Overviewing Directories for R/3 With Oracle On Windows NT

Overview

Chapter 4: Overviewing Directories for R/3 With Oracle On Windows NT

Contents
Overview ................................................................
................................................................................................
................................................................
................................................................
..................................................
..................4–1
4–1
Planning the Distribution of the SAP System to Disks .......................................................................................................................... 4–1
Distribution.......................................................................................................................................................................................... 4–2
Archives and Reorganization ............................................................................................................................................................... 4–3
Mirrored Log Files ............................................................................................................................................................................... 4–3
Database Files.................................................................................................................................................................................... 4–3
The Oracle Control Files................................
Files................................................................
................................................................
................................................................
............................................................
............................4–34–3
Recommendations .............................................................................................................................................................................. 4–5

Overview
This chapter describes the directory structure of an R/3 Oracle system on a Windows NT platform.
We recommend that you install only one SAP System on a computer. The reason for this limitation is a
special feature of Oracle software storage under Windows NT. The Oracle software is stored only once for
each computer. For example, if you had a test and a production system on one computer, both systems
would have to work with the same Oracle software version. An upgrade or migration of the Oracle
software would be required for both SAP Systems at the same time.
For systems of central importance, we recommend that you mirror the complete SAP System using
hardware utilities. You should at least mirror the online redo logs and the control files with ORACLE
software utilities.
If possible, disks with many I/Os (for example, redo log files) should have a separate controller.

Planning the Distribution of the SAP System to Disks

This section describes the base directories needed and the requirements to be met when distributing the
SAP system to disks.
A central system requires the base directories listed below. In a standard installation, these directories are
installed with the sizes that are specified in the file SAPFS.INF. The file is located on the CD "SAP
KERNEL" in the directory <CD-DRIVE>:\NT\<Hardware Platform>. (e.g. D:\NT\I386\SAPFS.INF
contains the disk layout for Intel platform on Windows NT).
Base directories required in a central system are:

\usr\sap
\usr\sap\trans
\orant
\oracle\<SAPSID>\origlogA
\oracle\<SAPSID>\origlogB
\oracle\<SAPSID>\mirrlogA (only required if origlogA is not mirrored by hardware)
\oracle\<SAPSID>\mirrlogB (only required if origlogB is not mirrored by hardware)
\oracle\<SAPSID>\sapdata1

 1996 SAP Technology, Inc. 4–1

Overviewing Directories for R/3 With Oracle On Windows NT
Overview

\oracle\<SAPSID>\sapdata2
\oracle\<SAPSID>\sapdata3
\oracle\<SAPSID>\sapdata4
\oracle\<SAPSID>\sapdata5
\oracle\<SAPSID>\sapdata6
\oracle\<SAPSID>\saparch
\oracle\<SAPSID>\sapreorg
\oracle\<SAPSID>\saptrace
\oracle\<SAPSID>\sapbackup
\oracle\<SAPSID>\sapcheck
\oracle\<SAPSID>\sapstat

These directories are created automatically during the installation.

All directories except \orant must have Full Control (All) (All) for Everyoneaccess rights at the highest level.
Check the access rights, especially when you store directories on previously formatted disks, or on disks
already containing other data.

Distribution
For safety and performance reasons it is essential that a minimum of three logical disk volumes are used
in order to separate the online redo logs, archived redo logs, and database files. For safety reasons, it is
also advisable to distribute the following files to separate physical disks.
• The online redo logs (\oracle\<SAPSID>\origlogA and \oracle\<SAPSID>\origlogB) must reside on
a logical disk volume using RAID 1 (disk mirroring).
• The off-line redo logs (\oracle\<SAPSID>\saparch) must reside on a different logical disk volume
using RAID 1 (disk mirroring).
− For performance reasons, SAP Systems with very high data throughput should have the
directories origlogA and origlogB residing on different disks. In this case, four logical disks are
required.
• The data files ( \oracle\<SAPSID>\sapdata1through \oracle\<SAPSID>\sapdata5) should be located on
a different logical disk volume using RAID 5 (distributed parity checking).
The remaining directories can be distributed to any of the three (or four) disks:
\usr\sap
\usr\sap\trans
\orant
\oracle\<SAPSID>\sapreorg
\oracle\<SAPSID>\saptrace
\oracle\<SAPSID>\sapbackup
\oracle\<SAPSID>\sapcheck
\oracle\<SAPSID>\sapstat

Archives and Reorganization

Information about archives and reorganization:
• The database archives are stored in \oracle\<SAPSID>\saparch.

4–2  1996 SAP Technology, Inc.

 Overviewing Directories for R/3 With Oracle On Windows NT
The Oracle Control Files

• The directory \oracle\<SAPSID>\sapreorgis used when reorganizing the database.

• The archive directory \oracle\<SAPSID>\saparchshould have sufficient space for the archives between
two data backup intervals. The values depend on your application environment (reasonable values are
300 MB for an SAP System with low data throughput, and 1 GB for an SAP System with high data
throughput).

Mirrored Log Files

In a standard installation, the mirrored log files are stored in the directory \oracle\<SAPSID>\mirrlogA
and \oracle\<SAPSID>\mirrlogB.

