Brocade Network Advisor High Availability Using Microsoft Cluster Service

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Brocade Network Advisor

High Availability Using

Microsoft Cluster Service

This paper discusses how installing Brocade Network Advisor

on a pair of Microsoft Cluster Service nodes provides automatic

failover of management services in case of server failure. With

High Availability, network management tasks can continue with

minimal interruption.

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INTRODUCTION

Brocade® Network Advisor is the SAN and Ethernet networking management application from Brocade.

Brocade Network Advisor provides an intuitive, user-friendly Graphical User Interface (GUI) for the configuration and monitoring of multiple Fibre Channel (FC) fabrics, Ethernet fabrics, Ethernet switches and routers, Brocade Host Bus Adapters (HBAs), and virtualized server infrastructures.

Brocade Network Advisor is a client-server application; multiple clients communicate with a central server, which stores configuration and performance data in a SQL Server database colocated on the server’s workstation. The server communicates with all of the managed devices to apply configuration changes and collect configuration and performance data.

High Availability (HA) capabilities are not built into the Brocade Network Advisor application, but you can achieve HA using some external tools. This document explains how to configure Brocade Network Advisor to work in HA environments using the Microsoft Cluster Service management application (which is built into the Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 Enterprise Edition and Datacenter Edition).

PREREQUISITES

The following are prerequisites for running Brocade Network Advisor software in the Microsoft Cluster Server.

Hardware

Two servers are required, each of which has the following configuration:

OS CPU RAM Storage

Windows 2008 R2 x64 Enterprise or Datacenter Edition

Quad Core Xeon 8 GB 120 GB

Also required is 500 GB of network shared storage, which is added to the cluster and which should be accessible from both the servers (the Microsoft Cluster Service nodes).

Setup:

fig01_bna-ha

Q:\Cluster Storage

Cluster shared storage Cluster nodes

BNA 12.0 Cluster Services Network Advisor Service Network Advisor DB Service Network Advisor CIMOM Service BNA 12.0

DB

NODE1 IP:172.xx.xx.xx

NODE2 IP:172.xx.xx.xx Cluster

IP:172.xx.xx.xx DB

Figure 1. Brocade Network Advisor cluster configuration.

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INSTALLING BROCADE NETWORK ADVISOR IN MICROSOFT CLUSTER SERVICE NODES

For the cluster to support HA, you need to map the Network Advisor Services in both of the cluster nodes. Since you are using the Microsoft Cluster Service shared disk, you must install Brocade Network Advisor twice in the shared disk, in order to install the services in both of the nodes.

Node 1

1. Copy the Brocade Network Advisor installer and extract it in cluster Node 1.

2. In the Install location, choose the cluster disk and proceed with the installation.

Figure 2. Brocade Network Advisor installation in shared storage.

3. Finish the installation.

4. Complete the configuration, and check that services have started.

5. Shut down the Brocade Network Advisor server and stop Microsoft Cluster Service in the node.

Find the copy of the Installation files located in the regular drive, which is available in cluster Node 1.

Now delete the install files in the cluster managed disk; in other words, delete the installation folder and everything that appears under it on the shared disk. (It is necessary to do this, because you are installing Brocade Network Advisor twice in the same shared disk.)

Note: It is not necessary to delete the shortcuts, menu items, registry entries, and so forth.

Stop Microsoft Cluster Service in Node 1, and verify that the cluster disk has moved to Node 2.

Node 2:

1. Copy the Brocade Network Advisor installer, and extract it in cluster Node 2.

2. In the Install location, choose the cluster disk and proceed with the installation.

3. Finish the installation.

4. Complete the configuration, and check that services have started.

5. Shut down the Brocade Network Advisor server, and stop Microsoft Cluster Service in the node.

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ADDING BROCADE NETWORK ADVISOR RESOURCES

Start Microsoft Cluster Service in both of the nodes, and execute the following procedure in any one of the cluster nodes.

Brocade Network Advisor Service

1. Click Services and Applications. Then, in the Actions list (on the right), click Configure a Service or Application.

2. In the Select Service or Application interface, select Generic Service.

Figure 3. The HA wizard.

3. In the Select Service interface, in the drop-down list that appears, select Network Advisor.

Figure 4. The HA wizard: Selecting the service.

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4. Assign the name and IP address (cluster IP).

Figure 5. The HA wizard: Setting the client access point.

5. Click Next to finish. Confirm that the Network Advisor Service is added as a service.

Figure 6. The Failover Cluster Manager: Displaying the Brocade Network Advisor Service.

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Brocade Network Advisor Database Service

1. Select Services and Applications. Then, in the Actions list (on the right), click Configure a Service or Application.

2. In the Select Service or Application interface, select Generic Service.

Figure 7. The HA wizard: Selecting the service or application.

3. In the Select Service drop-down list, select Network Advisor Database.

Figure 8. The HA wizard: Selecting the service.

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4. Assign the name and IP address (that is, the cluster IP, which is the same for both the Brocade Network Advisor main server and database server).

Figure 9. The HA wizard: Setting the client access point.

5. Click Next to finish. Confirm that the Network Advisor Database Service is added as a service.

Figure 10. Failover Cluster Manager: Displaying Brocade Network Advisor services.

