Configuration
Since the configuration file is executed as a shell script, we have to stick to Shell rules here - i.e., no spaces left or right to the equal sign: the syntax is strictly "var=value". Do not ever remove or comment out any configuration lines, even if you want to use OSPRep's defaults, since this may lead to misbehaviour. The script relies on the settings are made in the config file.
Required Settings
The configuration shipped with OSPRep already contains useful default values for most settings. However, there are some values the developer cannot know or set up to auto-run on every system, such as usernames, passwords, the database name or the target directory to store the reports in. So these are the minimum of settings you have to make in order for OSPRep to run properly:
VariableExplanation
ORACLE_SID As already known from the Oracle setup, the ORACLE_SID is the Service IDentifier for a given database instance. In the context of OSPRep, the SID is additionally used to generate the file names for the database report files, which will be called <ORACLE_SID>.html. If you did not specify a separate connection string (see the command line parameter "-c" in the Usage section of this documentation), this value is also used to connect to the database.
user The user and password to connect to the database. Although you may override these settings using the command line parameters "-u" and "-p", this is not recommended for the password on manual calls, since the entire command line is kept in the systems process list and can be made visible by any user e.g. with the ps command, and thus the password can be sniffed. So better specify it inside the script and protect the file against unauthorized access, e.g. using the shell command "chmod 0700 <config_file>". If you need different user/password combinations, the recommendation is to use different config files, which you then can specify on the command line using the "-c" switch.
password
TMPDIR Directory to place temporary files into (these files will be removed at the end of the run of the script). The default setting, /tmp, should be fine for most systems. Just ensure that the /tmp directory is available on your system ;-)
REPDIR The directory where the reports (HTML) should be written to. Below this directory you created the "help" directory when following the installation instructions supplied with this documentation.
CSS Name of the StyleSheet the HTML reports should use, with relative path (if any). An example StyleSheet file, containing all classes needed/used by OraRep, is provided in the reports/ directory of the archive.
Optional Settings
Once you are familiar with the reports generated by OSPRep, you may want to fine-tune it a bit to better suit your requirements. For this issue, the config file provides some more settings which are to be explained here:
VariableExplanation
TOP_N_WAITS How many items to list up in the "Top N" blocks of the report for Wait objects and SQL statements
TOP_N_SQL
EXC_PERF_FOR This can be used to exclude objects of given users from some statistics. For example, it makes no sense to print long execution plans for statements generated by the system and just using system objects, since we will not go to tune these. In most cases, the preset of "SYS SYSTEM" will be fine. If you need to change this, beware its case sensitivity (must be all uppercase for current Oracle releases)
START_ID These two values specify the snapshot interval to consider. Setting the value of zero for both instructs OSPRep to automatically evaluate the interval - it will then find the latest snapshot available and consider all snapshots since the last instance startup for the report. Leaving the START_ID on zero but specifying a different END_ID will take the largest possible interval up to the given END_ID. Setting both values to a value <> 0 will take the specified interval. Be careful not to set START_ID to a non-zero value but leaving END_ID on zero - this would mean just to use the same Snapshot for both, start and end.
END_ID
MK_ALLWAITS Whether to display the "All Wait Events" block. The "Top N Wait Events" will allways be displayed, regardless of this setting.
MK_BGWAITS Whether to include the "Background Waits" segment. In normal cases, you will not need the "All Wait Events" and "Background Waits" segments (that's why they are turned off by the default configuration), but they may be useful for closer investigations.
MK_INSTACT The "Instance Activity" segment of the report can be boring sometimes, so you may suppress it here and just activate it if you really need it ;-)
MK_USSTAT Except for special occasions, the "Undo Segment Statistics" will not be needed (especially when using automatic undo management). This option will not turn off the "Undo Segment Summary" table, however.
MK_LACT "Latch Activity" will only be needed for closer investigation, so this option is turned off by the default configuration. When you will need this, the hints/online help of OSPRep will indicate it to you.
MK_LMS The "Latch Miss Sources" report is only needed by Oracle staff. The reason for this is quite easy: they are the only possible people to understand it, if anybody does. So you may turn it on just for fun (to see how it looks like), but for your normal reports you can leave it off. Besides: if you already turned the "Latch Activity" (MK_LACT) off, the "Latch Miss Sources" will be suppressed anyway.