using symantec storage foundation ha for host failover

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Using Symantec Storage Foundation HA for Host Failover with Infortrend Subsystem

Using Symantec Storage Foundation HA for Host Failover with Infortrend

Subsystem

Application Note

Abstract:

This document describes how to use Symantec Storage Foundation HA for

Host Failover with Infortrend Subsystem


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Table of Contents

Products Covered in This Document ........................................................................................... 3

Introduction .................................................................................................................................... 3

About Storage Foundation and High Availability ................................................................ 4

About Service Groups........................................................................................................ 4

Scenario.......................................................................................................................................... 6

System Configuration.................................................................................................................... 7

System Components................................................................................................................. 7

Hardware Requirement:..................................................................................................... 7

Software Requirement: ...................................................................................................... 7

System Architecture .................................................................................................................. 7

Storage Configuration ............................................................................................................... 8

RAID Configuration............................................................................................................ 8

SFHA Configuration .................................................................................................................. 8

Veritas Cluster Server Configuration.................................................................................. 8

Storage Foundation Configuration ................................................................................... 12

SFHA Administration ................................................................................................................... 14

CLI Commands....................................................................................................................... 14

Conclusion ................................................................................................................................... 16

Reference...................................................................................................................................... 16

pyright © 2013 Infortrend Technology, Inc. All rights reserved. / 16


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Products Covered in This Document

This application note applies to the following product models:

ESDS-B24F-R2852-6

ESDS-S12F-R2850

ESDS-S12F-R2851

ESDS-S16F-R2850

ESDS-S16F-R2851

ESDS-S16F-R2852-6

ESDS-S24F-R2850

ESDS-S24F-R2851

ESDS-S48F-R2852-6

ESVA-F75-2830

Further compatibility information can be found at Symantec’s Hardware Compatibility List (HCL):

https://sort.symantec.com/hclcentral/diskarray

For more information regarding subsystem configuration, please check the User Manual included

with the storage system or visit Infortrend’s official website for more product solutions:

http://www.infortrend.com

Introduction

This application note provides insight into how to implement Symantec’s Storage Foundation and

High Availability (SFHA) with Infortrend subsystems.

The purpose of this document is to allow readers be able to understand and how to set up SFHA

with Infortrend subsystems. Provided in a step-by step fashion, readers can easily follow the steps

in this application note to fulfill host failover with Infortrend subsystems.

With SFHA enabled on an Infortrend subsystem, your IT environments are kept more resilient.

Therefore, SFHA and Infortrend subsystems strive to provide a solution to accomplish HA

protection by cluster technology and advanced subsystem design.



http://www.infortrend.com/


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About Storage Foundation and High Availability

Symantec’s Storage Foundation High Availability solutions protect data by keeping applications,

data, and infrastructure resilient and available for the most critical services in your data center.

Veritas Storage Foundation by Symantec includes Veritas File System by Symantec

(VxFS) and Veritas Volume Manager by Symantec (VxVM) with various feature levels.

The Veritas File System is a high-performance journaling file system that provides easy

management and quick-recovery for applications. Veritas File System delivers scalable

performance, continuous availability, increased I/O throughput, and structural integrity.

Veritas Volume Manager removes the physical limitations of disk storage. You can configure, share,

manage, and optimize storage I/O performance online without interrupting data availability. Veritas

Volume Manager also provides easy-to-use, online storage management tools to reduce downtime.

You add high availability functionality to Storage Foundation HA by installing Veritas Cluster Server

software.

Veritas Cluster Server by Symantec (VCS) is a clustering solution that provides the following

benefits:

■ Reduces application downtime

■ Facilitates the consolidation and the failover of servers

■ Manages a range of applications in heterogeneous environments

About Service Groups

A service group is a virtual container that contains all the hardware and software resources that are

required to run the managed application.

Service groups allow VCS to control all the hardware and software resources of the managed

application as a single unit. When a failover occurs, resources do not fail over individually; the entire

service group fails over. If more than one service group is on a system, a service group can fail over

without affecting the others. Figure 1 illustrates a typical service group.



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Figure 1: Typical database service group

A single node can host any number of service groups, each providing a discrete service to

networked clients. If the server crashes, all service groups on that node must be failed over

elsewhere.



