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This solution demonstrates how IT and data professionals can use the data virtualization capabilities of Oracle Big Data SQL to integrate multiple data repositories. Data virtualization can be an efficient and seamless experience for many application development use cases. Oracle Big Data SQL supports integration across a wide set of data management options including Apache Hadoop, Apache Kafka, many NoSQL products, object-structured data stores, and relational database products like Oracle Database. Access is enabled using native access drivers delivered with Oracle Big Data SQL. Oracle Database Gateways are used to transparently connect SQL Server to Oracle Big Data SQL. Our goal is to show how customers can use data virtualization to natively connect and, in the absence of access drivers, to integrate other systems.
In the data virtualization architecture described in this paper, PowerEdge servers were used for the Oracle Big Data SQL deployment and for the storage. One of the key design considerations was to architect the data virtualization platform for maximum agility. For example, it was important that the PowerEdge servers be easily redeployed based on initial test results. Observing and adjusting the architecture enables Dell Technologies to show customers how to be successful.
PowerFlex software-defined storage maximizes agility by enabling the Dell team to easily address any I/O bottlenecks by adding additional storage nodes while providing enterprise class resiliency. All the data management applications were installed on the PowerFlex storage platform for maximum scalability.
VMware vSphere virtualization was used to enable the nondisruptive movement of applications in the solution. For example, as part of initially testing the data virtualization infrastructure, it became important to intelligently place application components. Thus, the team was able to quickly use vMotion for intelligent placement of data virtualization services. This use of vMotion also made it possible to manage the entire data virtualization infrastructure from VMware vSphere.
In using Oracle Big Data SQL data virtualization, the focus of this solution was on functionality. The key goal was to validate that Oracle Big Data SQL can access Oracle NoSQL Database (ONDB), Hadoop, and Microsoft SQL Server using Oracle Database Gateways for Microsoft SQL Server. The standard queries provided with the decision support benchmark were modified to access tables across these management layers. Performance was not part of our testing but, because the architecture was designed to maximize agility, nearly any component can be scaled to address possible bottlenecks.