Next week Craig Resnick, research director and automation expert at ARC Advisory Group will be the guest speaker for our webinar "Best Practices for Preventing Downtime in Automation Systems." We recently sat down with Craig to discuss some of the recent trends in the manufacturing and automation industries.
Q: What are some of the newer trends that you are seeing in the automation space?
Craig Resnick: A primary trend that we see at ARC is the convergence of automation and IT systems. Nearly every manufacturing company uses a variety of plant automation and enterprise IT systems to manage its operations. Plant floor systems, such as distributed control systems (DCS), programmable automation and logic controllers (PACs/PLCs), and a wide range of plant floor applications provide a wealth of real-time information regarding productivity, efficiency, equipment health, capability, and quality. Business systems, in turn, provide information on raw material costs, product orders and inventories, manufacturing resources, production schedules, etc. This wide range of information often remains isolated in systems such as manufacturing execution systems (MES), laboratory systems, maintenance systems, scheduling systems, enterprise resource planning (ERP) systems, supply chain management (SCM) systems, and customer relationship management (CRM) systems. Decisions based on data from any one of these system will always be less than optimal because, without the corresponding information from the other systems, the information will be incomplete.
To close this gap between automation and IT systems, and to address the trend of the plant floor becoming more IT-centric, ARC has defined a new space, defined as Collaborative Production Systems. These new systems consist of platforms in which the controls layer domains of process, logic, motion, building automation, and power control systems converge with the information layer domains of production management and MES systems. These converged systems enable, for example, the required data and information to be directly tied into applications such as corporate reporting and manufacturing compliance. Collaborative Production Systems will become the industrial blade server that provides full monitoring and control of the enterprise, from the office to the plant floor, sharing that information with the supply chain to, for example, procure materials and resources and purchase or sell power at the optimal times and prices from the smart grid, while providing full financial metrics and KPIs to ERP systems to maximize profitability.
Q: Now that corporate reporting and systems are heavily tied into the “factory floor”, how is that changing the need for system availability and data protection?
Craig Resnick: The need for system availability and data protection continues to expand, driven by a combination of issues ranging from global competition to regulatory requirements. Process safety and critical control are primarily focused on system availability and process uptime. As a specific example, take the Pharmaceutical industry, where data and batch information can never be lost or interrupted. System availability and data protection needs are also forcing E-records regulations to evolve across the globe. In the US, this includes 21 CFR Part 11, as well as the FDA’s Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) and Process Analytical Technology (PAT) initiatives. In Europe, this includes Annex 11 of the EU GMPs, electronic Signatures Directive 1999/93/EC, and Data Protection Directive 95/46/EC. The European Data Protection Directive requires even more protection on data than the current FDA regulations and extends this requirement to clinical trials patients, as all clinical trials data requires maximum protection to remain compliant with regulations.
Unscheduled downtime is expensive. It often impacts production’s ability to meet its schedule and may cause missed customer commitments. Unplanned downtime, which also includes unexpected stoppages resulting from equipment failure, operator error, or nuisance trips, is the nemesis of all manufacturers. Statistics on the impact of unplanned downtime on plant operations show that it accounts for 2 to 5 percent of production lost in, for example, the petrochemical industry. Unscheduled downtime is also costly in terms of equipment damage, environmental harm, and worker safety. The cost of downtime is reflected in a primary key performance indicator (KPI) used by manufacturers known as Dynamic Overall Equipment Effectiveness (OEE), which helps determine the real-time impact of the performance of any individual process or piece of equipment on the overall efficiency of the plant. Unscheduled downtime is a primary factor that significantly lowers Dynamic OEE, which translates to the manufacturer decreasing both its efficiency and profitability.
Q: What are some of the basic steps that companies can implement to ensure the availability of their systems?
Craig Resnick: The first step that companies can implement to ensure the availability of their systems is to maximize their operator’s effectiveness in the control room, which is essential to minimize the risks of accidents, eliminate unscheduled downtime, and maximize production quality. The global process industry loses $20 billion, or five percent of annual production, due to unscheduled downtime and poor quality. ARC estimates that almost 80 percent of these losses are preventable and 40 percent of those preventable losses are primarily the result of human or operator error. Maximizing operator effectiveness requires automating as many functions as technology will allow, as well as reducing complexity wherever possible. For example there are still many plants where operators monitor the processes and collect data manually or semi-automatically using chart recorders. This process is both tedious and error prone, and does not provide appropriate process insight or instill a sense of ownership among the control room operators.