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Scenario

This application mainly focuses on how to protect applications from a fault in a node of a two-node

Veritas Cluster Server cluster. To simulate a host failover scenario, we need two servers using the

same Infortrend storage. Once one node fails, the service group will automatically failover to

another node as figure 2 shows. Therefore, SFHA can provide high availability protection.

Figure 2: Host Failover Scenario



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System Configuration

This section will list hardware and software requirement and configuration of SFHA and Infortrend

RAID. In addition, it will introduce the system architecture as well.

System Components

Hardware Requirement:

2 (64-bit) SUSE Linux Enterprise Server v11.0 SP1 SFHA servers

3 NIC interfaces per server

4 FC/iSCSI ports per server

Software Requirement:

Storage Foundation and High Availability Solutions (SFHA) 6.0

System Architecture

Figure 3: System Topology

In order to fulfill local cluster service group failover, we create a two-node local cluster with shared

Infortrend storage as figure 3 shows.



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Storage Configuration In this case, we create a RAID-5 LD first. And then, put it into a LV. Later, create a partition and

share it to the two servers in the local cluster.

RAID Configuration

Figure 4: RAID Configuration

Steps:

1. Create a RAID-5 LD

2. Create a LV

3. Edit LUN mapping

SFHA Configuration

Veritas Cluster Server Configuration

To fulfill local service group failover, we must install VCS in advance. Here is the command and

specific steps.

Install VCS

SFHA-2:~ # /opt/VRTS/install/installsfha -configure SFHA-1 SFHA-2



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Figure 5: System Connectivity View

After installing VCS correctly, you can see the system connectivity view by cluster explorer as figure

5 shows. Now, we have a two-node local cluster environment.

Storage Foundation Configuration

Owing to the cooperation between Infortrend and Symantec, Infortrend Fibre Channel storage can

be found on Symantec’s Array Support List (ASL). Once you install Storage Foundation, you are

able to put the partition from Infortrend subsystem under VxVM control by the below commands.

For finding supported models, please check the link for HCL.




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SFHA-1:~ # vxdisk list

SFHA-1:~ # vxdisk scandisks

SFHA-1:~ # vxdisk list

As the above screenshot shows, use the commands “vxdisk scandisks” to scan the Infortrend

storage. In addition, you can use “vxdisk list” to make sure that SFHA identify Infortrend storage

already. Until this step, you have finished the required installation.



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SFHA Administration

The Storage Foundation HA for host failover readiness scenario is simulated by introducing a fault

that affects one node of the two-node cluster, which causes the application to failover to the other

node of a two-node cluster. Hence, the section described below shows readers how to verify host

failover in SFHA environment whether is applicable or not.

CLI Commands Since we would like to verify storage foundation HA for host failover, we must create a service

group first. Therefore, we create a service group called appsg. You can use hastatus –sum to

check if your service group is online or not. Another way to check the service group status is by

cluster manager GUI.

Create a service group

Figure 6: Service Group Resource View

After checking the service group is online, we use the command below to simulate a node

shutdown and to see if it’s applicable that the service group failover to the other node.



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Switch service group

Figure 7: Local Cluster Status View

SFHA-1:~ # hagrp -switch appsg -to SFHA-2

Figure 8: Local Cluster Status View

As the figure 7 and figure 8 show, the service group has a successful failover from SFHA-1 to

SFHA-2.

Hence, if one server shutdown unexpectedly, SFHA and Infortrend subsystem can provide

continuity for mission-critical applications.



Copyright © 2013 Infortrend Technology, Inc. All rights reserved. / 16

Conclusion

Storage Foundation and High Availability Solutions (SFHA) 6.0 is capable of monitoring the

application over a number of servers, providing high availability protection by facilitating failover

between nodes. Integrated with Infortrend storage, SFHA can build a local cluster with high

availability whether in either host side or storage side.

With SFHA enabled on Infortrend storage, your IT environments are provided with flexibility in

disaster recovery and business continuity for mission-critical applications.

Reference

For more information on SFHA, please check the following resources

Veritas Storage Foundation™ and High Availability Installation Guide

Veritas Cluster Server Installation Guide

Veritas Cluster Server User’s Guide

Veritas™ Cluster Server Administrator's Guide

using symantec storage foundation ha for host failover

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