Active/Active cluster

[former_member183788]

Dear Experts,

How to configure Active/Active cluster in SQL 2008 for SAP windows server?

[martin_E · Accepted solution]

Not sure what your current scenario is; whether you already have SAP on SQL Server, or if you're talking about a brand new system, or even what your customer's requirements are ?

Have you considered using virtualisation ?? An OS image can be moved (while running) from one physical server to another to enable scheduled hardware outages, and VMware (and most other enterprise level virtualisation tools) can trigger a restart (on another physical server) if an OS image fails due to hardware errors.

Amyway, regarding the active / active configuration, read the Installation Guides for NW7.1+ systems on SQL Server - there's one each for ABAP, JAVA and Dual Stack installations, available at http://service.sap.com/instguides ==> SAP Netweaver ==> SAP NetWeaver 7.3 (for example)

They suggest that if you have an existing SAP system and plan to migrate to a cluster with new hardware, you install the new SAP system (as a clustered system) using a system copy. I have always read this to include moving from unclustered to clustered systems, because even if you are fully virtualised and / or are using identical hardware, you still want to retain the unclustered system as a backup until you have completed your testing and released the clustred system to your customer / user / developer teams.

Again, the Installation Guides for Windows / SQL Server provide a comprehensive description of what is required to implement MS Failover Clustering and the appropriate sequence in which to perform these tasks. There is also more detail in the SQL Installation / Upgrade guides in http://service.sap.com/instguides ==> Database Upgrades ==> MS SQL Server

BTW, in general, Microsoft have generally recommended active/passive cluster configurations over active/active configurations because they are more likely to improve both availability and scalability; Of course, there's the cost of the unused hardware (which is why active / active became popular), but remember that any outage (scheduled or unscheduled) to either of the active database nodes will impact performance.

hth

[former_member183788 · Accepted solution]

Dear Martin,

We have a new environment with DEV,QAS,PRD(2),Portal(2),Solman,IDES. We completed the DEV and QAS. We are planning to do portal and PRD in cluster windows 2008.

I had a experinece of making ACTIVE/PASSIVE means, except OS disk all the disk were shared in SAN Stoarge and if one node fails the other will take care.

Now here the scenario is different our client Basis manager is insisting we to do ACTIVE/ACTIVE cluster. So if you have any suggestions or materials for making ACTIVE/ACTIVE cluster configuration advice us, and what is the advatage and disadvatage of ACTIVE/ACTIVE & ACTIVE?PASSIVE.

Thanks & Regards.

[sunny_pahuja2 · Accepted solution]

Hello,

You can simply follow installation guide. It has described all steps required to install new system in HA configuration.

Advantage of Active/Active is that second can be used in load balancing when your system is working in normal condition. Application server will be installed on other node which will share load in normal condition.

Thanks,

Sunny

[former_member183788 · Accepted solution]

Dear Sunny,

Waht kind of clustering solution is SAP with MSSQL is supporting? It's Active/Active or Active/Passive. Just see the below screen.

[sunny_pahuja2 · Accepted solution]

It should be active/active.

Thanks,

Sunny

[former_member183788 · Accepted solution]

Dear Sunny,

The below image is correct for ACtive/Active.

[sunny_pahuja2 · Accepted solution]

It looks good.

Thanks,

Sunny

[Sriram2009 · Accepted solution]

Hi Philip

In SAP it will support active /active cluster environment. both nodes SAP instance kept on,end users can logon thru the virtual name(SAP Group) & you can create load balancing in RFC connections & background. all the profile parameters should be same in the both nodes

In the cluster you are going to create the Three virtual host name and IP.

1. Cluster group - Windows Quorum, & DNS Name (Host name & IP address)

2. DBGRP - MS Sql group which is holding Database & application installation folder

3. SAPGRP  - SAP Application group which is holding the Two services in failover cluster 1 ASCS - ABAP & 2. SCS - Java central service instance. in this group  as mention in the installation guide

DBGRP & SAPGRP you can keep the group in any one of the Node. basically we can use the both nodes for this node 1 can hold the SAPGRP & Node 2 can hold the SQL DB group

Regards

Sriram