If the mirroring of redo log files is done by hardware, it is not necessary to establish mirroring by
software. To prevent R3INST from creating these mirrored redo log files, read the chapter “Database Build
and Database Load” of the R/3 Installation on Windows NT Manual.

Database Files
The database files are distributed to the directories \oracle\<SAPSID>\sapdata1 through
\oracle\<SAPSID>\sapdata<N>. Standard sizes for the files are specified in the file SAPFS.INF.
If you want to take into account a growing data volume when creating the database, before executing
R3INST you can edit the parameter file SAPFS.INF to allocate more disk space.
Use the directories \oracle\<SAPSID>\sapdata1through \oracle\<SAPSID>\sapdata<N>exclusively for
data files of the database. Observe the SAP naming conventions to ensure trouble-free database
administration.
For performance reasons, please make sure that table and index data of a tablespace reside on different
disks. You can distinguish table data from index data as follows:
• Tablespaces with table data always end with D, for example, PSAPPOOLD.
• Tablespaces with index data always end with I, for example, PSAPPOOLI.
In installations where a large amount of customer data is expected, it is recommended to store the
following tablespaces on separate disks:
• STABD
• STABI
• BTABD
• BTABI

The Oracle Control Files

The following Oracle control files should be stored on different disks:
\oracle\<SAPSID>\origlogA\ctrl<SAPSID>.ctl
\oracle\<SAPSID>\saparch\ctrl<SAPSID>.ctl
\oracle\<SAPSID>\sapdata1\ctrl<SAPSID>.ctl
This is guaranteed in a standard installation.

 1996 SAP Technology, Inc. 4–3

Overviewing Directories for R/3 With Oracle On Windows NT
The Oracle Control Files

The following figures show how the directory \usr\sap must be shared.

Physical Directory
Structure
UNC name: Global Directories UNC name: Instance Directories
usr
\\<SAPGLOBALHOST>\sapmnt \\<SAPLOCALHOST>\saploc

sap

<SID>

sys <instance>

exe profile global work data log

run dbg opt

Figure: Directory structure on the global host

The above figure shows the directory structure of the computer, which will be referred to as the global host
in the following. The global data is stored in the global directories on the global host. This data physically
exists only once for each SAP System. Other computers access this data using the UNC name ( UNC is the
Universal Naming Convention ) \\<SAPGLOBALHOST>\SAPMNT.
In this directory name, the parameter SAPGLOBALHOST is replaced by the SAP System with the name of
the global host. The global host accesses its own instance-specific data via
\\<SAPLOCALHOST>\SAPLOC. The parameters SAPGLOBALHOST and SAPLOCALHOST have the
same value on the global host.

4–4  1996 SAP Technology, Inc.

 Overviewing Directories for R/3 With Oracle On Windows NT
The Oracle Control Files

Central System Distributed Instance

UNC name: UNC name:
usr Global Directories usr InstanceDirectories
\\<SAPGLOBALHOST>\sapmnt \\<SAPLOCALHOST>\saploc
sap sap

<SID> <SID>

sys <instance>

exe profile global work data log

Figure: Directory structure of a distributed installation

The above figure shows how the Central Instance, which runs on the global host, interacts with a
distributed instance running on another computer. The distributed instance uses the UNC name
\\<SAPGLOBALHOST>\SAPMNT to access the global directories. To access local instance-specific data,
the distributed instance uses the UNC name \\<SAPLOCALHOST>\SAPLOC. In this case the value of
the parameter SAPGLOBALHOST is not the same as the value of SAPLOCALHOST.

Recommendations
The R/3 Directory Tree will be created for you by the installation tool, assuming “standard” sizes which
are sufficient in most cases. However you may consider the following:
• Since SAP traces for the instance are created in the directory \usr\sap, sufficient space should be
available in this directory. Changes in SAP profiles may also affect the disk space (for example, the
size of the Roll Area). If you create the subdirectory \SYS (global data) locally on application or
presentation servers, you have to distribute the software for the R/3 System manually when
upgrading to a new SAP release. SAP does not provide support in this case.
• If you wish to use the transport system, an additional space in the directory named \usr\sap\trans is
required. Since the required storage size differs depending on the transport volume, we can not
specify the required amount of free disk space. We recommend that you reserve 20 MB per user of the
transport system, with a minimum of 200 MB.

 1996 SAP Technology, Inc. 4–5

Overviewing Directories for R/3 With Oracle On Windows NT
The Oracle Control Files

For further details refer to…

R/3 System Administration Made Easy

Overviewing Disk Layout for R/3 with Oracle on Windows NT (Ch. 3)

Installing R/3 Version 3.0E with Oracle on Windows NT (Ch. 5)

Completing and Checking the Central Instance Installation of R/3 3.0E with Oracle on Win. NT (Ch. 6)

Checking the Windows NT Technical Environment of an R/3 System (Ch. 97)

R/3 Basis Knowledge Products

System Logistics CD Reference → Pre-Installation → R/3 System Installation → Disk Layout

→ Directories for R/3 on Windows NT

Basis Courses

R/3 Installation on Windows NT (PABC90)

4–6  1996 SAP Technology, Inc.