HP Instant Capacity (iCAP) manual Global Instant Capacity Group Managers, Standby Group Managers

Global Instant Capacity Group Managers

For each group, an HP-UX system must be designated as an active GiCAP Group Manager. This system maintains information about the group, group resources, and grouping rules. Use the icapmanage commands on a Group Manager system only.

The active Group Manager must be an HP-UX system running Instant Capacity software version

9.0or later. The system running the Group Manager does not require any Instant Capacity components, and it does not need to be a partitionable system. A Group Manager cannot be run on a virtual machine (also known as a guest). The system must have a machine-readable serial number, as displayed by the shell command getconf CS_MACHINE_SERIAL.

The Group Manager can be run on either a partitionable or a nonpartitionable system. If run on a partitionable system, changing the configuration of the partitions can result in the Group Manager becoming inoperative. For optimal availability, run the Group Manager on a server or partition that is not a member of any GiCAP group, although it does not need to be dedicated to only the Group Manager software. A Group Manager can manage multiple groups, but it is recommended that it manages a single group for recoverability and ease of use.

Standby Group Managers

The active GiCAP Group Manager can designate a standby Group Manager to be available for use as an active Group Manager if the current Group Manager is unavailable. The requirements and recommendations defined for the Group Manager also apply to the standby Group Manager; it is a Group Manager with “standby” status. This standby Group Manager is set up using the icapmanage -a-Scommand on the active Group Manager system.

When the icapmanage -a-Scommand is issued, it sets up a cron job on the active Group Manager that periodically transfers a copy of the GiCAP database to the standby Group Manager. Prior to activating the standby Group Manager as the active Group Manager, the GiCAP database on the standby Group Manager should match the database on the active Group Manager. Although this is done automatically on a periodic basis, under some circumstances (such as intermittent problems with network communication between the active Group Manager and the standby Group Manger) the database on the standby Group Manager may be out of date. In this case, you might need to manually transfer a copy of the database from the active Group Manager to the standby Group Manager. This is done using the icapmanage -tcommand on the active Group Manager.

The standby Group Manager can take control of GiCAP group management from the active Group Manager using the command icapmanage -Qon the standby Group Manager. This allows GiCAP group operations to continue if the GiCAP Group Manager is unable to function. The new active Group Manager attempts to contact all group members, informing them that this system is the active Group Manager. It also attempts to contact the previous Group Manager to make it the standby Group Manager. The current system becomes the active Group Manager regardless of whether or not these attempted contacts succeed or fail.

When the standby Group Manager becomes the active Group Manager, the cron job set up an the former active (and now standby) Group Manager is removed, and a new cron job is set up on the currently active Group Manager to continue the periodic transfer of a copy of the GiCAP database to the standby Group Manager.

The standby Group Manager is removed using the icapmanage -r-Scommand on the active Group Manager system. The active Group Manager updates all member hosts about the removal, discontinues all GiCAP database transfer operations, and directs the standby Group Manager to remove its copy of the GiCAP database.

The use of the icapmanage command is limited on a standby Group Manager. Only the -Qand -soptions are allowed, all other options are restricted to use only on the active Group Manager.

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