The Abnormal Situation Management Consortium (ASM) points out that most incidences occur from multiple modes of failure. Preventable human error is a contributing factor to these losses, but is hardly the only cause. Preventing abnormal situations requires a multilayered multi-discipline approach focused on maximizing production throughput, efficiency and quality while minimizing lost production time and preventing damage to assets and endangerment to personnel. This approach requires deploying collaborative production systems designed and implemented to be able to deliver high levels of availability and fault-tolerance expected from any other mission critical industrial system. This typically requires effective data backup mechanisms, redundant controllers for critical applications, plus industrial grade software. Manufacturers are also deploying more fault tolerant server technology to ensure continuous availability of these mission critical applications; the continuous flow of vital products to the market; and the avoidance of the potentially negative financial, social, or environmental impact that operating without high availability fault-tolerant systems might bring.
To learn more about preventing downtime in your automation applications, be sure to attend next week's webinar where Craig will provide expert info on steps for reducing the human error that leads to downtime, how to protect your hardware, storage and networks for complete availability coverage, and how to protect against a complete site failure. You can register here.
Tom Reed, Marathon’s Senior Systems Engineer and MCSE, hosted our most recent webinar on SharePoint High Availability. We’ve summarized the Q&A portion of the webinar below. A recording of the webinar is also available for on-demand viewing.
Q: Do I have to have identical servers to use everRun?
The servers don’t have to be exactly the same; however, the CPUs should be identical as a best practice. For what we call our Level 2 protection (for component level protection of the network and disk), you can use different RAM and spindle speeds on storage. Level 3 protected workloads require the servers to be alike. You can view a complete list of supported processors on our website.
Q: What kind of storage do I need to use everRun?
One of the great things about everRun is that it is storage agnostic. It doesn’t matter what type of storage you are running. You can work with SAS drives, and iSCSi, local or fibre SAN, pretty much any type of storage and it doesn’t have to be the same on both sides. Some customers using everRun SplitSite are using SAN at the primary data center and local disk at the secondary data center, which can save storage costs.
Q: Does everRun DR integrate with SRM from VMware and how does this work with VMs as a second server?
VMware SRM, or site recovery manager, is designed to asynchronously replicate the actual virtual machines to a secondary site. It does this by using replication software at the SAN level. So once you purchase SRM you have to purchase SAN replication software as well. If you didn’t want to replicate the actual virtual machines over, what you could do is use everRun DR, the difference being that we do not bring over the current virtual machine. We have a separate vm built and we have the capability to start and stop service, recover from a single point in time, and drag and drop recover files on a replicated data drive. If you are looking for an in-depth comparison of VMware SRM vs. everRun DR, you can contact us at 800.884.6425 or via email for more info.
Q: How much overhead does everRun place on the protected server?
General use cases today are 3-10%. We have application performance documentation for Exchange 2007 and XenApp that you can download from our website. We will have a similar document for SharePoint in early 2010.
Q: How does everRun differ from a backup solution?
We have found that there is a lot of confusion in the industry around the difference between backup vs. high availability. Backup solutions are designed to provide a disk-to-disk or disk-to-tape scenario for recovery of data. Backup is a recovery option, not a prevention option. It lets you recover to your last point in time, last snapshot, or last tape. Again, this will not prevent downtime or provide availability for users. It is a means of recovery. everRun DR can provide this type of solution if this is what your business needs. If your goal is to prevent outages and data loss (rather than recover from them), what you really want is a local high availability solution.
Q: What version of Windows does everRun support?
everRun supports Windows Server 2003 SP2 Standard and Enterprise Editions, 32-bit and 64-bit, as well as Windows Server 2008 Standard and Enterprise Editions, 64-bit.
Q: Does everRun work with SQL 2008?
Yes. everRun supports any Windows application without requiring changes or customization. Because everRun resides below the operating environment, we are protected underneath that. We have a number of ISVs that use our software with their applications and they use us because they don’t have to make any changes to their software. It’s not tied into the application, and doesn’t need to be “cluster aware” or anything similar to that.
Q: Can I use everRun between two VMs? Meaning two VMs instead of two physical servers?
We build out the virtual machines when you install our software, so if you’re using our VMs to build out your machines, then we can do that.
Q: Do you have experience using everRun in education environments?
Yes, a couple of examples of everRun being used in education environments include Michigan State University in the US, and Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute in the UK. We have several additional education customer examples and references that we can provide to you. Give us a call at 800.884.6425 for more information.
Q: How do you determine when to use everRun HA vs. everRun DR solution?
A good method for determining which solution is most appropriate for your situation is to take a closer look at your Recovery Point Objective (RPO) and your Recovery Time Objective (RTO). How long can you be down and how much data can you lose? If you can be down for several days, then you want to look at a DR solution. Just take into consideration that while DR failover is sometimes necessary, it can be a lengthy, complex process and is sometimes invasive to your environment. First you have to failover to the DR site and then failback when the primary site is restored, which can be very time consuming.
The majority of failures are not catastrophic. Most are pretty common like network issues or hardware failures. For this scenario what you should really look at is local high availability protection. For the most complete protection overall, best practices are to have local high availability protection and then DR as a back-up for a major disaster. Then at the DR site you should also have an HA solution because if you do have that major catastrophe and failover, you want to make sure that secondary environment is protected while you are re-building the primary site.
