InfoScale™ 9.0 Storage Foundation and High Availability Solutions HA and DR Solutions Guide for Microsoft SQL Server - Windows
- Section I. Getting started with Storage Foundation and High Availability Solutions for SQL Server
- Introducing SFW HA and the VCS agents for SQL Server
- How is application availability achieved in a VMware virtual environment
- How VCS monitors storage components
- Deployment scenarios for SQL Server
- Reviewing the active-passive HA configuration
- Reviewing a standalone SQL Server configuration
- Reviewing the campus cluster configuration
- Reviewing the Replicated Data Cluster configuration
- About setting up a Replicated Data Cluster configuration
- Disaster recovery configuration
- Reviewing the disaster recovery configuration
- Notes and recommendations for cluster and application configuration
- Configuring disk groups and volumes for SQL Server
- About managing disk groups and volumes
- Configuring the cluster using the Cluster Configuration Wizard
- Installing SQL Server
- Completing configuration steps in SQL Server
- Introducing SFW HA and the VCS agents for SQL Server
- Section II. Configuring SQL Server in a physical environment
- Configuring SQL Server for failover
- About configuring the SQL Server service group
- Configuring the service group in a non-shared storage environment
- Configuring an MSDTC Server service group
- Configuring campus clusters for SQL Server
- Configuring Replicated Data Clusters for SQL Server
- Setting up the Replicated Data Sets (RDS)
- Configuring a RVG service group for replication
- Configuring the resources in the RVG service group for RDC replication
- Configuring the VMDg or VMNSDg resources for the disk groups
- Configuring the RVG Primary resources
- Adding the nodes from the secondary zone to the RDC
- Verifying the RDC configuration
- Configuring disaster recovery for SQL Server
- Setting up your replication environment
- About configuring disaster recovery with the DR wizard
- Configuring replication and global clustering
- Configuring the global cluster option for wide-area failover
- Testing fault readiness by running a fire drill
- About the Fire Drill Wizard
- Prerequisites for a fire drill
- Preparing the fire drill configuration
- Deleting the fire drill configuration
- Configuring SQL Server for failover
Creating volumes for campus clusters
This section will guide you through the process of creating a volume on a dynamic disk group for a campus cluster.
For creating volumes for other types of clusters:
Before you begin, review the following topics:
Use the following procedure to create dynamic volumes for a campus cluster.
Note:
When assigning drive letters to volumes, ensure that the drive letters that you assign are available on all nodes.
To create dynamic volumes
- Launch Veritas Enterprise Administrator from the Apps menu on the Start screen.
- Click Connect to a Host or Domain.
- In the Connect dialog box select the host name and click Connect.
To connect to the local system, select localhost. Provide the user name, password, and domain if prompted.
- To start the New Volume wizard, expand the tree view under the host node to display all the disk groups. Right click a disk group and select New Volume from the context menu.
You can right-click the disk group you have just created.
For example, INST1_DG.
- At the New Volume wizard opening screen, click Next.
- Select the disks for the volume as follows:
Group name
Make sure the appropriate disk group is selected.
Site preference
Select the Site Separated option.
Select site from
Select the campus cluster sites. Press CTRL to select multiple sites.
Note:
If no sites are listed, the disks have not yet been added to a site.
Auto select disks
Automatic disk selection is recommended for campus clusters.
SFW automatically selects the disks based on the following criteria:
Their port assignment (disks with two different ports are selected): Note that in the list of available disks, the entry after each disk name starts with the port number. For example, the "P3" in the entry P3C0T2L1 refers to port 3.
Amount of available space on the disks: SFW picks two disks (one from each array) with the most space.
Manually select disks
If you manually select disks, use the Add and Remove buttons to move the appropriate disks to the Selected disks list.
Disable Track Alignment
You may also check Disable Track Alignment to disable track alignment for the volume. Disabling track alignment means that the volume does not store blocks of data in alignment with the boundaries of the physical track of the disk.
Click Next.
- Specify the volume attributes as follows:
Volume name
Specify a name for the volume. The name is limited to 18 ASCII characters and cannot contain spaces or forward or backward slashes.
Size
Specify a size for the volume. If you click Max Size, the Size box shows the maximum possible volume size for that layout in the dynamic disk group.
Layout
Ensure that the Mirrored checkbox is selected.
Select either the Concatenated or Striped layout type.
If you are creating a striped volume, the Columns and Stripe unit size boxes need to have entries. Defaults are provided. In addition, click the Stripe across checkbox and select Ports from the drop-down list.
Mirror Info
Click Mirror across and select Enclosures from the drop-down list.
When creating a site separated volume, as required for campus clusters, the number of mirrors must correspond to the number of sites. If needed, you can add more mirrors after creating the volume.
Enable logging
Verify that this option is not selected.
Click Next.
- In the Add Drive Letter and Path dialog box, assign a drive letter or mount point to the volume. You must use the same drive letter or mount point on all systems in the cluster. Make sure to verify the availability of the drive letter before assigning it.
To assign a drive letter, select Assign a Drive Letter, and choose a drive letter.
To mount the volume as a folder, select Mount as an empty NTFS folder, and click Browse to locate an empty folder on the shared disk.
Click Next.
- Create an NTFS file system.
Make sure the Format this volume checkbox is checked and select NTFS.
Select an allocation size or accept the default.
The file system label is optional. SFW makes the volume name the file system label.
Select Perform a quick format if you want to save time.
Select Enable file and folder compression to save disk space.
Note that compression consumes system resources and performs encryption and decryption, which may result in reduced system performance.
Click Next.
- Click Finish to create the new volume.
- Repeat these steps to create additional volumes as needed.
Note:
Create the cluster disk group and volumes on the first node of the cluster only.