Resources and Resource Types

Data services utilize several types of resources: applications such as Apache Web Server or iPlanet Web Server utilize network addresses (logical hostnames and shared addresses) upon which the applications depend. Application and network resources form a basic unit that is managed by the RGM.

A resource is an instantiation of a resource type that is defined cluster wide. There are several resource types defined.

Data services are resource types. For example, Sun Cluster HA for Oracle is the resource type SUNW.oracle and Sun Cluster HA for Apache is the resource type SUNW.apache.

Network resources are either SUNW.LogiclaHostname or SUNW.SharedAddress resource types. These two resource types are pre-registered by the Sun Cluster product.

The SUNW.HAStorage resource type is used to synchronize the startup of resources and disk device groups upon which the resources depend. It ensures that before a data service starts, the paths to cluster file system mount points, global devices, and device group names are available.

RGM-managed resources are placed into groups, called resource groups, so that they can be managed as a unit. A resource group is migrated as a unit if a failover or switchover is initiated on the resource group.

When you bring a resource group containing application resources online, the application is started. The data service start method waits until the application is up and running before exiting successfully. The determination of when the application is up and running is accomplished the same way the data service fault monitor determines that a data service is serving clients. Refer to the Sun Cluster 3.0 Data Services Installation and Configuration Guide for more information on this process.

Resource and Resource Group Properties

You can configure property values for resources and resource groups for your Sun Cluster data services. A set of standard properties are common to all data services and a set of extension properties are specific to each data service. Some standard and extension properties are configured with default settings so that you do not have to modify them. Others need to be set as part of the process of creating and configuring resources. The documentation for each data service specifies what properties are used by the resource type, and how they should be configured.

The standard properties are used to configure resource and resource group properties that are usually independent of any particular data service. The set of standard properties is described in an appendix to the Sun Cluster 3.0 Data Services Installation and Configuration Guide.

The extension properties provide information such as the location of application binaries and configuration files. You modify extension properties as you configure your data services. The set of extension properties is described in the individual chapter for the data service in the Sun Cluster 3.0 Data Services Installation and Configuration Guide.