Common Oracle Installation and RAC Deployment Bugs—and How to Fix Them

Introduction

This document collects common deployment bugs encountered when installing Oracle Database (single‑instance and RAC) across versions 10g, 11g, 12c and 19c on Linux, and provides concrete remediation steps.

1. Oracle version – Linux compatibility

Oracle is officially supported only on specific Linux distributions. Using an unsupported distribution increases the likelihood of installation‑time failures.

2. 10g deployment bug

During silent vipca execution on a RAC node the following error may appear:

/home/oracle/crs/oracle/product/10/crs/jdk/jre//bin/java: error while loading shared libraries: libpthread.so.0: cannot open shared object file: No such file or directory

Fix (apply on the second node before running the script):

Edit /u01/crs/oracle/product/10.2.0/crs/bin/vipca and add the following around the existing code:

if [ "$arch" = "i686" -o "$arch" = "ia64" ]; then
    LD_ASSUME_KERNEL=2.4.19
    export LD_ASSUME_KERNEL
fi
unset LD_ASSUME_KERNEL

Perform the same edit for /u01/crs/oracle/product/10.2.0/crs/bin/srvctl.

Run the CRS root script on the second node: /u01/crs/oracle/product/10.2.0/crs/root.sh If the error persists, configure the network interfaces manually with oifcfg commands, e.g.:

./oifcfg getif
./oifcfg iflist
./oifcfg setif -global eth0/192.168.1.0:public
./oifcfg setif -global eth1/192.168.6.0:cluster_interconnect

3. 11g deployment bugs

3.1 DB installation bug (Linux 7)

Installation of Oracle 11gR2 on RHEL 7 may fail with missing make targets.

$(SYSMANBIN)nmumc $(SYSMANBIN)emagtmc:
    $(MK_EMAGENT_NMUMC)
$(SYSMANBIN)emdctl:
    $(MK_EMAGENT_NMECTL) -lnnz11

Modify $ORACLE_HOME/sysman/lib/ins_emagent.mk to include the above definitions.

3.2 RAC cluster deployment bugs

3.2.1 Ohasd service failure on RHEL 7

During root.sh execution the error “ohasd failed to start” occurs because RHEL 7 uses systemd instead of SysV init.

Create a systemd unit file /usr/lib/systemd/system/ohas.service with the following content:

[Unit]
Description=Oracle High Availability Services
After=syslog.target

[Service]
ExecStart=/etc/init.d/init.ohasd run > /dev/null 2>&1
Type=simple
Restart=always

[Install]
WantedBy=multi-user.target

Enable and start the service:

systemctl daemon-reload
systemctl enable ohas.service
systemctl start ohas.service
systemctl status ohas.service

3.2.2 Missing inittab entry on RHEL 6

After a reboot the ohasd service does not start because the legacy /etc/inittab entry is absent.

Comment out the old line in /etc/inittab and create an Upstart job /etc/init/init-oracle.conf:

# Comment out in /etc/inittab
#h1:35:respawn:/etc/init.d/init.ohasd run > /dev/null 2>&1

# /etc/init/init-oracle.conf
start on runlevel [0123456]
stop on runlevel [016]
respawn
exec /etc/init.d/init.ohasd run > /dev/null 2>&1

Set correct permissions:

chmod 555 /etc/init/init-oracle.conf

4. 12c deployment bug

4.1 root.sh failure

The grid installation may abort with a Perl error in rootcrs.pl. Apply the appropriate PSU patch before re‑running root.sh and reset the environment:

export ORACLE_HOME=/u01/app/12.2.0/grid
cd /u01/app/12.2.0/grid/rdbms/lib
# (optional) make client_sharedlib libasmclntsh12.ohso libasmperl12.ohso
./gridSetup.sh -applyPSU /opt/33583921
/root.sh

4.2 Diskgroup incomplete errors

After cluster installation the database may report:

WARNING: group 2 (DATA) has missing disks
ORA-15040: diskgroup is incomplete

Correct ownership and permissions of the oracle binary:

chown oracle:asmadmin /u01/app/oracle/product/12.2.0/dbhome_1/bin/oracle
chmod 6751 /u01/app/oracle/product/12.2.0/dbhome_1/bin/oracle

5. 19c deployment bugs

5.1 Makefile library link errors

Installation can fail with:

[FATAL] Error in invoking target ‘libasmclntsh19.ohso libasmperl19.ohso client_sharedlib’

Ensure that all required .so files in $ORACLE_HOME/lib have correct symbolic links (e.g., libclntsh.so -> libclntsh.so.19.1). Re‑create missing links, then run: relink all and retry the installation.

5.2 Password‑less SSH connectivity failure (INS‑44000)

OpenSSH 8.x changes break the installer’s password‑less SSH check. Replace the system scp with a wrapper that forwards the -T option:

# Backup original scp
mv /usr/bin/scp /usr/bin/scp.orig

# Create wrapper
cat > /usr/bin/scp <<'EOF'
#!/bin/bash
/usr/bin/scp.orig -T "$@"
EOF
chmod 555 /usr/bin/scp

# After installation, restore original
mv /usr/bin/scp.orig /usr/bin/scp

6. Summary

The above troubleshooting procedures address frequent Oracle Database installation and RAC cluster deployment failures across versions 10g‑19c on various Linux releases. Applying the listed script modifications, configuration adjustments, and patch steps helps DBAs avoid or resolve these common errors.