Q: What are some large county government examples using everRun software?
Q: When using everRun, can I use the secondary server to backup the data to avoid impact on the primary production server, or will both servers feel the impact during the backup window?
You should run your backup on the active server. On the secondary server, the workloads are in paused mode, so you can’t run a backup agent there. If you run it on the primary server, then it’s cloned over to the secondary server automatically.
We had some great questions during last week's webinar High Availability Doesn't Have to be Expensive. A recap of the Q&A is below, including the questions that we weren't able to get to because of time constraints. Be sure to check out our library of on-demand webinars, for this webinar, as well as other topics including SQL availability, Windows Server availability, everRun product demos and more.
Q: How is everRun different from replication solutions?
To understand how everRun is different from replication solutions, you need to take a look at the key differences between disaster recovery and high availability. Availability is about preventing outages instead of just recovering from them; about maintaining the user state with minimal interruptions. With disaster recovery (DR) and replication methods, if there is a failure, you lose connectivity for a period of time and then you have to recover your data and system state. Conversely, availability is about reducing and preventing downtime and keeping users online, even through a failure.
everRun is used for availability, both locally and for short-distance geographic separation as well. We have a replication and recovery solution as well that can be used for disaster recovery for long distances. You should determine what your objectives are: do I have to keep my applications up and running or do I just need to recover it if something fails? What’s the recovery time objective for each application? It’s up to your individual applications and what level of protection you need for each. Oftentimes, availability is a priority as downtime is not desirable, with DR also a requirement on top of that to ensure recovery in the event of a major outage.
Q: What kind of bandwidth requirement is needed for a two-site solution?
As a general rule of thumb, an OC3 connection is required per application workload being protected. Latency is really more critical than bandwidth and this will vary based on the applications and environment.
Q: How does everRun software compare with EMC’s RepliStor and AutoStart applications?
everRun is different from these products because it provides high availability in an automated way with fault tolerant capabilities to prevent user interruptions when hardware fails. This goes back to prevention rather than recovery.
RepliStor is a DR/replication product. While it does provide a failover/restart capability, as do most DR solutions, it is really best used for failover in the event of a major disaster. There’s usually a substantial amount of downtime and a manual failover process to get the systems back online at the secondary site and to failback once the primary site is back online. For DR, you probably want to be able to specify when your systems fail over. But, you will lose some data because this is an asynchronous solution. For minor outages, you really don’t want this. For example, let’s say the power goes out in your primary location for an hour. It can take even longer than that with DR systems to failover to the secondary DR site. You would have been better off just waiting an hour for the power to come back on and restarting the primary systems. RepliStor is more suited for major disaster scenarios, rather than just minor local or regional failures.
Auto-Start is more of a clustering type of product designed for availability and application restarts. It’s not designed to prevent downtime due to failures, but rather to recover from them.
Q: Can everRun be used for planned downtime?
Planned downtime for patches, upgrades, etc. can sometimes cost as much or more to your company as unplanned downtime. The answer to this question will depend on the type of updates. Some OS upgrades do require that there be a restart for the changes to take effect. For some types of planned maintenance, everRun can eliminate the need for downtime. For the others, one of the main things everRun can do is to reduce the risk of updating a system and not having it come back online. For example, you’ve just overwritten your production system and it worked in a test environment, but now it won’t come up in production. We can reduce that risk greatly, by getting it back online quickly without the need to rebuild the server.
Q: What is the difference between everRun and vMotion and VMware HA?
These are two different products, so we'll start with VMware HA. The HA product is a failover/restart capability. If you lose a host, the system will try to restart the virtual machines on another host on the pool. There’s no real guarantee here though. It’s going to try to find resources when a failure happens, but they might not be there. There are some checks in place to warn when over using resources will impact the recovery plan but there is nothing to prevent this. When there’s a critical RTO though, it’s better to have something that is more assured like what everRun provides. everRun uses mirrored systems, so you always know that you have resources available in the event of a failure. everRun also protects the data – we don’t require a SAN. everRun can mirror data between to two systems or two buildings and it doesn’t have to be the same type of storage on both sides. It can be SAN on one side and NAS on the other. everRun can move the data between locations and keep it tied to the applications to keep your business running, even when there is a failure.
As far as vMotion, that is primarily used for planned downtime. Motion capabilities in general allow virtual machines to be moved or “motioned” while they are running from one host to another host. everRun can provide that capability as well. We call it online migration. If you want to take host offline for planned downtime for upgrades for example, we can do that. Motioning is really for planned downtime. If something fails unexpectedly, vMotion can’t help you there. everRun provides capabilities for both planned and unplanned downtime.
Q: What versions of Windows does everRun support?
everRun supports Windows Server 2003 SP2 Standard and Enterprise Editions, 32-bit and 64-bit, as well as Windows Server 2008 Standard and Enterprise Editions, 64-bit.
