2 Managing the Administration Server

The administration server is a specially configured Oracle Traffic Director virtual server that you can use to create, monitor, and manage Oracle Traffic Director instances.

For information about the role of the administration server in the administrative framework of Oracle Traffic Director, see Administration Framework of Oracle Traffic Director.

This chapter describes how to create, remove, start, stop, and restart the administration server; and how to configure its settings. It also describes how to access the administration interfaces of Oracle Traffic Director—the administration console and the command-line interface.

This chapter contains the following sections:

Starting the Administration Server

To be able to use the administration interfaces—administration console and command-line interface, the administration server should be running.

Note:

Oracle Java Cloud Service starts the administration server when you create an Oracle Java Cloud Service instance with a load balancer or add a load balancer to an Oracle Java Cloud Service instance. You need to start the administration server only if it has been stopped outside the control of Oracle Java Cloud Service, for example, by using Oracle Traffic Director administration interfaces.

To start the administration server, run the following command:

> $INSTANCE_HOME/admin-server/bin/startserv

INSTANCE_HOME is the directory that contains all the Oracle Traffic Director instances, including the administration server instance. This is the directory that you specified with the instance-home option while creating the administration server by using the configure-server command.

The startserv command starts the administration server using the port that you specified while creating the administration server.

Wait for the successful server startup message to be displayed, as shown in the following example:

Oracle Traffic Director 11.1.1.7.0 B01/14/2013 09:08

[NOTIFICATION:1] [OTD-80118] Using [Java HotSpot(TM) 64-Bit Server VM, Version 1.6.0_29] from [Sun Microsystems Inc.]

[NOTIFICATION:1] [OTD-80000] Loading web module in virtual server [admin-server] at [/admin]
[NOTIFICATION:1] [OTD-80000] Loading web module in virtual server [admin-server] at [/jmxconnector]
[NOTIFICATION:1] [OTD-10358] admin-ssl-port: https://bin.example.com:8989 ready to accept requests
[NOTIFICATION:1] [OTD-10487] successful server startup

You can now use the administration interfaces of Oracle Traffic Director—administration console and command-line interface—to configure and manage Oracle Traffic Director instances.

To use the administration console and the command-line interface, you should log in by using the user name and password that you specified while creating the administration server. For more information, see Accessing the Administration Interfaces.

Accessing the Administration Interfaces

This section contains the following topics:

Note:

To be able to use the administration interfaces, the administration server should be running. For information about starting the administration server, see Starting the Administration Server.

Accessing the Command-Line Interface

Before accessing the command-line interface of Oracle Traffic Director, you must log in to the VM where the load balancer is running as explained in Accessing a VM or Load Balancer in Using Oracle Java Cloud Service.

You can access the command-line interface (CLI) of Oracle Traffic Director by running the tadm command from the ORACLE_HOME/bin directory, as follows:

./tadm [subcommand] --user=admin_user --host=adminserver_host [--password-file=path_to_file] --port=adminserver_port

The CLI uses password-based authentication to allow access to the administration server. If you do not specify the --password-file option, a prompt to enter the administrator user password is displayed. After you enter the password, the specified subcommand is executed.

The tadm command supports a comprehensive set of subcommands that you can use to create, view, update, and manage settings for all of the features of Oracle Traffic Director. If you run the tadm command without specifying the subcommand, you enter the shell mode of the CLI. In the shell mode, the options to connect to the administration server—user, host, port, and password—have already been specified; so you can run individual subcommands without specifying the connection options each time.

You can view help for a subcommand by running the subcommand with the --help option.

For more information about using the CLI, including the usage modes (standalone, shell, and file), the subcommands that the tadm command supports, and the options for each subcommand, see the Oracle Traffic Director Command-Line Reference.

Accessing the Administration Console

The administration console is a browser-based graphical interface that enables you create, configure, and monitor Oracle Traffic Director instances.

To access the Oracle Traffic Director administration console for an Oracle Java Cloud Service instance, follow the instructions to open the load balancer console in Accessing an Administration Console for Software that a Service Instance Is Running in Using Oracle Java Cloud Service.

When you complete this task, the home page of the administration-console is displayed.

Figure 2-1 Oracle Traffic Director Administration-Console Home Page

Description of "Figure 2-1 Oracle Traffic Director Administration-Console Home Page"

You can now administer the Oracle Traffic Director software for your Oracle Java Cloud Service instance.

Note:

If the administration-console browser session remains idle for 30 minutes, you will be logged out and the log-in page will be displayed.

Stopping and Restarting the Administration Server

At times, you might want to create the administration server instance afresh with new settings. Before attempting to re-create the administration server, you should stop the running administration server as described in this section. In some situations, such as when you change the administrator password or the administrator server port, for the changes to take effect, you should restart the administration server as described in this section.

You can stop and restart the administration server by using either the administration console or the CLI.

Note:

If you stop the administration server, the administration console will not be available again until you restart the administration server.

