Fix AHF-00074 Error: Net::Ping Perl Module Missing in Exadata (AHF Installation Guide)

During Autonomous Health Framework (AHF) installation on Exadata, you may suddenly hit the following error:

[ERROR] : AHF-00074: Perl Modules not found : Net::Ping

This is a very common issue on fresh Oracle Linux 8 (or later) Exadata environments where the required Perl module Net::Ping is missing from the base OS installation.

Root Cause

AHF installer depends on several Perl modules. On Oracle Linux 8+, the module Net::Ping is not installed by default. When the installer checks for it, it fails with AHF-00074.

The fix is simple — install the perl-CPAN package, which automatically pulls perl-Net-Ping as a dependency.

Prerequisites

• Login as root on the Exadata compute node
• Yum / DNF repository access (internet or local repo)
• AHF installer has already been downloaded
• Root access required (no sudo workaround)

Step 1: Check Current Perl Path

[root@ORACLEDBASECRETS01 ~]# which perl
/usr/bin/perl

Step 2: Trigger Perl CPAN (This will detect the missing package)

[root@ORACLEDBASECRETS01 ~]# cpan
bash: cpan: command not found...
Install package 'perl-CPAN' to provide command 'cpan'? [N/y] y

Step 3: Let YUM Install perl-CPAN + Dependencies (Including Net::Ping)

* Waiting in queue...
The following packages have to be installed:
 perl-CPAN-2.18-397.el8.noarch
 perl-Net-Ping-2.55-417.el8_3.noarch
 ... (many other perl and build dependencies)

perl-Net-Ping will be automatically installed as a dependency of perl-CPAN.
Just press y and let YUM complete the installation.

Step 4: Verify the Module is Now Available

[root@ORACLEDBASECRETS01 ~]# perl -MNet::Ping -e 'print "Net::Ping is available\n"'
Net::Ping is available

Step 5: Re-run the AHF Installer

[root@ORACLEDBASECRETS01 ~]# cd /path/to/ahf_installer
[root@ORACLEDBASECRETS01 ~]# ./ahf_setup

The AHF-00074 error will no longer appear.

Key Takeaways

• AHF-00074 is caused by missing Perl module Net::Ping
• Installing perl-CPAN is the fastest and cleanest fix
• This issue is very common on fresh Oracle Linux 8+ Exadata images
• Always run AHF installer as root
• No need to install individual Perl modules manually
• Test in non-production first (though this fix is completely safe)

This exact fix has been successfully used on multiple Exadata X8M / X9M systems running Grid Infrastructure 19c/21c and Oracle Linux 8.

Conclusion

The AHF-00074 Perl module error is easy to resolve once you know the root cause. By simply installing the perl-CPAN package, the missing Net::Ping module is automatically added, allowing the Autonomous Health Framework installer to proceed without any issues.

This is one of the most frequent “gotchas” when setting up AHF on new Exadata environments. Keeping this fix handy will save you a lot of time during infrastructure builds and health framework deployments.

Please feel free to ask if you have any questions. Thank you 🙂

Toufique Khan