Q: In considering using everRun across two sites, is everRun doing real-time synchronization between the sites?
Yes it is. It’s writing the data on both systems in a synchronous manner, so that data is always complete—system data and applications are secure and exactly mirrored on the secondary server. It protects the entire environment—the operating system, registry, every setting, etc. is completely cloned. You can turn on that system on the other site and not have to rebuild the server. We maintain exact mirror copies of both servers. That goes back to our message about prevention and computing through failures, rather than downtime and recovery.
Q: Does everRun work with SQL 2008 and SharePoint 2010?
everRun sits below Windows. It’s not in the operating environment. We protect the entire environment, so anything in that environment is automatically protected, whether it’s SQL or Exchange or anything else, even custom applications. There is no customization needed for everRun to protect any Windows applications.
Q: What are the storage requirements for everRun?
everRun offers two storage configuration options: mirrored storage and a shared storage model. When using mirrored storage, everRun will synchronously mirror all storage between paired hosts; this includes the OS, the application, data, etc. This does not require similar storage vendors or types. One host can have SAN-attached storage while the other has local SCSI storage.
In a shared-storage configuration, the everRun paired hosts must be connected to the same storage device with access to the shared LUN’s. In this configuration, everRun does not mirror the data or protect against failures within the storage subsystem. Because of this, it is critical that you ensure proper configuration of the storage devices to protect against failures.
Q: Should everRun be set up on a seperate server?
everRun is typically deployed on two new servers, however an existing server can be utilized, requiring only one additional server.
Q: How is everRun different from the NeverFail product?
Neverfail is an asynchronous DR solution with failover/restart capabilities.
Thanks again to those who joined us for the everRun 2G live demo. An on-demand recording is now available to watch at your convenience.
We had quite a few questions and couldn’t get to all of them during the webinar, so we’ve put together a recap of all of the questions and answers below, including the ones we weren’t able to get to during the live event.
Q: You said that everRun supports any Windows application. Does that include Oracle DB too?
Yes. Any application that runs on Windows is supported by everRun. Custom applications that run in Windows are supported as well.
Q: Does workload mean a virtual machine that is running inside of everRun 2G?
Yes, that’s correct. A workload is a virtual machine that has its own Windows environment, its own application environment, and its own identity.
Q: Can you upgrade to everRun 2G from 7.1 or is it a new installation?
everRun 7.1 is the previous version of our product, and sits on a Windows base. everRun 2G is based on XenServer. As such it requires a new installation. We have a process to help you migrate your virtual machine from everRun HA or FT to everRun 2G. We also offer services to perform this migration.
Q: In everRun FT we need 3 windows licenses, 2 for co-servers and 1 for FT... how many Windows licenses do we need for 2G?
We always recommend that your check with your software vendors and license agreements on this question. For Windows, you do need a valid licensed copy of Windows on both hosts. If you have the Enterprise version of Windows, you can have multiple workloads there using the same enterprise license. Be sure to check with your Microsoft representative or other vendors for specific licensing questions.
Q: What is the base operating system running on Xen Hosts?
XenServer is the base operating system. everRun runs on top of XenServer.
Q: In an environment such as the one shown on your slide, would you be paying for two licenses of MS Exchange?
You should always check with your vendor and/or license agreement to ensure you have your applications licensed correctly.
Q: Can everRun be deployed on an existing server without a rebuild of the OS or server?
It can be if the existing server is running Citrix XenServer. In this case you would simply layer on everRun. If you have a Windows server with Windows on the bare metal, you would have to reconstruct that environment.
Q: What are the benefits of moving to everRun 2G for customers who are currently running everRun HA or FT?
everRun 2G is the next generation of everRun HA and FT, enabling multiple levels of protection within a single solution. While there are a number of new capabilities within everRun 2G, one of the most significant enhancements is the ability to protect multiple Windows workloads on a single pair of servers. With everRun HA and FT, only a single Windows workload can be protected on a pair of servers. everRun 2G allows multiple workloads to be protected on the same pair of servers to help reduce hardware costs and take advantage of more powerful servers. From a supported platform standpoint, everRun HA and FT support Windows Server 2003 32-bit Standard and Enterprise. everRun 2G supports Windows Server 2003 32- bit and 64-bit Standard and Enterprise as well as Windows Server 2008 64-bit Standard and Enterprise.
Q: How would you plug the NICs from each server to your network so that a faulty switch would not mess up the redundancy?
As a best practice to remove any single point of failure, redundant switches would be deployed.
Q: What is the maximum distance/geographic location for two physical servers to work using everRun?
The answer to this question is based on latency and bandwidth. It depends on the network connection. We have a latency requirement of 5ms roundtrip between the two servers to maintain the synchronous state that we provide. We have customers that separate servers campus-wide, and customers that run up to 50-100 miles with a dedicated fiber connection between the two servers. It depends on what your needs and requirements are and the network that runs between the two locations.
