OPatch finds invalid inventory. The patch storage directory '$ORACLE_HOME\.patch_storage' is present but Standalone Inventory '$ORACLE_HOME\sainventory' is not present

for the below issue follow MOS note:1477475.1

Opatch Commands Failing with Error: "OPatch finds invalid inventory. The patch storage directory '$ORACLE_HOME\.patch_storage' is present but Standalone Inventory '$ORACLE_HOME\sainventory' is not present." (Doc ID 1477475.1)

addtional note if needed : Steps To Recreate Central Inventory(oraInventory) In RDBMS Homes (Doc ID 556834.1)

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subhen_host:ORCL > /dboracle/orabase/product/11.2.0.4/OPatch/opatch lsinv
Oracle Interim Patch Installer version 11.2.0.3.4
Copyright (c) 2012, Oracle Corporation.  All rights reserved.


Oracle Home            : /dboracle/orabase/product/11.2.0.4
Oracle Home Inventory  : n/a
OPatch version         : 11.2.0.3.4
Product information    : n/a
Log file location      : /dboracle/orabase/product/11.2.0.4/cfgtoollogs/opatch/opatch2016-05-11_14-00-54PM_1.log

Patch history file: /dboracle/orabase/product/11.2.0.4/cfgtoollogs/opatch/opatch_history.txt

Lsinventory Output file location : /dboracle/orabase/product/11.2.0.4/cfgtoollogs/opatch/lsinv/lsinventory2016-05-11_14-00-54PM.txt

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
There are no Interim patches installed in this Oracle Home.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

OPatch succeeded.

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for below issue also check the similar locations , i copied the missing file from other servers and it worked

subhen_host:ORCL > pwd
/dboracle/oraInventory/ContentsXML
subhen_host:ORCL > ls -tlr
total 8
-rw-r----- 1 oracle oinstall 329 May 11 14:34 comps.xml
subhen_host:ORCL > ls -ltr
total 24
-rw-r----- 1 oracle oinstall 329 May 11 14:34 comps.xml
-rw-r----- 1 oracle oinstall 618 May 11 14:36 inventory.xml
-rw-r----- 1 oracle oinstall 292 May 11 14:36 libs.xml


subhen_host:ORCL > /dboracle/orabase/product/11.2.0.4/OPatch/opatch lsinv
Oracle Interim Patch Installer version 11.2.0.3.4
Copyright (c) 2012, Oracle Corporation.  All rights reserved.


Oracle Home       : /dboracle/orabase/product/11.2.0.4
Central Inventory : /dboracle/oraInventory
   from           : /dboracle/orabase/product/11.2.0.4/oraInst.loc
OPatch version    : 11.2.0.3.4
OUI version       : 11.2.0.4.0
Log file location : /dboracle/orabase/product/11.2.0.4/cfgtoollogs/opatch/opatch2016-05-11_14-06-49PM_1.log

List of Homes on this system:

Inventory load failed... OPatch cannot load inventory for the given Oracle Home.
Possible causes are:
   Oracle Home dir. path does not exist in Central Inventory
   Oracle Home is a symbolic link
   Oracle Home inventory is corrupted
LsInventorySession failed: OracleHomeInventory gets null oracleHomeInfo

OPatch failed with error code 73

ORA-00205: error in identifying control file during DB upgrade from 11.2.0.3 to 11.2.0.4

scenario : we were doing a upgrade from 11.2.0.3 to 11.2.0.4.
we have newly installed 11.2.0.4 software and going to upgrade the first DB
we ran into the below issue while "startup upgrade" command as per MOS note 1054033.1 we found out the issue lies with the wrong group ownership of oracle executable as shown below
after making below changes on all RAC nodes my upgrade went fine without any issue

In my case, the oracle binary is owned by
-rwsr-s--x 1 oracle oinstall
instead of
-rwsr-s--x 1 oracle asmadmin

solution:

1. Manually change the oracle binary ownership and permission:

as root user:
# cd $ORACLE_HOME/bin
# chgrp asmadmin oracle
# chmod 6751 oracle
# ls -l oracle

--below is the error snapshot
subhen_host:ORCL > sqlplus / as sysdba

SQL*Plus: Release 11.2.0.4.0 Production on Wed May 11 15:29:14 2016

Copyright (c) 1982, 2013, Oracle.  All rights reserved.

Connected to an idle instance.

SQL> startup upgrade
ORACLE instance started.

Total System Global Area 1570009088 bytes
Fixed Size                  2253584 bytes
Variable Size             469765360 bytes
Database Buffers         1073741824 bytes
Redo Buffers               24248320 bytes
ORA-00205: error in identifying control file, check alert log for more info