Working with option groups in RDS Custom for Oracle - Amazon Relational Database Service
Overview of option groups in RDS Custom for OracleOracle time zone
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Working with option groups in RDS Custom for Oracle

RDS Custom uses option groups to enable and configure additional features. An option group specifies features, called options, that are available for an RDS Custom for Oracle DB instance. Options can have settings that specify how the option works. When you associate an RDS Custom for Oracle DB instance with an option group, the specified options and option settings are enabled for this instance. For general information about option groups in Amazon RDS, see Working with option groups.

Overview of option groups in RDS Custom for Oracle

To enable options for your Oracle database, add them to an option group, and then associate the option group with your DB instance. For more information, see Working with option groups.

Summary of RDS Custom for Oracle options

RDS Custom for Oracle supports the following options for a DB instance.

Option Option ID Description

Oracle time zone

Timezone

The time zone used by your RDS Custom for Oracle DB instance.

Basic steps for adding an option to an RDS Custom for Oracle DB instance

The general procedure for adding an option to your RDS Custom for Oracle DB instance is the following:

  1. Create a new option group, or copy or modify an existing option group.

  2. Add the option to the option group.

  3. Associate the option group with your DB instance when you create or modify it.

Creating an option group for in RDS Custom for Oracle

You can create a new option group that derives its settings from the default option group. You then add one or more options to the new option group. Or, if you already have an existing option group, you can copy that option group with all of its options to a new option group. To learn how to copy an option group, see Copying an option group.

The default option groups for RDS Custom for Oracle are the following:

  • default:custom-oracle-ee

  • default:custom-oracle-se2

  • default:custom-oracle-ee-cdb

  • default:custom-oracle-se2-cdb

When you create an option group, the settings are derived from the default option group. After you have added the TIME_ZONE option, you can then associate the option group with your DB instance.

One way of creating an option group is by using the Amazon Web Services Management Console.

To create a new option group by using the console

  1. Sign in to the Amazon Web Services Management Console and open the Amazon RDS console at https://console.amazonaws.cn/rds/.

  2. In the navigation pane, choose Option groups.

  3. Choose Create group.

  4. In the Create option group window, do the following:

    1. For Name, type a name for the option group that is unique within your Amazon account. The name can contain only letters, digits, and hyphens.

    2. For Description, type a brief description of the option group. The description is used for display purposes.

    3. For Engine, choose any of the following RDS Custom for Oracle DB engines:

      • custom-oracle-ee

      • custom-oracle-se2

      • custom-oracle-ee-cdb

      • custom-oracle-se2-cdb

    4. For Major engine version, choose a major engine version supported by RDS Custom for Oracle. For more information, see Supported Regions and DB engines for RDS Custom for Oracle.

  5. To continue, choose Create. To cancel the operation instead, choose Cancel.

To create an option group, use the Amazon CLI create-option-group command with the following required parameters.

  • --option-group-name

  • --engine-name

  • --major-engine-version

  • --option-group-description

Example

The following example creates an option group named testoptiongroup, which is associated with the Oracle Enterprise Edition DB engine. The description is enclosed in quotation marks.

For Linux, macOS, or Unix:

aws rds create-option-group \
    --option-group-name testoptiongroup \
    --engine-name custom-oracle-ee-cdb \
    --major-engine-version 19 \
    --option-group-description "Test option group for a Custom Oracle CDB"

For Windows:

aws rds create-option-group ^
    --option-group-name testoptiongroup ^
    --engine-name custom-oracle-ee-cdb ^
    --major-engine-version 19 ^
    --option-group-description "Test option group for a Custom Oracle CDB"

To create an option group, call the Amazon RDS API CreateOptionGroup operation.

Associating an option group with an RDS Custom for Oracle DB instance

You can associate your option group with a new or existing DB instance:

Oracle time zone

To change the system time zone used by your RDS Custom for Oracle DB instance, use the time zone option. For example, you might change the time zone of a DB instance to be compatible with an on-premises environment, or a legacy application. The time zone option changes the time zone at the host level. Changing the time zone impacts all date columns and values, including SYSDATE and SYSTIMESTAMP.

Time zone option settings in RDS Custom for Oracle

Amazon RDS supports the following settings for the time zone option.

Option setting Valid values Description

TIME_ZONE

One of the available time zones. For the full list, see Available time zones in RDS Custom for Oracle.

The new time zone for your DB instance.

Available time zones in RDS Custom for Oracle

You can use the following values for the time zone option.

Zone Time zone

Africa

Africa/Cairo, Africa/Casablanca, Africa/Harare, Africa/Lagos, Africa/Luanda, Africa/Monrovia, Africa/Nairobi, Africa/Tripoli, Africa/Windhoek

America

America/Araguaina, America/Argentina/Buenos_Aires, America/Asuncion, America/Bogota, America/Caracas, America/Chicago, America/Chihuahua, America/Cuiaba, America/Denver, America/Detroit, America/Fortaleza, America/Godthab, America/Guatemala, America/Halifax, America/Lima, America/Los_Angeles, America/Manaus, America/Matamoros, America/Mexico_City, America/Monterrey, America/Montevideo, America/New_York, America/Phoenix, America/Santiago, America/Sao_Paulo, America/Tijuana, America/Toronto

