(ATS6-PLAT09) Deploying Applications on Load Balanced AEP

Servers for High AvailabilityConrad Agramont

Senior Product Manager, Enterprise Technologies

Accelrys Enterprise Platform

conrad.Agramont@Accelrys.com

The information on the roadmap and future software development efforts are intended to outline general product direction and should not be relied on in making

a purchasing decision.

Content

• System Requirements

• Deployment

• Tools & Tips

• Pools

• High Availability

• High Concurrency

• Load Distribution

• Great for “Small Jobs”

• Windows and Linux

• Leverages Third-Party Load-Balancing systems

Web Farm/Load Balancing

AEP01 AEP02 AEP03 AEP04 AEP05

Corporate Network

LOAD BALANCER

Back-End Network

Accelrys Enterprise Platform 9.0Web Farm

• Connecting to AEP over the Internet without VPN

• Connecting to PP server via a different URI than server name

Internet Facing

INTERNET

FIREWALL

AEP01 AEP02 AEP03 AEP04 AEP05

DMZ

LOAD BALANCER

Back-End Network

Accelrys Enterprise Platform 9.0Internet Deployed Web Farm

System Requirements

• Operating Systems

• Storage Requirements

• Load Balancers

Operating Systems

• Windows Server 2008 R2 (64 bit)

• Windows Server 2012

• Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5 (64 bit)

• Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 (64 bit)

• SuSE Linux 11 (64 bit)

Storage Requirements

• Shared Storage used by all nodes

– Jobs

– User

– Public

– Shared

– Temp

• Performance Considerations

Windows Server for Shared Storage

• Disable distributed directory caching

– Registry Update[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\services\LanmanWorkstation\Parameters]

"FileInfoCacheLifetime"=dword:00000000

"FileNotFoundCacheLifetime"=dword:00000000

"DirectoryCacheLifetime"=dword:00000000

– Registry Update provided

<Server Install>\install\LoadBalancingConfig_Enable.reg

Load Balancers

• What we tested with (F5)

– Hardware

– Virtual

• AEP generically works with different load balancing technologies

– Hardware Device

– Software

– Virtualization

Deployment

• Planning for Deployment

• Configuration Management

Planning and Deployment

• What to do with the Installer

• Everyone has their own XMLDB

• What doesn’t work in this deployment

– Pipeline Pilot Authoring

– Model Building Protocols (they write into the XMLDB)

• Applications, Protocols, & Components need to use Packaging to be distributed across the nodes

Step 1: The basics

• Directory Services• Database Connections• Storage

– Use local temp folders for better job performance– Shared Storage required for all nodes (Jobs, Users, Shared Directory)

• Recommend 100 GB Network dedicated• NFS Supported, but not recommended• Fast Storage technologies are recommended (e.g. IBM GPFS)

Step 2: Build your Staging Server

• Deployed using GUI or Unattended Installation

• Same configuration as production

• Export settings that will be used for Load-Balanced Nodes

Staging01

Step 2: Build your Gold node

• Deployed using Unattended Installation

• Configure Reverse Proxy

• Enable Load Balancing

• Export Configuration

• Set Folder Locations

AEP01Staging01

(ATS6-PLAT07) Managing AEP in an Enterprise Environment

What do we have now?

• Single Node

• XMLDB is no longer “Writeable”

AEP01Staging01

Step 3: Deploy additional nodes

• Deployed using automated purposing technology and leverage unattended installation

• Import Configuration from “Gold” node

AEP01 AEP02 AEP03 AEP04 AEP05Staging01

What do we have now?

• Bunch of nodes, but no load balancing

AEP01 AEP02 AEP03 AEP04 AEP05Staging01

Step 4: Load Balancer

• Deploy the load balancer (see Vendor directions for details)

• Enable SSL at the load balancer

• Set Affinity

AEP01 AEP02 AEP03 AEP04 AEP05Staging01

What do we have now?

• A web farm

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Deploying Applications

• First deploy to the Staging server and test your regressions

• Before deploying to the web farm, use maintenance mode to pause requests going to the servers

• Xcopy package to each node

• Use PkgUtil to deploy package

• Turn off maintenance mode

• Run tests

• Pat yourself on the back AEP01 AEP02 AEP03 AEP04 AEP05Staging01

(ATS6-DEV06) Using Packages for Enterprise Application Delivery

• Always have a Firewall between AEP and the Internet

• At the Firewall or Proxy Server level

– Only expose the end-points that are required for the service (e.g. don’t expose Web Port if not required)

– Don’t allow access to Admin Portal via the Internet

A word about security

• Load-Balancing provide high availability and concurreny, but require additional configuration settings

• Load-Balancing is an infrastructure pattern the requires servers, shared storage, and networking equipment all working together

• Load-Balancing requires planning and guidance for application development, deployment, and operations

• See the AEP 9 Deployment Guide for more details.

Summary