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SME High Availability

guestHH

SME High Availability
« on: March 05, 2002, 09:08:23 PM »
Hi all,

As mentioned in previous posts I have been 'working' on a MITEL SME High Availability How-To.

After feed-back from several users and some testing, I think it's time to let more people try it out or even use it :-)

So what's it about?

*. 2 servers (MITEL SME 5.1.2), 1 primary 1 secondary.
*. If the primary fails the seconday will take over within 10 seconds (no data loss)
*. Data (incl. open files e.q. databases) is written to both severs real time (RAID-1 over LAN)

More details are in the How-To.

http://www.star-support.com/downloads/mitel/contrib/Linux-HA/SME%20High%20Availability%20How-To.html

(maybe the above link show 'broken' in this message, then go to:
http://www.star-support.com/downloads/mitel/contrib/Linux-HA/)

Any feed-back is highly appreciated, even the smallest remark or comment!

I submitted this How-To documentation@e-smith.com so it should be added to the contributed howto documents section shortly.

Do think this could be a usefull contribution to MITEL SME functionality ???

Thanks for reading,
guestHH

DJ_Ramjet99

Re: SME High Availability
« Reply #1 on: March 06, 2002, 08:38:45 AM »
Wow, looks amazing !!

Quick Question before I give this a whirl, will it mirror Server-Gateway servers as well ? Or is a 3rd network card required ?

guestHH

Re: SME High Availability
« Reply #2 on: March 06, 2002, 12:40:25 PM »
Hi DJ,

It can be in Server Gateway mode. This I have not tested yet. If a 3rd NIC is required it will be not a problem to add this NIC.

Maybe you can give it a try so we can share information?

Thanks,
guestHH

Judy Morgann

Re: SME High Availability
« Reply #3 on: March 07, 2002, 10:11:19 PM »
Hi,

this is the best news i have ever seen here! very great job!!! i think this is the most important function e-smith lacks of. e-smith is a greate server distribution but with your howto it can take place in enterprise.
taking over other services like apache, imap works greate too.
some "problem" i try to figure out is how to replicate the user profiles from an e-smith pdc.
we have some e-smith servers running as pdc for our win2k/xp clients. but if one fails user can´t log in to another server cause of missing the user and machine accounts.
i try to copy smbpasswd and MACHINE.SID from one server to the others via rsync, but clients can´t logon.
if someone has a idea it would be very nice.

thanks again for your greate work!!!

judy

guestHH

Re: SME High Availability
« Reply #4 on: March 07, 2002, 10:32:07 PM »
Hi Judy,

You're a step ahead... :-)

Just copying the smbpasswd will not work for user accounts (home directories, unix password, unix-samba synchronisation etc.) are handled by the 'create user' script in the manager panel. So is other system related data.
So if you have the correct smbpasswd you don't have the other related stuff....

In the How-To i describe only 1 drbd device: nb0 mounted at the files section of data ibay. It is possible to create more drbd devices mounted at e.q. /etc or /home.
That will get you further ont the track in respect to user data.

Now for system configuration, I think we have to calll in the help of the dev-info community.

1. They have the expertise in customising SME
2. They know which files/scripts/acton exactly are needed to create an exact copy
3. They is also MITEL people who have more in depth knowledge.

So for now I am performing a 'create user' and 'create ibay' action on both servers to make them exactly the same....

Rsync is a good way of relicating from server 1 to server 2, but how about server 1 is down and changes are made (users, ibays) to server 2? That's why I like to try Unison.

Next to the 'server only' mode I also received questions about 'server gateway' mode. This too is an importent issue.

Nevertheless you're comments AND results are most welcome !!!

I give a post to the dev-info list a go. See if anybody can help out.

Thanks for your kind words Judy and good luck.

(but after giving it a try it wasn't that complicated at all was it... :-)  )

Regards,
guestHH

Judy Morgann

Re: SME High Availability
« Reply #5 on: March 10, 2002, 02:45:53 AM »
hi RequestedDeletion,

any response from e-smith developers?
i can´t understand why they don´t add your greate work to the howto section :(
do you understand why the respones from other users is so little? in my eyes high availability is some of the most important feature for a server, so e-smith developers would do a greate job to help you! there was a greate project too last year - axon-linux, an enhanced version of e-smith. they added some greate and important features like jounraling filesystem...but it died. this project and your work together would be best server...

thanks again - i´m still testing to get user accounts synced.

regards
judy

guestHH

Re: SME High Availability
« Reply #6 on: March 10, 2002, 03:37:44 PM »
Hi Judy,

I'll forward the How-To to documentation@e-smith.com again. We'll see....

According to my statistics, the How-To was viewed/ grabbed over 250 times the last 1,5 month so I imagine people gave it a ty.

Maybe we can start a mailing-list so we can share information. It's more efficient then posting in the forum all the time. I don't know how or where though. Maybe you have an idea?

Regards,
RequestedDeletion

ps. I'm interested in (future) results you may have with replicating user accounts..

Judy Morgann

Re: SME High Availability
« Reply #7 on: March 10, 2002, 08:15:09 PM »
Hi RequestedDeletion,

nice to hear from you.

>According to my statistics, the How-To was viewed/ grabbed over 250 times the >last 1,5 month so I imagine people gave it a ty.
this is very cool hope this people will share their experience with us!
 
>Maybe we can start a mailing-list so we can share information. It's more efficient >then posting in the forum all the time. I don't know how or where though. Maybe >you have an idea?
greate idea!!! a friend of mine has a small server with ezml running...

regards
judy

Steve

Re: SME High Availability
« Reply #8 on: March 10, 2002, 09:47:00 PM »
My servers bored - if its any use

guestHH

Re: SME High Availability
« Reply #9 on: March 11, 2002, 02:13:36 AM »
uuuhhh??? What do you mean ?

Regards,
guestHH

guestHH

Re: SME High Availability
« Reply #10 on: March 11, 2002, 02:19:57 AM »
Ye sJudy, I agree,

I'll post you current result form others directly.

Regards,
RequestedDeletion

ps. or all other, I'm trying to get a mailing-list started, just I don't know how...hehehe

Steve

Re: SME High Availability
« Reply #11 on: March 11, 2002, 02:37:17 AM »
If you want somewhere to host a mailing i have a server that i would be willing to use to support your efforts

Judy Morgann

Re: SME High Availability
« Reply #12 on: March 12, 2002, 01:39:51 AM »
Hi Steve,

greate idea to exchange about e-smith and high-availability with others!

regards
judy

guestHH

Re: SME High Availability
« Reply #13 on: March 12, 2002, 02:47:34 AM »
Yes Steve,

Fire up the mailing list please and post details.

Regards,
guestHH

guestHH

Re: SME High Availability
« Reply #14 on: March 12, 2002, 02:51:44 AM »
Uhhh, Judy if you think it should be somewhere else....

Or if anybody want's discuss the location of a mailing list, please do so.

Regards,
RequestedDeletion

ps. I gave a presentationtoday which wet very well. Still for 'juicy' effect, I have to keep that mp3 running upon fail-over....