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giuliod's avatar
giuliod
Level 5
14 years ago
Solved

EV building blocks

Hi All,

I am trying to find some documentationon on how to configure a building blocks EV environment but, to be honest, I couldn't find too much info within the EV manuals. Are you aware of any howto document about this?

Please notice I have two EV servers (one for mail archiving and one for journaling) that I want to create building blocks for.

Thank you very much.

Configuring
Enterprise Vault
Information Governance
Installing
Integration
Tip-How to
  • giuliod's avatar
    giuliod
    14 years ago

    Actually, no one of the answers helped me out to much, to be honest. I just followed the manuals and tested in my lab. 

    Patriot, basically you just need to add second EV server, lunch the configuration wizard on it and add it to the EVsite. All the configurations (storage, policies, targets etc.) should be done on the primary EV server.

    When a disaster occurs, you just need to change the DNS alias of the second server to match the alias of the first one and then update the service locations. Of course all the data must higly available ie. accesible to both servers.

    Hope this helps.

     

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  • LCT's avatar
    LCT
    Level 6
    14 years ago

    Here are some if you have not come across them before:

    http://www.symantec.com/business/support/index?page=content&id=HOWTO37984

    http://www.symantec.com/business/support/index?page=content&id=HOWTO37985#v8822851

    http://www.symantec.com/business/support/index?page=content&id=HOWTO57728

    http://www.symantec.com/business/support/index?page=content&id=HOWTO56905#v11746261

    Mark has a good overview here:

    https://www-secure.symantec.com/connect/forums/block-mode-configuration

    Hope that helps a little.

  • giuliod's avatar
    giuliod
    Level 5
    14 years ago

    Thanks. I've already been through those tech-notes, but still have a few questions.

    Supposing I have two servers S1 and S2 part of the building blocks config. Basically per the reqs, I need to assign to each of them an alias and add them to the same EV site. 

    Let's say that I configure the index locations, vault stores, policies, targets and everything on S1 and S2 is in standby. Beside lunching the configuration wizard and adding the S2 to the EVsite, should I perform any additional operations on S2?

    If S1 fails, as far as I'm aware, I just need to assigns S1 server alias to the S2 server and then update service locations and it will take over S1, right? 

    Thank you very much.

  • MarkBarefoot's avatar
    MarkBarefoot
    Level 6
    14 years ago

    First off you can't store anything locally onto S1, as this makes any clustering/failover invalid as the data is not on a shared resource.

    Once S2 is added to the site, and you've gone through the docs and link above, it's fairly pain-free to do. Building Blocks is a "poor mans clustering" really, and it's a proven method of High Availibility.

  • JesusWept3's avatar
    JesusWept3
    Level 6
    14 years ago

    poor mans clustering yes, high availability, no, its not an HA solution

  • AndrewB's avatar
    AndrewB
    Moderator
    14 years ago

    i would argue it's neither and that's why someone came up with their own term for it. i like to explain to customers that it's like a warm stand-by.

  • giuliod's avatar
    giuliod
    Level 5
    14 years ago

    Thanks guys. I've made some tests in my lab and now everything is clear now.

  • AndrewB's avatar
    AndrewB
    Moderator
    14 years ago

    glad to hear you got it worked out. please remember to mark the post that helped you solve your question.

  • patriot3w's avatar
    patriot3w
    Level 5
    14 years ago

    Does Symantec support this configration? How come don't have details guide on this configration? All the links I saw so far is overall.

    Thank you.

  • giuliod's avatar
    giuliod
    Level 5
    14 years ago

    Actually, no one of the answers helped me out to much, to be honest. I just followed the manuals and tested in my lab. 

    Patriot, basically you just need to add second EV server, lunch the configuration wizard on it and add it to the EVsite. All the configurations (storage, policies, targets etc.) should be done on the primary EV server.

    When a disaster occurs, you just need to change the DNS alias of the second server to match the alias of the first one and then update the service locations. Of course all the data must higly available ie. accesible to both servers.

    Hope this helps.

     

  • MarkBarefoot's avatar
    MarkBarefoot
    Level 6
    14 years ago

    This is all in the Admin Guide, look under "Failover in a building blocks configuration"