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Brocade Network Advisor CIMOM Service

In the same way, add the Brocade Network Advisor CIM Object Manager (CIMOM) service (if required).

After the services are installed, start the server in Node 1.

FAILOVER TEST

1. Confirm that Node 1 is active.

2. Launch the client using the cluster IP. Here you can change settings in the client such as fabric name, switch name, and so forth.

3. Pull out the network cable or shut down Node 1, and observe that the client disconnects from the server and the following message appears:

4. Wait for few minutes, then confirm that the cluster resources are moved to Node 2.

5. Relaunch the client using the cluster IP, and verify that the settings persist.

SERVER MAINTENANCE

1. If you want to manually start the Brocade Network Advisor server in Node 2 when Node 1 is active, first stop the service on Node 1.

2. In case of a power failure on both of the nodes, Microsoft Cluster Service automatically starts Brocade Network Advisor on only one node when power is restored.

3. To migrate the Brocade Network Advisor server from the current release to the next release, first stop Microsoft Cluster Service on both nodes. On Node 1, perform the migration and remove the installation files.

Then perform the migration on Node 2. Once a successful migration is complete, you can start Microsoft Cluster Service on both nodes.

LIMITATIONS

1. Microsoft Cluster Service provides HA support only in case of hardware failure or connectivity loss to one node. It does not provide HA for server software issues such as server restart, and so forth.

2. It can take up to five minutes to start the Brocade Network Advisor main server and database server. During that time, Brocade Network Advisor cannot collect events and performance data.

3. Stopping Brocade Network Advisor in the Server Management Console (SMC) does not trigger failover.

SUMMARY

The Brocade Network Advisor HA solution works for all failover situations supported by Microsoft Cluster Service.

The Microsoft Cluster Service is an effective option for providing HA access to Brocade Network Advisor. Upon a server failure detected by Microsoft Cluster Services, a backup copy of Brocade Network Advisor is automatically started on another cluster node. The backup copy uses shared database files to maintain continuous performance monitoring data and event logging. Clients must re-login to the same address, and within a few minutes users can continue working with the same data as before the server failure.

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APPENDIX

Installing Failover Clustering

The steps for installing failover clustering are as follows.

Note: To create the cluster, both the nodes should be in the same domain, and the user must log in as domain administrator.

1. Launch the Windows Server Manager console.

Figure 11. Windows Server Manager: Launching the console.

2. Click Add Features.

Figure 12. Windows Server Manager: Adding features.

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Figure 13. Windows Server Manager: Selecting features.

3. Select Failover Clustering in the drop-down box, and click Next to continue.

4. Confirm that the parameters are correct. If you need to make changes, click the Previous button.

Figure 14. Windows Server Manager: The Add Features wizard.

5. Click Install to complete the installation of the Failover Clustering feature.

If the feature is successfully installed, the wizard should look similar to the example in Figure 14.

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Figure 15. Windows Server Manager: Failover Clustering installation is successful.

Configuring Microsoft Cluster Service

Start both the cluster Node 1 server and the cluster Node 2 server. Launch the Failover Cluster Management console by selecting Administrative Tools->Failover Cluster Management.

Figure 16. Cluster management dialog.

After the management console is launched, run a validation check for the clustering before starting. After the validation is successful (with no errors), proceed to the next step.

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Creating Clusters

Now you can create the cluster. Use the following steps.

1. Click Create a Cluster from the Actions panel on the right.

Figure 17. Failover Cluster Management dialog.

2. The Create Cluster wizard appears.

Figure 18. The Create Cluster wizard.

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3. Click Next to continue. Add the names of both the cluster nodes.

Figure 19. Selecting servers.

4. Specify the Cluster Name and Cluster IP address (in other words, the virtual IP that is used to access the cluster), and complete the cluster configuration.

Figure 20. Adding the Cluster Name and Cluster IP.

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Figure 21. Cluster summary.

5. Launch the Failover Cluster Manager and verify that both nodes are displayed, as in Figure 21.

Figure 22. Failover Cluster Manager: Cluster configuration.

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Adding Cluster Storage

After the cluster is created, select the storage node and add shared storage using the Add a Disk option.

Figure 23. Failover Cluster Manager: Adding a disk.

After the disk is added, it appears in the Disk panel.

Figure 24. Failover Cluster Manager: Adding storage.

Now the cluster is ready for use.

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© 2013 Brocade Communications Systems, Inc. All Rights Reserved. 08/13 GA-TB-480-00 ADX, AnyIO, Brocade, Brocade Assurance, the B-wing symbol, DCX, Fabric OS, ICX, MLX, MyBrocade, OpenScript, VCS, VDX, and Vyatta are registered trademarks, and HyperEdge, The Effortless Network, and The On-Demand Data Center are trademarks of Brocade Communications Systems, Inc., in the United States and/or in other countries. Other brands, products, or service names mentioned may be trademarks of their respective owners.

REFERENCES

• For more information on Brocade Network Advisor, see:

www.brocade.com/bna

• For more information about failover clusters in Windows Server 2008, see:

www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2008/failover-clusters.mspx technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc706993.aspx

• For more information about clustering in general, see:

www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2003/techinfo/overview/san.mspx

www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2003/evaluation/overview/technologies/clustering.mspx

Brocade Network Advisor High Availability Using Microsoft Cluster Service