Now that we have the printers all added, the last thing we want to do is have to rekey them all on every server.  Every time you do a manual migration, you increase the chance for errors.

We can use system-config-printer to migrate our queues at the linux level and FNDLOAD to migrate the queues in the E-Business Suite.  However, there is one manual step you must go through if you added any PPD files.

The first step in our process is to download the printers.

For linux (as root), enter the command:

system-config-printer-tui –Xexport > printers.xml

For the E-Business Suite (as oracle with the environment set for your apps tier), enter the command:

FNDLOAD apps/apps_password 0 Y DOWNLOAD $FND_TOP/patch/115/import/afcppinf.lct source_printer_def.ldt FND_PRINTER

Unfortunately, the list of printers available to Enterprise Linux distros is missing many printers used in the real world.  You can find drivers for most printers and information about how to install them at openprinting.org.

However, many of the drivers available there are for LSB 3.2 and many Enterprise Linux distros are not LSB 3.2 compliant (LSB certification provides a standard, but it moves faster than Enterprise Linux distros).

Many printers can be used as long as the correct PPD file is installed.  At openprinting.org, you can download the correct custom PPD file, and you will find the instructions for installing new drivers in cups.  Do not follow these instructions.  You need to add the PPD file through system-config-printer.  The only way I have found to do this is in the GUI version.

Run system-config-printer, click on the Action Menu and choose Import PPD.

system-config-printer

Make sure you pay attention to the order that you add PPD files.  These PPD files are added sequentially rather than with the model named.  This means that if you want to migrate the queues to another server, you need to add the PPDs in the same order or you will have to edit the printers after adding them.

After the PPD file has been added, the printer model will show up under the appropriate manufacturer containing a driver of type PPD.

One of the major concerns with My Oracle Support comes from the use of flash on the server.  One of the main reasons given is that people require the capability to download patches directly to the server.  For many users, this is a major concern since the server is frequently in a remote datacenter.  One solution for this issue is to download the patches using wget.

wget is a command line utility that is part of the GNU project.  It is a non-interactive command line tool that will download files http, https and ftp.  Oracle provides instructions for using wget in Metalink Note 841055.1 and (for now at least–it will go away when Classic Metalink is retired) as part of the login splash when you ftp to updates.oracle.com.

To use wget to download a patch, you will need to get the url behind the download button.

Right Click on the button,  select Properties and copy the address.

You can then run the command:

wget –http-user=user –http-password=password –output-document=patch.zip “pasted address”

using your My Oracle Support username and password.

For example:

wget –http-user=dba@michael-brown.org –http-passwd=yeah_right –output-document=p6890831_111070_Linux-x86.zip “http://updates.oracle.com/ARULink/Download/process_form/p6890831_111070_Linux-x86.zip?file_id=25070608&aru=10498637&userid=ml-mlbrown&email=work@mlbrown.com&patch_password=&patch_file=p6890831_111070_Linux-x86.zip”

If wget is not installed, have your system administrator install it for you.  It is available on most platforms.

Oracle has now updated note 848202.1, Installing and Troubleshooting Adobe Flash Player on Linux

This is a little bit cleaner than the workaround I posted yesterday since you do not need to replace the /usr/bin/firefox with a shell script.

However, it uses the nspluginwrapper which Oracle does not support.  The previous workaround was done using products covered by a linux support contract from Oracle (the bash script is a convenience to set the LD_LIBRARY_PATH).

Starting with Oracle Enterprise Linux 4 x86_64 with firefox installed.

1. download Adobe Flash Player 9 (32-bit) from http://kb2.adobe.com/cps/406/kb406791.html
2. download the nspluginwrapper plugin and viewer from http://gwenole.beauchesne.info//en/projects/nspluginwrapper
3. tar zxvf install_flash_player_9.tar.gz
4. cd install_flash_player_9_linux/
5. cp libflashplayer.so /usr/lib/mozilla/plugins  –The install script will not work, you have to copy manually
6. rpm -i nspluginwrapper-i386-1.2.2-1.x86_64.rpm
7. rpm -i nspluginwrapper-1.2.2-1.x86_64.rpm
8. nspluginwrapper -l
9. Check the output from the last command, it should include libflashplayer.so