Q: At what intervals does everRun monitor the standby server?
It checks constantly. One of the things everRun does that is unique is active validation. We are constantly utilizing and validating the secondary server and all its devices. We’re doing disk I/O, we’re doing network reads, taking packets in from the network so that we know the network is good and the CPU is good. We’re actively validating all of the components. With a back-up site, it could be weeks or months since anything has run on the secondary server. So if there’s a failure that goes unnoticed on the backup server, and then there’s a failure on the primary, it has nowhere to go. With everRun, the secondary system is being actively validated at all times so that you know it will work in the event of a failure.
Q: Does Level 3 protection require shared storage?
It does not. everRun offers two storage configuration options; mirrored storage and a shared storage model. When using mirrored storage, everRun will synchronously mirror all data between paired hosts; this includes the OS, the application, data, etc. This does not require similar storage vendors or types. One host can have SAN-attached storage while the other has local SCSI storage. In a shared-storage configuration, the everRun paired hosts must be connected to the same storage device with access to the shared LUN’s. In this configuration, everRun does not mirror the data or protect against failures within the storage subsystem. Because of this, it is critical that you ensure proper configuration of the storage devices to protect against failures.
Q: How much hardware similarity do you need between the hosts in a pool?
It’s really tied to similarities in processors, not servers or disks. For a complete list of hardware that is supported, view our Supported Processor List.
Q: Does everRun having rolling upgrade support?
There are capabilities to assist with applying updates and performing maintenance. To be clear, everRun does not allow applying a service pack without having to reboot the server, if the service pack requires it. Contact Marathon for more information on this capability.
Q: Do you have plans to support Hyper-V?
We plan to support Hyper-V in a future release.
Q: Do you have some experience about Oracle Applications in that (virtual) environment - are there any references?
We do have customers running Oracle. Please contact our sales department for references.
Q: Is the Xen server running over Windows, Linux, Unix?
XenServer runs on the bare metal. It does not run ‘over’ any other OS.
Q: If you have an Exchange server that is separated by a WAN, how does the client connect to the 2nd server when we lose network connection on primary?
Each of the everRun-protected hosts must be in a common subnet or vLAN.
Q: Will the system still run in this scenario: disk is not working / has fault on host 1 while host 2 has a problem on the NIC both at the same time?
Absolutely. everRun will handle each of these failures simultaneously without any disruption or interruption to the application.
Q: Can a workload be running on Linux?
Linux workloads are not currently supported for protection by everRun. Unprotected Linux workloads can be created, however.
Q: How do you remotely monitor the system and get automatic notification of hardware failures – e.g. SNMP?
SNMP will be available in the near future.
Q: Will everRun work over WAN and if so what is required?
5ms latency and 155Mb bandwidth per protected workload.
We had a fantastic presentation last week from IT expert and author Niel Nickolaisen. Niel shared his proven methods for reducing downtime and improving the alignment of IT resources to better support business goals. If you weren’t able to attend the live event, you can watch the recorded version here.
If you prefer a white paper format, Niel’s strategies and best practices have also been summarized in a brand-new 8-page white paper, “Reduce Downtime by 70% - Without Spending a Dime” which you can download here.
The Q&A session from the live webinar with Niel Nickolaisen and Michael Bilancieri of Marathon has been summarized below:
Q: Can you give some tips on how I can educate my branch offices about my business continuity plan? Niel Nickolaisen, CIO: At Headwaters, Inc., we have 120 remote sites. We approached this from an SLA perspective. We translated how the SLAs affected the operations at our branch locations. Then we communicated it and got them to buy into the SLAs and the things we were doing and suggested that they followed our lead.
Q: How often should you update your disaster recovery plans? Niel Nickolaisen, CIO: In our case at Headwaters, Inc., we have Sarbanes-Oxley regulatory requirements. We do an annual formal risk assessment both for our business and for IT. When we’re done with that assessment we update our disaster recovery plans, which are based on the risks. Our disaster plan is designed to mitigate or recover from the risks that we’ve identified.
Q: How does everRun work?
At a high-level, everRun takes your entire Windows environment and protects it as a whole. Most protect from within the OS but we protect from underneath the OS. We clone to a second system for redundancy in a synchronous fashion. A good way to understand how everRun works is to watch our product demos videos and flash demos available on our website.
Q: How does everRun fit into a virtual environment?
everRun allows the ability to create multiple workloads on a single server. Our technology is based on virtualization technology – we’re virtualizing two instances to appear as one. You can create multiple workloads and put them on the same server and protect them. It’s based on Citrix XenServer.
Q: Will this work in conjunction with SAN offhost backups using Vertias Netbackup and FlashSnap option?
