access to CHM raw data - without manipulating the -MGMTDB

In Version 12.1 Oracle introduced the Grid Infrastructure Management Repository (GIMR) called ‑MGMTDB.
This self managed pluggable database is a required component of Grid Infrastructure and should never require direct interactions. (there can be some interactions when you want to migrate to different diskgroups, but also those activities are covered within wrapper scripts provided by Oracle).
Every interaction with the data stored in this DB is done through applications - oclumon might be the best know. (If you prefer a graphical interface, you can check chmosg instead). Just as these are interfaces for the data stored on CHM user, Oracle does not provide any information how to connect to the database directly and query the data.
Of course I can always do a bequeath connection to the CDB, do a
alter session set container = <cluster_name>;

and query the tables directly. But sometimes I prefer to do queries from my PC, using sqldeveloper. So I was searching for CHMs password.

The probably most complicated way is to identify where the password could be stored. After some internet research I was sure it would be worth to check for a wallet stored in OCR. Even the docu does not show it, crsctl query wallet can show some details about a wallet called MGMTDB.

crsctl query wallet -type MGMTDB -all
CRS-10252: Aliases present in the wallet 'MGMTDB' are:
CHM
PCMRADMIN

So I know there is a wallet and it contains 2 credentials, but crsctl does not provide their passwords - at least I did not find out how.

So I have to go the longer way:

First get the proper entry from OCR:

ocrdump -keyname SYSTEM.WALLET.MGMTDB -xml /tmp/ocrdump.SYSTEM.WALLET.MGMTDB.xml

Then some transformation to get from

<name>SYSTEM.WALLET.MGMTDB</name>
<value_type>BYTESTREAM (16)</value_type>
<value>&lt;![CDATA[a1f84e370000000600000021.............
</value>

to a wallet which can be used by mkstore:

echo "cat //OCRDUMP/KEY/VALUE/text()" | \
xmllint --nocdata --shell /tmp/ocrdump.SYSTEM.WALLET.MGMTDB.xml |  \
head -n -1 | tail -n -1 | \
xxd -r -p > /tmp/ocrdump.SYSTEM.WALLET.MGMTDB.bin

Not that complicated at all. Now it's mkstore to query the details:

mkstore -wrl /tmp/ocrdump.SYSTEM.WALLET.MGMTDB.bin -list
Oracle Secret Store Tool : Version 12.1.0.2
Copyright (c) 2004, 2014, Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved.

Oracle Secret Store entries:
CHM
PCMRADMIN

It's quite similar to the previous result from crsctl query wallet - so we are nearly there!

mkstore -wrl /tmp/ocrdump.SYSTEM.WALLET.MGMTDB.bin \
-viewEntry CHM
Oracle Secret Store Tool : Version 12.1.0.2
Copyright (c) 2004, 2014, Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved.
 CHM = cRlu7yvFd7gZoYmqEl2Ye6jx143Iji

mkstore -wrl /tmp/ocrdump.SYSTEM.WALLET.MGMTDB.bin \
-viewEntry PCMRADMIN
Oracle Secret Store Tool : Version 12.1.0.2
Copyright (c) 2004, 2014, Oracle and/or its affiliates. All rights reserved.

 PCMRADMIN = mfqO8gPGFfzQZWPgyZhwO0pZk8zgSu

Here I have the passwords I'm looking for!

To connect to the -MGMTDB I need the listener information:

lsnrctl status MGMTLSNR

LSNRCTL for Linux: Version 12.1.0.2.0 - Production on 08-FEB-2016 10:52:00

Copyright (c) 1991, 2014, Oracle.  All rights reserved.

Connecting to (DESCRIPTION=(ADDRESS=(PROTOCOL=IPC)(KEY=MGMTLSNR)))
STATUS of the LISTENER
------------------------
Alias                     MGMTLSNR
Version                   TNSLSNR for Linux: Version 12.1.0.2.0 - Production
Start Date                24-JAN-2016 11:21:26
Uptime                    14 days 23 hr. 30 min. 33 sec
Trace Level               off
Security                  ON: Local OS Authentication
SNMP                      OFF
Listener Parameter File   /some_path/grid/grid_12102/network/admin/listener.ora
Listener Log File         /some_path/logs/grid/diag/tnslsnr/av3l958t/mgmtlsnr/alert/log.xml
Listening Endpoints Summary...
  (DESCRIPTION=(ADDRESS=(PROTOCOL=ipc)(KEY=MGMTLSNR)))
  (DESCRIPTION=(ADDRESS=(PROTOCOL=tcp)(HOST=1.2.3.4)(PORT=1521)))
  (DESCRIPTION=(ADDRESS=(PROTOCOL=tcp)(HOST=5.6.7.8)(PORT=1521)))
Services Summary...
Service "-MGMTDBXDB" has 1 instance(s).
  Instance "-MGMTDB", status READY, has 1 handler(s) for this service...
Service "_mgmtdb" has 1 instance(s).
  Instance "-MGMTDB", status READY, has 1 handler(s) for this service...
Service "crs908" has 1 instance(s).
  Instance "-MGMTDB", status READY, has 1 handler(s) for this service...
The command completed successfully

With all those bits and pieces I am able to connect to CHM@-MGMTDB:

CHM/cRlu7yvFd7gZoYmqEl2Ye6jx143Iji@1.2.3.4:1521/crs908 

It's not very practical, especially as the pasword can change for several reasons without notification, but still for any deeper data analysis it's handy to access the tables directly.