11i Top level directories

1.APPL_TOP
2.AU,FND,AD
3.ORA_TOP
4.DB_TOP
5.DATA_TOP

Core Technology Directories

In APPL_TOP admin,ad,au,fnd are called Core Technology Directories

Admin:

this contain files and scripts by AD utilities during upgrade and maintenance.

A SID directory contains log and out and restart containing upgrade log,output and restart files respectively
this directory contain scripts according 11i but in R12 it is changed to inst_top directory.
its contains adovers.env file,text files containing product related information used by auto upgrade and application contextfile(in R12 INST_TOP)


AU:


This contains files of all the products. Consolidated in a single location for optimal processing

A form directory contain forms of all products in .fmb format.
A report directory containing all reports of all products
A plsql directory contains library files which are used by reports
A resource directory containing libraries used by forms.


FND:

 It contains scripts and programs that are used as the foundation for all application products to build data dictionaries, forms and c object libraries.

 A secure directory contains .dbc file used in authentication process

the fnd directory contains fndenv.env environment file it is called by main environment file.(FND_TOP)

COMMON_TOP:

It is top level directory containing files used by different oracle application products and third party products.
COMMON_TOP/admin: it is default directory for log and out directory
             log:containing log files written by concurrent manager
             Out:containing out files written by concurrent manager
             install:containing scripts and log file used by rapid install
             scripts: to start services like concurrent manager and listener.
             Html: contain application html based sign-on screen and oracle html based applications HTML files.

ORA_TOP:

 It is called application technology stack.it contain two top level directories 806 home and IAS home

    806Home: oracle home for Developer6i products like forms,reports and discoverer in the respective sub directories forms60,reports60 and discwb4
             the product libraries of 806 home is used for relinking oracle executable

     IAS home:It contain oracle home 9i application server which is powered by Apache server. it contain java libraries/code for running Apache server
              Apache related files located under fallowing sub directories

              ias_home/Apache:contain all Apache related files and directories
              ias_home/Apache/Apache: contains all Apache configuration and executable files
              ias_home/Apache/Apache/jdk/: it contain java developer kit in jdk sub directory
              ias_home/Apache/Apache/jsdk: java software development kit in Jdk sub directory
              ias_home/Apache/Apache/jserv:servlet related files
              ias_home/Apache/Apache/jsp: ojsp configuration files
              ias_home/Apache/Apache/modplsql:modplsql executales and related files

Oracle Application Database file system:
It contain two top level directories DB_TOP and DATA_TOP

1. DB_TOP
 
    It contain all files needed for running and maintaining application database. It is the Oracle hoe for Application Database.
     Admin: It contain all the dump files used by the database(bdump,cdump,udump)
     Dbs: it contain init.ora file
      Network/Admin- contain Tnsnames.ora and listener.ora files

2. Data_TOP:
 
 It conatains all the data files of applications. The dbf files related to data,index redologs and system etc

Environment variables 11i and R12

$CONTEXT_NAME= <SID>_<HOSTNAME>

In 11.5..8 or prior $CONTEX_NAME used to be just <SID>. This became problem when shared appl_top come in to picture, as this name used to create context.xml file as well as many other .env files. So its changed to <SID>_<HOSTNAME> from <SID>.

Context file: Are the file <SID>_<HOSTNAME>.xml that reside APPL_TOP/admin in 11.5.10 but in R12 location changed to INST_TOP(/inst/apps/PROD_mailserver2/appl/admin/PROD_mailserver2.xml).These contain the configuration values of all components in Oracle Applications specific to the node in xml format. This is the main XML file for Oracle Application.

APPL_TOP:A directory where all Oracle 11i porducts reside.

By default we need to source APPL_TOP env file and 806_OH env file for doing activities like patching or running adadmin utilities. To ease this activity, both these files are called from another env file named APPS<CONTEXT_NAME>.env.

Below tops we  can find in <CONTEXT_NAME>.env it located under appl_top.It is the main environment file and APPS<CONTEXT_NAME>.env is the consolidated environment file.

APPL_TOP : is the top-level directory for Oracle Applications

FNDNAM :is the name of your AOL schema default is apps

GWYUID  : is the schema name and password for your public schema 

APPLCSF  : is the top-level directory in which the Concurrent Manager puts log and output files.in R12 location for                                                     APPLCSF(/maildata_test/mcgm/appstier/inst/apps/PROD_mailserver2/logs/appl/conc

APPLLOG and APPLOUT: are the subdirectories in which the Concurrent Manager puts log and output                                                  files.