We are agnostic to the storage. If you’re using back-up right from the SAN, that’s fine. You can also use a mirrored option, where we can mirror the entire system in a synchronous fashion. That allows you to have SAN on one side and NAS on the other, or direct-attached, or both. It’s your choice, which gives you greater flexibility. You can separate the servers as well between buildings. The other option is a single copy of storage, not mirrored and both systems can connect to that storage, but the SAN device will then have to protect the data.
Q: How can Marathon contribute to companies considering a move to SAP?
everRun can provide availability and fault tolerant protection to that SAP environment. If you’re considering a move to SAP, I would assume you have had some discussions about how to protect that—the SLA, the data, availability and disaster recovery. everRun can protect and provide disaster tolerance disaster recovery, and high availability for that application, as well as data protection. We don’t cause any changes to the application.
Q: Should Marathon be brought in as a consultant before SAP is contracted?
Sometimes it’s a good idea to have a joint discussion with vendors. A lot of times when you look at availability and redundancy or data replication, it’s doing things to the applications and data and can cause interaction issues. Sometimes the application has to be configured in a certain way, so you want to know up front how your high availability solution could affect the data and application. We can certainly do a call with any other software vendors to have that conversation up front.
Q: What version of Windows does everRun support?
everRun supports Windows Server 2003 32-bit and 64-bit and Windows Server 2008 64-bit.
Q: What kind of performance impact does the synchronous lock-step have on the system?
That varies by application, users, data, I/O, and other factors. In general, it can range from 10-20% on your application – we’ve seen less than that and more than that, depending on the system.
Q: Do you recommend WAN optimization to be used?
Our requirements are around bandwidth between the two systems if you want to separate the systems. WAN optimization tools don’t always help. It’s really a latency requirement to maintain good performance.
Congratulations to Thomas Burgdorf of Mii Management Group, the winner of a $100 American Express gift card from our recent everRun 2G demo webinar. If you weren’t able to attend the live event, a recording the everRun 2G demo webinar is now available for on-demand viewing here.
Be sure to join us for our next webinar on Oct. 8th, featuring IT process expert and author Niel Nickolaisen. We're really excited to have Niel as our guest speaker for this webinar. In addition to his 25+ years of IT experience, Niel is the CIO and Director of Strategic Planning at Headwaters, Inc. and also writes regular columns for the CIO Leadership Network and TechTarget's Search CIO. Niel is going to share his proven methods for reducing downtime, including:
* Conducting a gap analysis of your current IT processes
* Identifying weaknesses that can lead to downtime
* Simplifying IT processes so that your entire staff can understand and follow them
We're expecting a large group for this webinar, so be sure to register today to reserve your spot.
Thanks again to those who joined us for last week’s webinar, "Windows Server 2008 High Availability: Technology Comparison." The on-demand recording of last week's webinar is now available to watch at your convenience (here).
We had a lot of good questions from our attendees during the Q&A portion of the webinar, which are summarized below.
Q: How do you determine when to use an HA solution vs. a DR solution?
When it comes to availability vs. recovery, the most important question to ask is what are your recovery time objectives (RTO)? What is the amount of time your application can afford to be down? If the applications have strict requirements, then you want an availability solution. Disaster recovery is data replication often times with a failover capability, not availability. For critical applications, this may not be sufficient.
Q: If I have an HA solution in place, do I still need a solution for backup?
Availability and backup are two different things. That question comes up a lot, along with the need for disaster recovery. Backup will never likely go away completely. You still need to backup your data to ensure recovery in the future should that be necessary.
Q: Is everRun available for Linux applications?
Yes. We can provide basic failover capabilities for Linux applications today.
Q: How does everRun differ from replication solutions? everRun 2G is used for availability, both locally and for short-distance geographic separation as well. We have a replication and recovery solution as well that can be used for disaster recovery for long distances. You should determine what your objectives are: do I have to keep my applications up and running or do I just need to recover it if something fails? What’s the recovery time objective for each application? It’s up to your individual applications and what level of protection you need for each. Often times availability is a priority as downtime is not desirable, with DR also a requirement on top of that to ensure recovery in the event of a major outage.
Q: Can everRun be used for planned downtime (i.e. to keep one host running for end-users while the application on the other host is being upgraded)?
Yes, everRun can be used to help facilitate certain system updates to reduce interruptions and mitigate risk.
Q: Can it work between two virtual machines and on x64 based systems?
Yes, we support XenServer and 64-bit hardware and Windows Server environments.
Q: Does Marathon offer backup solutions for everRun users?
We have methods to backup your systems and we’re working improving on our current offerings to make them quicker, easier and more granular.
Q: Can everRun work with dissimilar hardware? Can everRun work with more than two servers?
From a server standpoint, you just need similar processors; storage does not need to be similar. You can have SAN on one side and NAS on the other or any other combination. On the second question, yes, everRun will work with more than two servers. You can build a pool of servers and protect within that pool.