Stopping and Restarting the Administration Server Using the Administration Console

To stop or restart the administration server by using the administration console, do the following:

Log in to the administration console, as described in Accessing the Administration Console.
Click the Nodes button near the upper left corner of the page.

A list of available nodes is displayed.
From the list of nodes, select Administration Server.
In the Common Tasks pane, click Restart or Stop.

A dialog box is displayed prompting you to confirm restarting or stopping the administration server. Click OK.

If you clicked Restart, then, after the administration server restarts, the log-in page of the administration console is displayed.

If you clicked Stop, then, after the administration server stops, a dialog box is displayed indicating that the browser is unable to communicate with the administration server. Start the administration server as described in Starting the Administration Server. Then, click the Reload button in the dialog box to bring up the log-in page of the administration console.

Stopping the Administration Server Using the CLI

To stop the administration server, run the stop-admin command:

> $ORACLE_HOME/bin/tadm stop-admin --user=admin_server_user --port=admin_server_port node_host

node_host is the name or IP address of the host on which the administration server instance is deployed.

At the prompt, enter the administration user password.

After the administration server shuts down, the following message is displayed:

OTD-70201 Command 'stop-admin' ran successfully.

Note:

Stopping the administration server has no effect on the state of Oracle Traffic Director instances.

Restarting the Administration Server Using the CLI

To restart the administration server by using the CLI, run the following command:

> $ORACLE_HOME/bin/tadm restart-admin --user=admin_server_user --port=admin_server_port node_host

node_host is the name or IP address of the host on which the administration server instance is deployed.

At the prompt, enter the administration user password.

After the administration server restarts, the following message is displayed:

OTD-70201 Command 'restart-admin' ran successfully.

Note:

Alternatively, you can use the following commands to stop and restart the administration server:

> $INSTANCE_HOME/admin-server/bin/stopserv

> $INSTANCE_HOME/admin-server/bin/restart

Viewing Administration Server Settings

You can view the settings of the administration server by using either the administration console or the CLI.

Note:

The CLI examples in this section are shown in shell mode (tadm>). For information about invoking the CLI shell, see Accessing the Command-Line Interface.

Viewing the Administration Server Settings Using the Administration Console

To view the current properties of the administration server by using the administration console, do the following:

Log in to the administration console, as described in Accessing the Administration Console.
Click the Nodes button that is situated near the upper left corner of the page.

A list of available nodes is displayed.

Note:

The Nodes button is available only after you have created at least one new configuration.
From the list of nodes, select Administration Server.

The General Settings page is displayed. You can view the authentication settings by clicking Authentication in the navigation pane.

Viewing the Administration Server Settings Using the CLI

To view the current properties of the administration server by using the CLI, run the following command:

tadm> get-admin-prop

The current properties of the administration server are displayed as shown in the following example:

instance-home=/production/otd
java-home=/production/otd/jdk
admin-node=false
server-version=Oracle Traffic Director 11.1.1.7.0 B01/14/2013 09:08
admin-user=admin
server-user=joe
ssl-port=8989
log-file=../logs/server.log
log-level=NOTIFICATION:1
access-log-file=../logs/access.log
host=adm.example.com
description=This is the Administration Server node

These are the properties that you specified, or were set by default, when you created the administration server by using the configure-server CLI command.

Changing Administration Server Settings

You can change the administration server settings by using either the administration console or the CLI.

Note:

The CLI examples in this section are shown in shell mode (tadm>). For information about invoking the CLI shell, see Accessing the Command-Line Interface.

Changing the Administration Server Settings Using the Administration Console

To change the properties of the administration server by using the administration console, do the following:

Log in to the administration console, as described in Accessing the Administration Console.
Click the Nodes button that is situated near the upper left corner of the page.

A list of available nodes is displayed.
From the list of nodes, select Administration Server.
The General Settings page is displayed. On this page you can do the following:
- Change the SSL port number on which the administration server communicates.
- Change the path to the JDK that the administration server process should use.
- Change the locations of the access and server logs, and the server log level.
- Change the user ID with which the administration server runs. Note that you can change the user ID only when the administration server is running as the root user and if there are no instances running on the administration server.
You can also set and configure a pin for the internal token for the administration server's certificates database, and change and configure the authentication mode for the administration server. For more information, see Securing Access to the Administration Server.
Specify the parameters that you want to change, and then click Save.

A message is displayed in the Console Messages pane indicating that the updated settings are saved.
Restart the administration server by clicking Restart in the Common Tasks pane.

Changing the Administration Server Settings Using the CLI

To change the settings of the administrator server by using the CLI, run the following command:

tadm> set-admin-prop (property=value)+

You can specify one or more property=value pairs separated by spaces, as shown in the following example:

tadm> set-admin-prop ssl-port=8900 log-level=WARNING:1

For information about the properties that you can set by using the set-admin-prop command, see the Oracle Traffic Director Command-Line Reference or run the command with the --help option.

Note:

For the changes to take effect, you must restart the administration server.