APPLTMP   :is the directory in which Oracle Applications temporary files are created.

                       (/maildata_test/mcgm/appstier/inst/apps/PROD_mailserver2/appltmp)

IAS_ORACLE_HOME=/maildata_test/mcgm/appstier/apps/tech_st/10.1.3

ORACLE_HOME= /maildata_test/mcgm/appstier/apps/tech_st/10.1.2

FND_SECURE: Define the DBC file storage         location/maildata_test/mcgm/appstier/inst/apps/PROD_mailserver2/appl/fnd/12.0.0/secure

NOTE:R12 new TOP added

INST_TOP: is the top level location for all the instance specific conf,logs, pids, certs etc.

exp:/maildata_test/mcgm/appstier/inst/apps/PROD_mailserver2

LOG_HOME is the top level location for all the instance specific logs

                         /maildata_test/mcgm/appstier/inst/apps/PROD_mailserver2/logs

ADMIN_SCRIPTS_HOME is the location for all the administation scripts for application tier.

this is different form 11i and R12

11i loaction appl_topa/admin/scripts

R12:INST_TOP/admin/scripts

Environment Variables:

Main environment file Oracle Application is CONTEXT_NMAE.env file.APP< CONTEXT_NMAE>.env file calls CONTEXT_NMAE.env and 806 home and custom environment files.

After finishing above key parameters in the CONTEXT_NMAE.env  next we have to know about adovers.env file

adovers.env:

location:APPL_TOP/admin (11i and R12)

To set the environment variables for other products like Java. This file is called by the main applications environment file.

The JAVA_TOP variable indicates the top-level directory where all Java class files will be copied.

Location: /maildata_test/mcgm/appstier/apps/apps_st/comn/java/classes

The OA_JRE_TOP variable indicates the location where you have installed the Java Runtime Environment (JRE) on your machine. You do not have to set this variable, however we recommend you use this to update your CLASSPATH,LD_LIBRARY_PATH, and PATH variables rather than hardcode the location of the JRE.

Location: /maildata_test/mcgm/appstier/apps/tech_st/10.1.3/appsutil/jdk/jre

The OAH_TOP and OAD_TOP variables define the locations to which Oracle Applications copies HTML and context-sensitive documentation files. These directories must exist and must be writable by the Operating System account that owns your Oracle Applications files.

OAH_TOP : /maildata_test/mcgm/appstier/apps/apps_st/comn/webapps/oacore

OAD_TOP : /maildata_test/mcgm/appstier/apps/apps_st/comn

Fndenv.env:

Application Object Library environment setup. It calls devenv.env

It located in FND_TOP/admin but in R12 FND_TOP

applora.txt

This file lists init.ora parameters required for Running Oracle Applications.

APPL_TOP/admin

           

Shared application tier in R12

Shared Application Tier File System

We can configure multiple application node machines working with a single E-Business Suite database node. This creation of a “multi-node” E-Business Suite instance is frequently done to lower cost of ownership (many small machines are cheaper than one big one), increase fault tolerance (one machine fails, others do not), or scale the instance (support more users and a greater load).

When configuring Oracle E-Business Suite to use a shared application tier file system, the application tier node can be configured to perform any of the standard application tier services, such as Forms, Web, and Concurrent Processing (Batch).
Note the following definitions:

Node
A node/server/instance is a logical set of processes running on one hardware machine. In a single-node installation of Oracle E-Business Suite, all the Applications processes (including the database processes) run on one node, whereas in a multi-node installation, the processes are distributed across multiple nodes.
A multi-node installation of Release 12 supports both shared and non-shared application tier file systems. An application tier file system consists of:

• APPL_TOP file system (APPL_TOP and COMMON_TOP directories).
• Application tier technology stack file system (OracleAS 10.1.2 and 10.1.3 Oracle Homes).
• Instance Home (INST_TOP) file system. Each application tier has a unique Instance Home file system associated with it.

Service

A service is a functional set of Oracle E-Business Suite application processes running on one or more nodes. Where applicable, the term ’service’ is replacing the more traditional term of ’server’.

