It has been a while since I last posted, but here I  go again.

I was recently installing Oracle Data Guard for a client that is running 11.2.0.2 on a Windows Servers 2008 system.  After configuring Data Guard I started testing the switch overs. As per the  instructions I was using  for Data Guard, I tested. I was  issuing a switchover to standby and then issuing a shutdown in the primary server. The shutdown caused Oracle to display an error ORA-01092 Oracle Instance Terminated. This was a bit disconcerting as without anything to go by it seemed that the instance had done an abort. Some research found in the alert log the following

Switchover: Primary controlfile converted to standby controlfile successfully. Switchover: Complete – Database shutdown required Completed: alter database commit to switchover to physical standby with session shutdown Fri Oct 21 10:21:15 2011 Performing implicit shutdown abort due to switchover to physical standby Shutting down instance (abort) License high water mark = 28 USER (ospid: 6244): terminating the instance Instance terminated by USER, pid = 6244 Fri Oct 21 10:21:18 2011 Instance shutdown complete ORA-1092 : opitsk aborting process

Now for me I don’t like when I issue a command and something entirely different happens, i get a little concerned. The SQLPlus session may have to be closed after this happens., as it is no longer connected to the instance.

In the absence of finding the knowledge from the documentation, it is there, I raised an SR and got a response explaining that this is in fact now the behaviour from 11.2 onwards as this allows the switchover to proceed faster. I would have liked either an error when I tried to issue the shutdown or the shutdown immediate however at this time this is not the case, I am not sure if there is any alternative with the SQLplus handling the abort

So don’t be concerned by this error if you are using Data Guard in 11.2 onwards as this is expected behaviour.

I hope this makes some else life a little easier

See ya round

Peter