Asia

Asia/Amman, Asia/Ashgabat, Asia/Baghdad, Asia/Baku, Asia/Bangkok, Asia/Beirut, Asia/Calcutta, Asia/Damascus, Asia/Dhaka, Asia/Hong_Kong, Asia/Irkutsk, Asia/Jakarta, Asia/Jerusalem, Asia/Kabul, Asia/Karachi, Asia/Kathmandu, Asia/Kolkata, Asia/Krasnoyarsk, Asia/Magadan, Asia/Manila, Asia/Muscat, Asia/Novosibirsk, Asia/Rangoon, Asia/Riyadh, Asia/Seoul, Asia/Shanghai, Asia/Singapore, Asia/Taipei, Asia/Tehran, Asia/Tokyo, Asia/Ulaanbaatar, Asia/Vladivostok, Asia/Yakutsk, Asia/Yerevan

Atlantic

Atlantic/Azores, Atlantic/Cape_Verde

Australia

Australia/Adelaide, Australia/Brisbane, Australia/Darwin, Australia/Eucla, Australia/Hobart, Australia/Lord_Howe, Australia/Perth, Australia/Sydney

Brazil

Brazil/DeNoronha, Brazil/East

Canada

Canada/Newfoundland, Canada/Saskatchewan

Etc

Etc/GMT-3

Europe

Europe/Amsterdam, Europe/Athens, Europe/Berlin, Europe/Dublin, Europe/Helsinki, Europe/Kaliningrad, Europe/London, Europe/Madrid, Europe/Moscow, Europe/Paris, Europe/Prague, Europe/Rome, Europe/Sarajevo

Pacific

Pacific/Apia, Pacific/Auckland, Pacific/Chatham, Pacific/Fiji, Pacific/Guam, Pacific/Honolulu, Pacific/Kiritimati, Pacific/Marquesas, Pacific/Samoa, Pacific/Tongatapu, Pacific/Wake

US

US/Alaska, US/Central, US/East-Indiana, US/Eastern, US/Pacific

UTC

UTC

Considerations for setting the time zone in RDS Custom for Oracle

If you choose to set the time zone for your DB instance, consider the following:

  • When you add the time zone option, a brief outage occurs while your DB instance is automatically restarted.

  • If you accidentally set the time zone incorrectly, you must recover your DB instance to its previous time zone setting. For this reason, we strongly suggest that you to use one of the following strategies before you add the time zone option to your instance:

    • If your RDS Custom for Oracle DB instance uses the default option group, take a snapshot of your DB instance. For more information, see Creating an RDS Custom for Oracle snapshot.

    • If your DB instance currently uses a nondefault option group, take a snapshot of your DB instance, and then create a new option group with the time zone option.

  • We strongly recommend that you back up your DB instance manually after applying the Timezone option.

  • We strongly recommend that you to test the time zone option on a test DB instance before you add it to a production DB instance. Adding the time zone option can cause problems with tables that use system date to add dates or times. We recommend that you analyze your data and applications to assess the impact of changing the time zone.

Limitations for the time zone setting in RDS Custom for Oracle

Note the following limitations:

  • You can't change your timezone directly on your host without moving it outside the support perimeter. To change your database timezone, you must create an option group.

  • Because the time zone option is a persistent option (but not a permanent option), you can't do the following:

    • Remove the option from an option group after you add the option.

    • Modify the time zone setting of the option to a different time zone.

  • You can't associate multiple option groups with your RDS Custom for Oracle DB instance.

  • You can't set the time zone for individual PDBs within a CDB.

Adding the time zone option to an option group

The default option groups for RDS Custom for Oracle are the following:

  • default:custom-oracle-ee

  • default:custom-oracle-se2

  • default:custom-oracle-ee-cdb

  • default:custom-oracle-se2-cdb

When you create an option group, the settings are derived from the default option group. For general information about option groups in Amazon RDS, see Working with option groups.

Console

To add the time zone option to an option group

  1. Sign in to the Amazon Web Services Management Console and open the Amazon RDS console at https://console.amazonaws.cn/rds/.

  2. In the navigation pane, choose Option groups.

  3. Choose the option group that you want to modify, and then choose Add option.

  4. In the Add option window, do the following:

    1. Choose Timezone.

    2. In Option settings, choose a time zone.

    3. To enable the option on all associated RDS Custom for Oracle DB instances as soon as you add it, for Apply Immediately, choose Yes. If you choose No (the default), the option is enabled for each associated DB instances during its next maintenance window.

    4. Important

      If you add the time zone option to an existing option group that is already attached to one or more DB instances, a brief outage occurs while all the DB instances are automatically restarted.

  5. When the settings are as you want them, choose Add option.

  6. Back up the RDS Custom for Oracle DB instances whose time zones were updated. For more information, see Creating an RDS Custom for Oracle snapshot.

Amazon CLI

The following example uses the Amazon CLI add-option-to-option-group command to add the Timezone option and the TIME_ZONE option setting to an option group called testoptiongroup. The time zone is set to America/Los_Angeles.

For Linux, macOS, or Unix:

aws rds add-option-to-option-group \
    --option-group-name "testoptiongroup" \
    --options "OptionName=Timezone,OptionSettings=[{Name=TIME_ZONE,Value=America/Los_Angeles}]" \
    --apply-immediately

For Windows:

aws rds add-option-to-option-group ^
    --option-group-name "testoptiongroup" ^
    --options "OptionName=Timezone,OptionSettings=[{Name=TIME_ZONE,Value=America/Los_Angeles}]" ^
    --apply-immediately

Removing the time zone option

The time zone option is a persistent option, but not a permanent option. You can't remove the option from an option group after you add it. To disassociate the old option group from your DB instance:

  1. Create a new option group with an updated Timezone option.

  2. Associate the new option group with your DB instance when you modify the instance.