Sun Cluster Geographic Edition System Administration Guide

Chapter 2 Before You Begin

This chapter describes what you need to know before you begin administering the Sun Cluster Geographic Edition software. Here you also learn about the Sun Cluster infrastructure that is required by the Sun Cluster Geographic Edition software. You also can find here common Sun Cluster concepts and tasks you need to understand before administering the Sun Cluster Geographic Edition software. This chapter also provides an example configuration that is used throughout this guide to illustrate the common Sun Cluster Geographic Edition administration tasks.

This chapter contains the following sections:

Overview of Sun Cluster Administration Concepts

You must be an experienced Sun Cluster administrator to administer Sun Cluster Geographic Edition software.

This section describes the Sun Cluster administration topics that you need to understand before you administer the Sun Cluster Geographic Edition software.

Configuring Resources and Resource Groups

You use either the scrgadm command or the SunPlex Manager to create failover and scalable resource groups.

For more information about administering resources and resource groups in Sun Cluster software, see the Sun Cluster Data Services Planning and Administration Guide for Solaris OS.

Configuring Logical Hostnames

The logical hostname is a special high-availability (HA) resource. The geoadm start command configures the logical hostname that corresponds to the cluster name. The IP address and host maps for the logical hostname must be set up before you run this command. Before assigning hostnames, familiarize yourself with the legal names and values that are described in Appendix B, Legal Names and Values of Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Entities.

For more information about using the geoadm start command , see Enabling the Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Software.


Note –

If you are using Sun StorEdgeTM Availability Suite 3.2 for data replication, a logical hostname is created for each device group to be replicated. For more information, see Chapter 1, Replicating Data With Sun StorEdge Availability Suite 3.2.1 Software, in Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Data Replication Guide for Sun StorEdge Availability Suite.


The following table lists the Sun Cluster and Sun Cluster Geographic Edition components that require IP addresses. Add these IP addresses to the following locations:

Table 2–1 IP Addresses Required by Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Software

Component 

Number of IP Addresses Needed 

Sun Cluster administrative console 

1 per subnet 

IP Network Multipathing groups 

  • Single-adapter groups – 1 primary IP address. For the Solaris 8 release, also 1 test IP address for each adapter in the group.

  • Multiple-adapter groups – 1 primary IP address plus 1 test IP address for each adapter in the group.

Cluster nodes 

1 per node, per subnet 

Domain console network interface (Sun FireTM 15000)

1 per domain 

Console-access device 

Logical addresses 

1 per logical host resource, per subnet 

Sun Cluster Geographic Edition infrastructure hostname 

1 logical IP address per cluster infrastructure. 

For example, if you have two clusters in your Sun Cluster Geographic Edition infrastructure, you need two IP addresses. 

Replication with Sun StorEdge Availability Suite 3.2.1 software 

1 dedicated logical IP address on the local cluster for each device group to be replicated.  

For example, if you have two clusters in your Sun Cluster Geographic Edition infrastructure, you need two IP addresses. 

For more information about configuring the IP address and host maps during the installation of Sun Cluster software, refer to Chapter 2, Installing and Configuring Sun Cluster Software, in Sun Cluster Software Installation Guide for Solaris OS.

Managing Device Groups

A device group is a hardware resource that is managed by the Sun Cluster software. A device group is a type of global device that is used by the Sun Cluster software to register device resources, such as disks. A device group can include the device resources of disks, Solaris Volume Manager disksets, and VERITAS Volume Manager disk groups.

For information about configuring device groups in Sun Cluster software, refer to Chapter 4, Administering Global Devices, Disk-Path Monitoring, and Cluster File Systems, in Sun Cluster System Administration Guide for Solaris OS.

The Sun Cluster Geographic Edition software configures Sun Cluster device groups to include replication.

For more information about configuring data replication in Sun Cluster Geographic Edition software, see Chapter 1, Replicating Data With Sun StorEdge Availability Suite 3.2.1 Software, in Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Data Replication Guide for Sun StorEdge Availability Suite, Chapter 1, Replicating Data With Hitachi TrueCopy Software, in Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Data Replication Guide for Hitachi TrueCopy, and Chapter 1, Replicating Data With EMC Symmetrix Remote Data Facility Software, in Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Data Replication Guide for EMC Symmetrix Remote Data Facility.

Overview of Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Administration Tasks

This section provides a starting point for administering the Sun Cluster Geographic Edition software. This section contains the following tasks:

Prerequisite Administration Tasks

Before you begin administering the Sun Cluster Geographic Edition software, you must identify the Sun Cluster installations you need to host protection groups. Then, you need to adjust the Sun Cluster configuration and environment to support the formation of partnerships and protection groups with the Sun Cluster Geographic Edition software. The following table describes these prerequisite tasks.

