1.5. Describing Media Management Layer

The media management layer (MML) interface is an Application Programming Interface (API) that interfaces RMAN and different hardware vendors' tape devices. These tape devices, as mentioned earlier in this chapter, are automated tape libraries (ATLs).

All tape hardware vendors that wish to work with Oracle RMAN make their own MML. This is necessary because most tape hardware devices are proprietary and require different program calls. The MML is then linked in with Oracle database kernel, so that the RMAN server process and MML can read and write the Oracle data to the tape device. Figure 1.1 illustrates this concept.

Figure 1.1. The media management layer (MML)