General Requirements

Both topologies must meet the following general requirements:

• Machines that host HADB nodes must be in pairs. That is, there must be an even number of them.

• Each data redundancy unit (DRU) must have the same number of machines. Create the HADB database in such a way that the mirrored (paired) nodes are on a different DRU than the primary nodes.

• Each machine that hosts HADB nodes must have local disk storage, used to store all persisted information in the HADB.

• Machines that host the HADB nodes must run the same operating system. It is best to use identical or nearly identical machines, in terms of configuration and performance.

• For HTTP and SFSB session information to be persisted to the HADB, the Application Server instances must be in a cluster and satisfy all related requirements. For more information on configuring clusters, see Chapter 5, Using Application Server Clusters, in Sun Java System Application Server Enterprise Edition 8.1 2005Q2 High Availability Administration Guide.

• Machines hosting the Application Server instances must be as identical as possible, in terms of configuration and performance. This is because the load balancer plug-in uses a round-robin policy for load balancing, and if machines of different classes host instances, then the load will not be balanced in the most optimum way across these machines.

• Preferably have a separate uninterruptible power supply (UPS) for each DRU.