12.2 New Features -- 3 : Flashback Pluggable Database

12.1 allows Point In Time Recovery of a Pluggable Database but not Flashback of an individual PDB.

12.2 now allows Flashback of an individual PDB.   This is easier with a Local Undo Tablespace instead of a Shared Undo Tablespace.

Here is a quick demo  :

[timestsamps in UTC]

[oracle@HKCORCL ~]$ sqlplus system/Oracle_4U@PDB1

SQL*Plus: Release 12.2.0.1.0 Production on Fri Nov 25 14:19:06 2016

Copyright (c) 1982, 2016, Oracle.  All rights reserved.

Last Successful login time: Thu Nov 24 2016 01:03:52 +00:00

Connected to:
Oracle Database 12c Enterprise Edition Release 12.2.0.1.0 - 64bit Production

SQL> select count(*) from hr.employees_part;

  COUNT(*)
----------
       107

SQL> drop table hr.employees_part purge;

Table dropped.

SQL> connect / as sysdba
Connected.
SQL> alter system switch logfile;

System altered.

SQL> alter pluggable database pdb1 close;

Pluggable database altered.

SQL>
SQL> select sysdate, sysdate-oldest_flashback_time
  2  from v$flashback_database_log;

SYSDATE   SYSDATE-OLDEST_FLASHBACK_TIME
--------- -----------------------------
25-NOV-16                    2.36273148

SQL>
SQL> flashback pluggable database pdb1
  2  to timestamp sysdate-2/24;

Flashback complete.

SQL> alter pluggable database pdb1 open;
alter pluggable database pdb1 open
*
ERROR at line 1:
ORA-01113: file 17 needs media recovery
ORA-01110: data file 17:
'/u02/app/oracle/oradata/HKCORCL/4157E08302CC2021E053B2D4100AABA3/datafile/o1_mf
_pdb1undo_d3dgxhbh_.dbf'


SQL> alter pluggable database pdb1 open resetlogs;

Pluggable database altered.

SQL>
SQL> connect system/Oracle_4U@PDB1
Connected.
SQL> select count(*) from hr.employees_part;

  COUNT(*)
----------
       107

SQL>

(Note : The 12.2 documentation shows the TO TIME clause, it is actually TO TIMESTAMP).
I have done a flashback of PDB1 to a time as of 2hours ago, when the table HR.EMPLOYEES_PART still existed.

Let's look for messages in the alert log.