Table 2–2 Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Prerequisite Tasks

Task 

Description 

Set the SC-clustername to the cluster name you want to use with the Sun Cluster Geographic Edition software.

Use the scconf(1M) command. For more information, see How to Enable Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Software.

Set up the IP address and host maps for the cluster that is enabled to run Sun Cluster Geographic Edition software. 

See Chapter 2, Installing and Configuring Sun Cluster Software, in Sun Cluster Software Installation Guide for Solaris OS.

Install and configure your data replication product. 

See the Sun StorEdge Availability Suite 3.2.1, Hitachi TrueCopy, or EMC Symmetrix Remote Data Facility documentation. 

This step is required before you can create protection groups with the geopg create command.

Port and configure application configuration and corresponding resource groups on clusters that are candidates for partnership. 

You can use the Sun Cluster scsnapshot tool to facilitate porting of application resource groups. See Creating and Modifying a Partnership for more information.

Enable the common agent container on all nodes of both clusters.  

See Enabling the Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Software.

Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Administration Tasks

After you have completed the prerequisite administration tasks, you can install, configure, and administer the Sun Cluster Geographic Edition software as described in the following table.

Table 2–3 Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Administration Tasks

Task 

Description and Documentation 

Install Sun Cluster Geographic Edition software. 

See the Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Installation Guide.

Set up security between the candidate partner clusters. 

Enable the Sun Cluster Geographic Edition software. 

Use the geoadm start command.

For more information, see Enabling the Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Software.

Create partnerships. 

See How to Create a Partnership. This procedure includes the following:

Configure data replication. 

For information about replicating data by using Sun StorEdge Availability Suite 3.2.1, see Chapter 1, Replicating Data With Sun StorEdge Availability Suite 3.2.1 Software, in Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Data Replication Guide for Sun StorEdge Availability Suite.

For information about replicating data by using Hitachi TrueCopy, see Chapter 1, Replicating Data With Hitachi TrueCopy Software, in Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Data Replication Guide for Hitachi TrueCopy.

For information about replicating data by using EMC Symmetrix Remote Data Facility, see Chapter 1, Replicating Data With EMC Symmetrix Remote Data Facility Software, in Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Data Replication Guide for EMC Symmetrix Remote Data Facility.

Create protection groups. 

Bring the protection groups online. 

See one of the following data replication guides: 

Test the configured partnership and protection groups to validate the setup.  

Perform a trial switchover or takeover and test some simple failure scenarios. See one of the following data replication guides:  


Note –

You cannot perform personality swaps if you are running EMC Symmetrix Remote Data Facility/Asynchronous data replication.


Migrate services to the partner cluster. 

See one of the following data replication guides:  


Note –

You cannot perform personality swaps if you are running EMC Symmetrix Remote Data Facility/Asynchronous data replication.


Take over services from primary to secondary during a disaster. 

See one of the following data replication guides:  

Recover from a takeover. 

Take a protection group offline. 

See How to Deactivate a Sun StorEdge Availability Suite 3.2.1 Protection Group in Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Data Replication Guide for Sun StorEdge Availability Suite, How to Deactivate a Hitachi TrueCopy Protection Group in Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Data Replication Guide for Hitachi TrueCopy, or How to Deactivate an EMC Symmetrix Remote Data Facility Protection Group in Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Data Replication Guide for EMC Symmetrix Remote Data Facility.

Delete a protection group. 

See How to Delete a Sun StorEdge Availability Suite 3.2.1 Protection Group in Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Data Replication Guide for Sun StorEdge Availability Suite, How to Delete a Hitachi TrueCopy Protection Group in Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Data Replication Guide for Hitachi TrueCopy, or How to Delete an EMC Symmetrix Remote Data Facility Protection Group in Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Data Replication Guide for EMC Symmetrix Remote Data Facility.

Delete a partnership. 

See Leaving or Deleting a Partnership.

Disable the Sun Cluster Geographic Edition software. 

See How to Disable the Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Software.

Uninstall the Sun Cluster Geographic Edition software. 

See the Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Installation Guide.

Example Sun Cluster Geographic Edition Cluster Configuration

The following figure describes a Sun Cluster Geographic Edition cluster configuration that is used throughout this guide to illustrate the Sun Cluster Geographic Edition administration tasks. The primary cluster, cluster-paris, contains two nodes, phys-paris–1 and phys-paris-2. The secondary cluster, cluster-newyork, also contains two nodes, phys-newyork-1 and phys-newyork-2.

Figure 2–1 Example Cluster Configuration

The figure illustrates a cluster configuration
between cluster-paris and cluster-newyork.