Duplicate another server including WAS applications 1

[FruitMouse]

Hi,
I duplicated a new server from 'mksysb' tape including WAS applications. I changed new server's IP address and host name. I also changed HTTP Server's configuration to start HTTP server. But I could not start WebSphere Application Server even I changed its configuration file admin.config. Later I tried to recreate a new admin database and import original configuration. But I still couldn't start WAS server.

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Server Environment:
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OS: AIX 4.3.3 ML9
Java: 1.2.2
WebSphere Application Server: 3.5.0

Is there anyone can give me advice?


Thanks

 

[fearo]

Hi (FruitMouse - like the name) intrigued as to the origins!!!,

The changed ip address and/or hostname of the machine should be updated in the following places.
DB2:
If the admin repository for WebSphere is also on the same machine, then you need to uncatalog the node and database and catalog them again with new IP address. This may need a machine restart. Connect to the admin repository database and then issue following SQLs.

update ejsadmin.bindingbeantbl set name='newIP' where name='oldIP'

update ejsadmin.bindingbeantbl set name='newHostname' where name='oldHostname'

update ejsadmin.node_table set name='newHostname' where name='oldHostname'


WebSphere configuration:

Edit sas.server.props file and replace all occurences of the old hostname with the new hostname. Same changes must be made to sas.server.props.future, if it is not empty.

Restart Websphere.

If the server still fails to start then you need to post the contents of the tracefile so that I can look further at the problem.

Regards,

Eddie

 

[FruitMouse]

fearo,
Thank you very much! You give me a big help!

 

[Einstein47]

I've had thoughts of doing this sort of thing (applying a mksysb of our production app server to a second server for failover reasons), however when I tried it - BOOM!!! The Informix DB died hard. I also noticed that a second node was created in the DB2 Admin Repository which I had to remove with SQL before I could get WebSphere to restart.

Why machine 2 would write to the DB2 Admin Repository of machine 1 is beyond my understanding. So FruitMouse, you may need to look for that too. (sorry that I don't remember the exact tables and SQL I used to clean up the DB2 Admin Repository)

But I do have another question - what is the best way to create a horizontal clone of my AppServer for failover? If anyone has done this before, I would love to discuss it over email, IM, or here.

Thanks, Einstein47
("For every expert, there is an equal and opposite expert." - Arthur C. Clarke)

 

[FruitMouse]

Einstein47,
I had same problem before. But after I tried fearo's tips, everything works fine. I think there are few important steps you have to do:

1. Connect to the admin repository database and then issue following SQLs.
update ejsadmin.bindingbeantbl set name='newIP' where name='oldIP'
update ejsadmin.bindingbeantbl set name='newHostname' where name='oldHostname'
update ejsadmin.node_table set name='newHostname' where name='oldHostname'
This step will use your new hostname and IP address to replace your old hostname and IP address in WAS admin repository. Then when you start WAS console, you will only have one node as new hostname which includes your original application server node inside.

2. If your WAS server and admin repository are not running on the same machine, or your use db2 client to connect to WAS admin repository, don't forget to uncatalog and catalog again your database nodes and databases. Before you start your WAS server, connect to all your database alias from db2 command line, make sure they don't have any problem to connect.

For you another question, I am confused. Do you want to run two WAS servers as clones or you want to run them as fail over?
From my understanding, if you create clones, your two servers will run at the same time, there is no fail over, but if one failed, the other one will continue to run. The only way you can keep two servers as fail over (one running, one stand by) is HA(for AIX). To run HA, You can duplicate your original server and use HA's service IP address to set up your WAS server.


FruitMouse