Q: Does everRun have backward compatibility with older OS?
Yes. It will work with Windows Server 2003, and also Windows Server 2008.
Q: Can everRun run on the Foundation Server Edition of Windows 2008? It does not. everRun supports the full implementation of Windows Server 2008. everRun runs underneath Windows, it does not install into Windows.
Q: How does everRun handle data stored on NAS? Storage is transparent to everRun. We look at storage as just a LUN.
Q: What is difference between everRun HA and everRun 2G in Windos Server 2003? The differences are the ability to create multiple workloads. HA can protect one workload. everRun 2G can protect multiple workloads. There is also a new and improved graphical interface with better reporting and management capabilities.
Q: Does everRun work with XenServer 5.5? Yes, everRun works with XenServer 5.5.
Q: Are there any changes in WS 2008 & WS 2008 R2 in the way that HA improves? Yes. You can find an overview of those changes directly from David Hanna of Microsoft in our recent webinar and white paper “The Top 10 Reasons to Upgrade to Windows Server 2008.” You can also read the Q&A with Microsoft from that webinar here.
Q: Is everRun 2G available for Microsoft Hyper-v? We will provide support for Hyper-v in a future release.
Q: With applications using various DNS names, how does this solution integrate with DNS changes? (failover to remote office for true DR-different IP/network) everRun availability solutions pairs systems within the same subnet of vLAN, eliminating the need to make any DNS changes.
Q: Question is tied to what permissions are needed to do a recovery. For recovery in active Directory most items need to replicate around that there was a change and we do not want to hand out Admin control over the domain(separation of access) everRun is designed to not require any changes to Active Directory during or after a failure or recovery.
We had a lot of good questions from our attendees during the Q&A portion of the webinar, which are summarized below.
How does everRun synchronize and how often?
everRun synchronizes as the data is written to the virtual machine. It’s not done on a time stamp. It is synchronously written to both physical hosts. We do a bit check to make sure both sides are written prior to responding back to the application, stating that it has been written, so that the data is always in a constant state and there is no data loss.
If I already have XenServer installed, can I install everRun on top of it, or do I need to reinstall XenServer?
everRun can be installed into existing XenServer environment. We do have resource pool requirements, so as long as you in a resource pool or can join yourself to a resource pool with a second server, or multiple servers for multiple host pools, we can be installed into an existing XenServer environment.
How does it support local storage? If the server that is hosting the storage goes down, what happens?
We mirror the virtual machine across two servers, so there are two copies of your virtual machine. Where we sit in dom0 (Xen domain zero), we have filter drivers sensing that type of situation. When using Level 2 protection with everRun, if you lose local storage, we leverage the copy of the info on the second server for zero downtime. If you were to lose the entire server, it would failover to the other side and start in Windows services. In Level 3, the same procedure applies to local storage. If you were to lose the entire server with Level 3, everRun allows it to simply continue functioning because we are running active-active.
Have you used this with a building automation system, such as Andover Controls Continuum which runs on a SQL Server?
We have a very large building automation practice here at Marathon and have worked with all flavors of SQL server. We have been working for years with building automation and security companies such as Johnson Controls, Tyco, Andover Controls, Siemens and many others. As long as the building system runs in Windows Server 2003 or 2008, we can provide availability for it with no custom scripts or custom coding.
Can everRun be used with homegrown or custom applications?
Yes. everRun is completely transparent to the application and can support any and all Windows applications without any modifications, customizations, or scripting.
Can everRun protect a workload that is physical on one side and virtual on the other?
We do not support P2V today, but we have an ongoing research project on this topic. You can contact your sales rep for more info.
What is the maximum number of workloads that can be run using everRun?
The best way to answer this is to look at your virtualization planning assessment, including power capacity planning and hardware capacity planning. If you can support 10 virtual machines on a server, then you can support 10 virtual machines protected by everRun on that server with no problem. We also require a similar machine as the secondary server running on the same resource pool. It really comes down to how much your hardware capacity can handle.
How to take care of software corruption?
Because we are a synchronously written high availability solution, if there is software corruption on one side, we are going to replicate it to the other side. We sit at an asynchronous block-level filter driver location, so we have no ties to the software. So if it corrupts, it will corrupt on both sides.
Are you currently developing for Exchange 2010?
Yes, everRun will support Exchange 2010.
Does everRun support Small Business Server?
Yes we do. We’ve tested and qualified it for 32-bit and 64-bit versions of Windows Server 2003 Small Business Server Edition.
Does everRun replicate all server data including application data like a SQL database?
Yes. We replicate synchronously at a block level. We sit inside dom0. We then send the info block level to the other side. We do a block check and then we check our bit map to make sure the blocks are synchronously written on ongoing basis.
Can everRun be installed on top of XenServer 5.5 ?
Yes. We will support 5.5 in our next release scheduled for September.
Can we achieve DR?
