I am kicking off a project to start migrating our Oracle Databases off of AIX running on IBM pSeries and onto Oracle Linux running on VMware ESX. I am not finding much information on what is the best approach or any tools that could help with all the data moves. I know that the Oracle Databases on AIX are big endian and when running on Oracle Linux it would be little endian. We do have a Database Group but I am trying to conduct some research as well because they are less than enthused of this project. The overall administration of our environment will be simplified and we can manage the OS the same as we do all our other Linux servers using Spacewalk. Plus the entire environment will be Oracle Linux so we would no longer need a dedicated person to manage just AIX, more people in the company know and understand Linux.
I am also trying to confirm if the Oracle relinking will be eliminated. Not a database guy but from what I heard is when AIX gets patched the DBA's need to relink the databases. Just wondering if that is another plus with moving to Oracle Linux. Actually, if any one has any pros for this move, moving Oracle databases from AIX to Oracle Linux that would be appreciated as well.
Anyways, looking for any recommendations or advice to help us with this migration.