaris distribution (of course). However, I do not know what function those files serve, except that they are part of the Sun Open Source Java initiative known as Glassfish. So, I told him to stop, because I was not sure if not having those files would affect apps like the db console, OEM, or even third party apps that access Oracle. Here are the files the Op found:

"

- Found that Oracle have file set up in /opt/SDK !?

/opt/SDK/lib/install/templates/resources/jdbc/oracle_dd_datasource.xml

/opt/SDK/lib/install/templates/resources/jdbc/oracle_inet_datasource.xml

/opt/SDK/lib/install/templates/resources/jdbc/oracle_type4_datasource.xml

He then stated:

"And I don't have SDK software on hand yet. "

"

The question is, if they continue and do the complete Solaris reinstall, will that necessitate me having to completely reinstall Oracle, or will it just be a matter of running some scripts to configure certain features. Would simply copying the directories listed above work?

Further, what might happen if the new distribution of Solaris had versions of software (e.g. SDK) that are much more current than what is there now?

why dont you just reinstall oracle, hours job at most

Assume you are "cloning" the Oracle Home and check all requirements are met as per the Oracle® Database Installation Guide 10g Release 2 (10.2) for Solaris Operating System, chapters:

2.3 Software Requirements

2.6 Configuring Kernel Parameters

B Cloning an Oracle Home


Good luck!
;)
PS: You may need to remove the oraInventory.

I should mention that we have NO problems in the current Oracle installation, which is the mama for a 3TB data warehouse, which spans two different storage arrays. The hardware is a Sunfire 6800 Sparc box.

Thanks for the tip on cloning an installation. I did not know about that one. I would likely not want to reinstall Oracle;unless I'm crazy, I think you have to uninstall it first, and I have heard that does not always clean everything up. Also, we do not have long maintenance windows, so extended outages would likely incur the wrath of the glorious leaders.

I am assuming from the answers given, that simply relinking the Oracle executables after they replace Solaris 10 with a newer distribution of that version would not work.

Re-link will work, but you want to make sure the kernel params are ok and all the libraries are there, therefore the clone simulation.
:p
PS: If you try re-link use "$OH/bin/relink all"