Sun Cluster Software Installation Guide for Solaris OS

Planning the Sun Cluster Environment

This section provides guidelines for planning and preparing the following components for Sun Cluster software installation and configuration:

For detailed information about Sun Cluster components, see the Sun Cluster Overview for Solaris OS and the Sun Cluster Concepts Guide for Solaris OS.

Licensing

Ensure that you have available all necessary license certificates before you begin software installation. Sun Cluster software does not require a license certificate, but each node installed with Sun Cluster software must be covered under your Sun Cluster software license agreement.

For licensing requirements for volume-manager software and applications software, see the installation documentation for those products.

Software Patches

After installing each software product, you must also install any required patches.

IP Addresses

You must set up a number of IP addresses for various Sun Cluster components, depending on your cluster configuration. Each node in the cluster configuration must have at least one public-network connection to the same set of public subnets.

The following table lists the components that need IP addresses assigned. Add these IP addresses to any naming services that are used. Also add these IP addresses to the local /etc/inet/hosts file on each cluster node after you install Solaris software.

Table 1–3 Sun Cluster Components That Use IP Addresses

Component 

Number of IP Addresses Needed 

Administrative console

1 per subnet 

IP Network Multipathing groups

  • Single-adapter groups – 1

  • 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 

Console-Access Devices

You must have console access to all cluster nodes. If you install Cluster Control Panel software on your administrative console, you must provide the hostname of the console-access device that is used to communicate with the cluster nodes.

For more information about console access, see the Sun Cluster Concepts Guide for Solaris OS.

Logical Addresses

Each data-service resource group that uses a logical address must have a hostname specified for each public network from which the logical address can be accessed.

Public Networks

Public networks communicate outside the cluster. Consider the following points when you plan your public-network configuration:

See IP Network Multipathing Groups for guidelines on planning public-network-adapter backup groups. For more information about public-network interfaces, see Sun Cluster Concepts Guide for Solaris OS.

Guidelines for NFS

Consider the following points when you plan the use of Network File System (NFS) in a Sun Cluster configuration.

Service Restrictions

Observe the following service restrictions for Sun Cluster configurations:

Sun Cluster Configurable Components

This section provides guidelines for the following Sun Cluster components that you configure:

Add this information to the appropriate configuration worksheet.

Table 1–4 Worksheets for Sun Cluster Configuration

Configuration Worksheet 

Location 

Table 2–2 (to use defaults) or Table 2–3 (to customize)

How to Configure Sun Cluster Software on All Nodes (scinstall)

Table 2–6

How to Install and Configure Sun Cluster Software (SunPlex Installer)

Table 2–7

How to Install Solaris and Sun Cluster Software (JumpStart)

Table 2–8

How to Configure Sun Cluster Software on Additional Cluster Nodes (scinstall)

Cluster Name

Specify a name for the cluster during Sun Cluster configuration. The cluster name should be unique throughout the enterprise.

Node Names

The node name is the name that you assign to a machine when you install the Solaris OS. During Sun Cluster configuration, you specify the names of all nodes that you are installing as a cluster. In single-node cluster installations, the default node name is the same as the cluster name.

Private Network


Note –

You do not need to configure a private network for a single-node cluster.


Sun Cluster software uses the private network for internal communication between nodes. A Sun Cluster configuration requires at least two connections to the cluster interconnect on the private network. You specify the private-network address and netmask when you configure Sun Cluster software on the first node of the cluster. You can either accept the default private-network address (172.16.0.0) and netmask (255.255.0.0) or type different choices if the default network address is already in use elsewhere in the same enterprise.


Note –

After the installation utility (scinstall, SunPlex Installer, or JumpStart) has finished processing and the cluster is established, you cannot change the private-network address and netmask. You must uninstall and reinstall the cluster software to use a different private-network address or netmask.


If you specify a private-network address other than the default, the address must meet the following requirements:

Although the scinstall utility lets you specify an alternate netmask, best practice is to accept the default netmask, 255.255.0.0. There is no benefit if you specify a netmask that represents a larger network. And the scinstall utility does not accept a netmask that represents a smaller network.

See “Planning Your TCP/IP Network” in System Administration Guide, Volume 3 (Solaris 8) or “Planning Your TCP/IP Network (Task)” in System Administration Guide: IP Services (Solaris 9) for more information about private networks.

Private Hostnames

The private hostname is the name that is used for internode communication over the private-network interface. Private hostnames are automatically created during Sun Cluster configuration. These private hostnames follow the naming convention clusternodenodeid-priv, where nodeid is the numeral of the internal node ID. During Sun Cluster configuration, the node ID number is automatically assigned to each node when the node becomes a cluster member. After the cluster is configured, you can rename private hostnames by using the scsetup(1M) utility.

Cluster Interconnect


Note –

You do not need to configure a cluster interconnect for a single-node cluster. However, if you anticipate eventually adding nodes to a single-node cluster configuration, you might want to configure the cluster interconnect for future use.


The cluster interconnects provide the hardware pathways for private-network communication between cluster nodes. Each interconnect consists of a cable that is connected in one of the following ways:

During Sun Cluster configuration, you specify the following information for two cluster interconnects:

You can configure additional private-network connections after the cluster is established by using the scsetup(1M) utility.

For more information about the cluster interconnect, see “Cluster Interconnect” in Sun Cluster Overview for Solaris OS and Sun Cluster Concepts Guide for Solaris OS.

IP Network Multipathing Groups

Add this planning information to the Public Networks Worksheet.

Internet Protocol (IP) Network Multipathing groups, which replace Network Adapter Failover (NAFO) groups, provide public-network adapter monitoring and failover, and are the foundation for a network-address resource. A multipathing group provides high availability when the multipathing group is configured with two or more adapters. If one adapter fails, all of the addresses on the failed adapter fail over to another adapter in the multipathing group. In this way, the multipathing-group adapters maintain public-network connectivity to the subnet to which the adapters in the multipathing group connect.

Consider the following points when you plan your multipathing groups.

Most procedures, guidelines, and restrictions that are identified in the Solaris documentation for IP Network Multipathing are the same for both cluster and noncluster environments. Therefore, see the appropriate Solaris document for additional information about IP Network Multipathing:

Also see “IP Network Multipathing Groups” in Sun Cluster Overview for Solaris OS and Sun Cluster Concepts Guide for Solaris OS.

Quorum Devices

Sun Cluster configurations use quorum devices to maintain data and resource integrity. If the cluster temporarily loses connection to a node, the quorum device prevents amnesia or split-brain problems when the cluster node attempts to rejoin the cluster. You configure quorum devices by using the scsetup(1M) utility.


Note –

You do not need to configure quorum devices for a single-node cluster.


Consider the following points when you plan quorum devices.

For more information about quorum devices, see “Quorum and Quorum Devices” in Sun Cluster Concepts Guide for Solaris OS and “Quorum Devices” in Sun Cluster Overview for Solaris OS.