2016-11-25T14:19:52.992589+00:00
Archived Log entry 11 added for T-1.S-11 ID 0x38800462 LAD:1
2016-11-25T14:19:57.621705+00:00
alter pluggable database pdb1 close
2016-11-25T14:19:57.640353+00:00
PDB1(3):JIT: pid 7920 requesting stop
2016-11-25T14:19:58.885892+00:00
Pluggable database PDB1 closed
Completed: alter pluggable database pdb1 close
2016-11-25T14:26:10.205824+00:00
flashback pluggable database pdb1
to timestamp sysdate-2/24
2016-11-25T14:26:10.627900+00:00
Flashback Restore Start
2016-11-25T14:26:11.513882+00:00
Restore Flashback Pluggable Database PDB1 (3) until change 3536013
Flashback Restore Complete
2016-11-25T14:26:11.707236+00:00
Flashback Media Recovery Start
2016-11-25T14:26:11.718480+00:00
Serial Media Recovery started
2016-11-25T14:26:12.006472+00:00
Recovery of Online Redo Log: Thread 1 Group 2 Seq 11 Reading mem 0
  Mem# 0: /u04/app/oracle/redo/redo02.log
2016-11-25T14:26:12.283587+00:00
Incomplete Recovery applied until change 3536477 time 11/25/2016 12:26:56
Flashback Media Recovery Complete
Flashback Pluggable Database PDB1 (3) recovered until change 3536477, at 11/25/2016 12:26:56
Completed: flashback pluggable database pdb1
to timestamp sysdate-2/24
2016-11-25T14:26:21.451523+00:00
alter pluggable database pdb1 open
PDB1(3):Autotune of undo retention is turned on.
2016-11-25T14:26:21.659109+00:00
Pdb PDB1 hit error 1113 during open read write (1) and will be closed.
2016-11-25T14:26:21.659410+00:00
Errors in file /u01/app/oracle/diag/rdbms/hkcorcl/HKCORCL/trace/HKCORCL_ora_7920.trc:
ORA-01113: file 17 needs media recovery
ORA-01110: data file 17: '/u02/app/oracle/oradata/HKCORCL/4157E08302CC2021E053B2D4100AABA3/datafile/o1_mf_pdb1undo_d3dgxhbh_.dbf'
PDB1(3):JIT: pid 7920 requesting stop
2016-11-25T14:26:21.804780+00:00
Errors in file /u01/app/oracle/diag/rdbms/hkcorcl/HKCORCL/trace/HKCORCL_m000_9995.trc:
ORA-01110: data file 9: '/u02/app/oracle/oradata/HKCORCL/PDB1/system01.dbf'
ORA-1113 signalled during: alter pluggable database pdb1 open...
2016-11-25T14:26:22.086212+00:00
Errors in file /u01/app/oracle/diag/rdbms/hkcorcl/HKCORCL/trace/HKCORCL_m000_9995.trc:
ORA-01110: data file 10: '/u02/app/oracle/oradata/HKCORCL/PDB1/sysaux01.dbf'
2016-11-25T14:26:22.175778+00:00
Errors in file /u01/app/oracle/diag/rdbms/hkcorcl/HKCORCL/trace/HKCORCL_m000_9995.trc:
ORA-01110: data file 12: '/u02/app/oracle/oradata/HKCORCL/PDB1/users01.dbf'
2016-11-25T14:26:22.270876+00:00
Errors in file /u01/app/oracle/diag/rdbms/hkcorcl/HKCORCL/trace/HKCORCL_m000_9995.trc:
ORA-01110: data file 17: '/u02/app/oracle/oradata/HKCORCL/4157E08302CC2021E053B2D4100AABA3/datafile/o1_mf_pdb1undo_d3dgxhbh_.dbf'
Checker run found 4 new persistent data failures
2016-11-25T14:26:39.804216+00:00
alter pluggable database pdb1 open resetlogs
2016-11-25T14:26:40.377390+00:00
Online datafile 17
Online datafile 12
Online datafile 10
Online datafile 9
2016-11-25T14:26:40.881181+00:00
PDB1(3):Autotune of undo retention is turned on.
PDB1(3):Endian type of dictionary set to little
PDB1(3):[7920] Successfully onlined Undo Tablespace 7.
PDB1(3):Undo initialization finished serial:0 start:868281239 end:868281333 diff:94 ms (0.1 seconds)
PDB1(3):Database Characterset for PDB1 is AL32UTF8
PDB1(3):JIT: pid 7920 requesting stop
2016-11-25T14:26:42.441388+00:00
PDB1(3):Autotune of undo retention is turned on.
2016-11-25T14:26:42.827673+00:00
PDB1(3):Endian type of dictionary set to little
PDB1(3):[7920] Successfully onlined Undo Tablespace 7.
PDB1(3):Undo initialization finished serial:0 start:868283079 end:868283168 diff:89 ms (0.1 seconds)
PDB1(3):Pluggable database PDB1 dictionary check beginning
2016-11-25T14:26:43.706672+00:00
PDB1(3):Pluggable Database PDB1 Dictionary check complete
PDB1(3):Database Characterset for PDB1 is AL32UTF8
2016-11-25T14:26:44.083617+00:00
PDB1(3):Opatch validation is skipped for PDB PDB1 (con_id=0)
PDB1(3):Opening pdb with no Resource Manager plan active
2016-11-25T14:26:45.205147+00:00
Starting control autobackup

Deleted Oracle managed file /u03/app/oracle/fast_recovery_area/HKCORCL/415864F430FE5FFEE053B2D4100A149C/backupset/2016_11_16/o1_mf_nnndf_TAG20161116T024856_d2qldlnv_.bkp
2016-11-25T14:26:46.523130+00:00
Deleted Oracle managed file /u03/app/oracle/fast_recovery_area/HKCORCL/3E09703FB0AF1A7EE053DE4BC40A6C1D/backupset/2016_11_16/o1_mf_nnndf_TAG20161116T024856_d2qlfzqg_.bkp
Control autobackup written to DISK device

handle '/u03/app/oracle/fast_recovery_area/HKCORCL/autobackup/2016_11_25/o1_mf_s_928852005_d3jlk651_.bkp'

Pluggable database PDB1 closed
Completed: alter pluggable database pdb1 open resetlogs

The set of ORA-01113 and ORA-01110 errors are when I tried to open PDB1 without a RESETLOGS.
The OPEN RESETLOGS issued at 2016-11-25T14:26:39.804216+00:00 was successful.
(Note : The ALTER SYSTEM SWITCH LOGFILE wasn't required but I like to archive out the CURRENT redo whenever I make a significant action against the database).

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