Autoconfig

An Oracle Applications instance has its configuration details that are stored and used in
multiple files. Managing these configurations manually would have been a big issue
without autoconfig. People who have worked with 11.0.3 and earlier versions would
understand the pain better than anyone else. Though in 11.0.3 the number of
configuration files were numbered and could be tracked with a little effort.

But not so in the case of 11i.Thankfully we have autoconfig to do up the messy job for us
now.

Autoconfig is a utility, which is shipped with the latest releases of Oracle Applications
that manages all the configuration files in oracle Applications.

Autoconfig has been defined by oracle 'as a tool which that simplifies and standardizes
configuration management tasks in an Oracle Applications environment'.

But where does autoconfig get the configuration information?

For this autoconfig relies on a file called the context file.
The context file is an XML file in the format [sid]_[hostname]. Xml
This xml file stores all the configuration details of your oracle applications system like
the web port number, database names etc.

There are separate context files for the database tier and the applications tier.
The [context_name] variable used here is an equivalent of [sid]_[hostname]

The location of the context file on the application tier is

$APPL_TOP/admin/[context_name].xml

The location of the context file for the database tier is

$ORACLE_HOME/appsutil/[context_name].xml

Additionally if the applications are spread across multiple nodes each node will have its
separate context file.
Autoconfig reads the information that is present in these context files and updates the
corresponding configuration files like appsweb.cfg, jserv.conf to name a couple.

But how do these context files get the information from?

In previous versions of Oracle Applications we had a utility called the context editor
which was used to update the context files.
This has now been replaced by the Oracle Applications Manager.
Context files should now be edited only through OAM and never manually.

In case the context file is lost, you can regenerate your context file using the adbldxml.pl
script
Once a particular context value is updated in OAM and saved, the changes are not
propagated across the configuration files till you run autoconfig.

Apart form the context file autoconfig also makes use of the template files. Each
configuration files that is going to be updated by autoconfig had a corresponding
template file. Autoconfig compares the value from the context file with the template file
before writing into the corresponding configuration file.

Driver files are also used by autoconfig, the driver files contain specific commands that
may be required to be executed to update certain values at the database level.

Adautocfg.sh calls adconfig.sh from $AD_TOP/bin which inturn calls adconfig.pl from
$AD_TOP/bin.
Don't forget to take backup of Context file before executing autoconfig.

The applications environment must be set before executing autoconfig, also since
autoconfig will require a connection to your database you must ensure that the
database and listener is up before running autoconfig.

Context file or autoconfig configuration file stores configuration in these main tags for
Application Tier. Tags include:

oa_context : For Start of Context file & context related information

oa_system : System related information under this there are further sections
which I'll discuss in next post
oa_host : Information specific to local hosts like users, groups, Apps User,
Groups..
oa_install : Installation related information like type of FS, Installation Location
oa_environments : environment specific information this tag has further
subsections
oa_processes : this section is related to processes for forms, apache, reports, cm
i.e. for all services
oa_custom : This section contain any custom setting (If any)
I'll explain subsections under this main section in my coming posts & few
important parameters

Template Files in AutoConfig

How Autoconfig populate/creates files

Use template files under each product top or tech stack directory in oracle
Applications 11i.
Example:
If you go to $IAS_ORACLE_HOME/appsutil/template directory, all template
files related to iAS ORACLE HOME like http.conf, jserv.conf, zone.properties
are stored in this their respective directories under template directory.
So template file to create httpd.conf is stored in
$IAS_ORACLE_HOME/appsutil/template/Apache/Apache/conf
similarly template file for jserv.conf will be in
$IAS_ORACLE_HOME/appsutil/template/Apache/Jserv/etc

In these directories you will see file like httpd.conf or jserv.conf with parameter
like
ApJServGroup OACoreGroup 1 1
%s_weboh_oh%/Apache/Jserv/etc/jserv.properties (in jserv.conf under
template directory)
or
ServerAdmin applmgr@%s_domainname% (in httpd.conf under template
directory)

Now when Autoconfig executes , its picks up these files & replaces parameters
like
%s_weboh_oh% & %s_domainname% from Autoconfig Configuration File
i.e. Context file or XML file of format SID_HOSTNAME.xml