Application Tier Services

The following are the major application tier services:

• Root services
• Web Entry Point services
• Web Application services
• Batch Processing services
• Other services

So if you have two nodes,one will serve as Primary Node and other will serve as Secondry Node. You can configure both the Application tier node as follows:

Primary Application Tier Node

A primary application tier node is the first application tier node where the APPL_TOP, COMMON_TOP, OracleAS 10.1.2 Oracle Home and OracleAS 10.1.3 Oracle Home are installed and configured.

Secondary Application Tier Node

A secondary application tier node is an application tier node where APPL_TOP, COMMON_TOP, 10.1.2 Oracle Home and 10.1.3 Oracle Home are visible and configured. The APPL_TOP, COMMON_TOP, OracleAS 10.1.2 Oracle Home and OracleAS 10.1.3 Oracle Home file system is mounted to this node from the primary application tier node, or from an NFS server.
Instance Home

Note :  In a shared file system, each application tier will have a unique Instance Home, which should be located on the local file system.

Shared Application Tier File System Architecture
In a shared file system, all application tier files (with the specific exception of the Instance Home file system) are installed on a shared disk resource, which is mounted on each application tier node. Any application tier node can be configured to perform any of the standard application tier services, such as Forms, Web and Concurrent Processing (Batch) services. All changes made to the shared file system are immediately accessible to all application tier nodes.

Shared Application Tier File System Layout
When configuring Oracle E-Business Suite to use a shared application tier file system, an application tier node can be configured to perform any of the standard application tier services, such as Forms, Web, or Concurrent Processing (Batch) services. An application tier will have a unique Instance Home associated with it that cannot be shared with other application tiers. You can configure the services running on an application tier node to match the node’s intended role

Example Shared File System

The following is an example of mount points shared on each application tier node:

• COMMON_TOP: /ebiz/oracle/VIS/apps/apps_st/comn
• APPL_TOP: /ebiz/oracle/VIS/apps/apps_st/appl
• OracleAS 10.1.2 ORACLE_HOME: /ebiz/oracle/VIS/apps/tech_st/10.1.2
• OracleAS 10.1.3 ORACLE_HOME: /ebiz/oracle/VIS/apps/tech_st/10.1.3

In the figure shown below, entitled “Shared Application Tier File System”, Server-appl_node1 is the primary application tier node, and uses the file systems “/ebiz/oracle/VIS” and “/ebiz/oracle/inst”. The file system “/ebiz/oracle/inst” contains the Instance Home, and “/ ebiz/oracle/VIS ” contains the APPL_TOP, COMMON_TOP, OracleAS 10.1.2 and 10.1.3 Oracle Home.

Server-appl_node2 is the secondary application tier node, and the shared file system “/ebiz/oracle/VIS” is also mounted on this node. The file systems “/ebiz/oracle/inst/apps/VIS_appl_node1″ and “/ebiz/oracle/inst/apps/VIS_appl_node2″ are only visible on the respective nodes.

10.1.2 and 10.1.3 homes in R12

R12 file system has come up with new model – Code, Data, Configurations are segregated nicely to have easy maintenance, to avert NFS mount issues on shared appl tier configuration systems. Auto-config will not write anything in APPL_TOP, COMMON_TOP area in R12. All instance specific configurations, log files are written in INST_TOP area. Instance Home provides the ability to share Applications and technology stack code among multiple instances.

APPL-TIER

• 10.1.2 C ORACLE_HOME / FORMS ORACLE_HOME (8.0.6 ORACLE HOME equivalence)‏
• 10.1.3 Java ORACLE_HOME/OC4J ORACLE_HOME (iAS ORACLE_HOME equivalence)‏
• INSTANCE_TOP : Each application tier has a unique Instance Home file system associated

Application Server Releases and versions

There are two versions of Oracle Application server 10g (oAS10g) used

• Oracle 10gAS R2: 10.1.2 – 10.1.2.2.0
• Oracle 10gAS R3: 10.1.3.0 – 10.1.3.3
• In R12, 10.1.2 AS and 10.1.3 AS Homes are newly introduced in lieu of 8.0.6 and iAS(1.0.2.2) – 11i Architecture.

Why do we have 10.1.2. AS and 10.1.3 AS? 

• 10.1.2 AS installation will be supporting forms based applications. It is Standalone 10.1.2 forms/reports server installation. Other components are not included.
• 10.1.3 AS tech-stack will be used by java based applications. 10.1.3 AS instance brings latest OC4J code which is successor of 10.1.2 AS. 10.1.3 AS release doesn’t contain forms/reports products.

Hence to take advantage of latest oc4j code 10.1.3 AS got introduced. But to support ebiz forms applications 10.1.2 AS introduced.

 If you dig into the INST_TOP you will find that it only contains all the configuration files, start-stop scripts, log files, certificate files, pid files etc.., so as to make DB_TOP and APPL_TOP untouched for any instance specific changes. So you can also make DB_TOP and APPL_TOP read only.

INSTANCE TOP
Instance home is the top-level directory for an Applications Instance which is known as Instance Home and is denoted the environment variable $INST_TOP. This contains all the config files, log files, SSL certificates etc.

Advantages of new INSTANCE HOME

• The additional Instance Home makes the middle tier more easy to manage and organized since the data is kept separate from the config files.
• The Instance Home also has the ability to share the Applications and Technology stack code across multiple instances.
• Another advantage of the Instance Home is that the Autoconfig writes only in INST_TOP so APPL_TOP and ORACLE_HOME can also be made read only file system if required.
• To create a new instance that shares an existing middle-tier, just create a new instance_top with proper config files and NFS Mount the middle tier

INSTANCE TOP – STRUCTURE

$INST_TOP      : $APPS_BASE/inst/apps/$CONTEXT_NAME/
/admin /scripts :  ADMIN_SCRIPTS_HOME: Find all AD scripts here
/appl              :  APPL_CONFIG_HOME. For standalone envs, this is set to $APPL_TOP
/fnd/12.0.0/secure : FND_SECURE: dbc files here
/admin             : All Env Config files here
/certs               : SSL Certificates go here
/logs                : LOG_HOME: Central log file location. All log files are placed here (except adconfig)
/ora                 : ORA_CONFIG_HOME
/10.1.2             : ‘C’ Oracle home config, Contains tnsnames and forms listener servlet config files
/10.1.3             : Apache & OC4J config home, Apache, OC4J and opmn
                         This is the ‘Java’ oracle home configuration for OPMN, Apache and OC4J
/pids                : Apache/Forms server PID files here
/portal              : Apache’s DocumentRoot folder

11i application tier components

11i Oracle Application (desktoptier)

Desktop Tier

The Client interface is provided through either the HTML interface or the Professional Java interface. The HTML interface products require only a Web browser on the desktop-tier. For professional java interface products, an Oracle JInitiator enabled Web browser downloads the necessary applets on demand and are cached locally for future use.




The Forms Client applet:

Displays oracle Applications screens.
Is packaged as Java archive files.
Is cached on the desktop.
Is downloaded on demand.

The form client applet is packaged as a Java archive files(JAR).The form client applet sends user requests to form server and handles responses from the from server such as screen updates and pop-up lists. The required and commonly used JAR files are downloaded from the web server at the beginning of the clients first session. 

Oracle JInitiator:
 
The forms clint applet must run within a java vertual machine (JVM) on the desktop. For Oracle Applications the JVM is supplied by Oracle JInitiator. Oracle JInitiator works in conjuction with the Web browser.
Oracle JInitiator is implementd on the desktop client as plug-in.When end user enter the desired oracle apllication signon URL withi the web browser, Oracle JInitiator executed.Oracle Jinitiator runs the Froms client applet and starts an Oracle application sessions.

11i Architecture

Oracle Applications


A file system containing:

-- Forms that allow interactive entry and updating of data
-- Reports that allow formatted documentation and display of data
--- Concurrent programs that provide high-volume,non-interactive update of data.
---programs and sql scripts for mantaining the system
--- HTML and Java that perform certain user interface and business fuctions.

An Oracle Database containing :

-- Data objects,such as tables and indexes used to store customer data.
--Code objects, such as views,grants,synonyms and PL/sql stored procedures and triggers for performing database processing

Oracle Application and Application Technology stack

                                        Oracle Applications

                               Oracle Applicatios Products

                              Applications Technology Stack

                          Oracle Developer        Oracle IAS

                                       DAtabase server

                                       Oracle RDBMS