Marathon offers a couple of options for disaster recovery (DR). Our SplitSite product can be used for metropolitan/campus DR, up to 150 miles apart, depending on your network conditions. We also offer everRun DR, for DR sites that are more than 150 miles apart.
Is the disk mirroring full copy or delta?
Upon initial protection we do a full copy. After you have a failure, such as an iSCSI card failure, we will do a delta copy back over to what’s missing. If you lose the entire RAID set, then we will need to do a full copy again.
Is the price of implementation based on the server capacity?
You need to purchase a license for each server in the pool. In terms of virtual machines (VMs), the license covers as many VMs as you can support in a box.
There are at least three straightforward steps that best practices companies are implementing to achieve aggressive costs savings with their server virtualization initiatives. I'll be reviewing these three steps in more detail, along with customer use cases, in a webinar on August 19th, "How to Get at least 2x Greater Cost Savings from Server Virtualization." To register for the webinar, go to: https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/72241968
1. Expand Ratio of Virtual Machines to Physical Hosts - One of the simplest steps companies are taking to realize larger cost savings from server virtualization is increasing the ratio of virtual machines per physical host. The average ratio for companies who’ve adopted server virtualization is five virtual machines per one physical host. But the improved performance of the latest hypervisors and Intel processors can easily support 2X greater virtual to physical ratios.
2. Increase the Percentage of Applications Running in Virtual Environments - Another step best practice companies are using to increase their virtualization costs savings is to increase the percentage of their applications running in their virtual environments. According to Goldman Sachs research on IT spending and trends, 90 percent of respondents currently virtualize only 15 to 30 percent of their applications. Best practice companies, including one showcased in the webinar, are virtualizing 90% of their applications.
3. Decrease Virtual Storage Costs by Avoiding Fibre Channel Storage Area Networks – Early virtualization platforms required shared or networked storage to take advantage of the most compelling features of server virtualization including live migration, high availability, provisioning templates and other valuable features. However, newer virtualization platforms and high availability solutions no longer require expensive FC SANs.
Our July 30th webinar “Top 10 Reasons to Upgrade to Windows Server 2008 Now” was very well attended, and as expected, generated a lot of good questions. So many questions, in fact, that we weren’t able to answer them all during the live Q&A portion of the webinar.
For your convenience, we’ve captured all of the questions below. Answers have been provided by our speakers, David Hanna, Infrastructure Architect at Microsoft, and Michael Bilancieri, Senior Director of Products at Marathon. The questions are grouped by topic, starting with Windows Server related questions and then Marathon everRun related questions following after.
How seamless is the migration from Windows Server 2003 to 2008?
It really depends on the workload. Active Directory upgrade is similar to the 2000 to 2003 upgrade, and should not be disruptive. Cluster migrations require a rebuild of the cluster. For IIS, many applications can be migrated easily. It’s best to look on Microsoft.com for migration info that is specific to your workload. Simply introducing a Windows Server 2008 server into a 2003 environment should be seamless.
Going from Windows Server 2003 to 2008, do you recommend upgrading or re-installing the operating system?
Microsoft supports an upgrade of the OS only – no applications. Most customers however, choose to reinstall with Windows Server.
Any difficulties adding a Windows 2008 Server into a 2003 domain? Anything to watch out for?
Adding Windows Server 2008 Member servers to the domain should not be an issue. There are no special things to watch out for, until you start adding Domain controllers. Note that if you add a 2008 member server, and do not extend the schema, some things will be unavailable, like the enhanced DFS capabilities in 2008.
Can I do in-place upgrade AD server 2003R2 to Server 2008 without any problem? Also, can I do that same thing with Exchange 2007 server on SRV2003R2?
Microsoft only supports the upgrade of the Operating System from 2003 to 2008. We do not support the upgrade of Windows Server 2003 with applications, so the Exchange 2007 upgrade would not be supported.
Is it possible to use the same imaging deployment method for Windows 2008 physical and virtual machines (in VMware) for consistent builds?
It is possible to use traditional imaging methods for physical and virtual, however in the virtual environment, most customers tend to use template Virtual Hard disks to deploy systems, as it is faster and more flexible than imaging.
What is the difference between GPO and NAP?
Group policy is a part of Active Directory that allows for management of users and computers. NAP, or network access protection provides endpoint health checking for network clients. This integrates with network components to restrict or allow network access. Client NAP configurations can be controlled by GPO, and some GPO settings can be enforced by NAP.
Does NAP work for VPN connections as well?
Yes. It is integrated with Microsoft VPN as well as some partner solutions.
Does XP pro and 2008 Server talk well together? What’s a better path, upgrade your clients to Win7 then servers to 2008? Or vice versa?
XP will work in a 2008 domain environment, but it won’t be able to take advantage of all of the features of 2008. Vista is designed to complement 2008, and Windows 7 works best with 2008 R2 (or 2008). I would recommend deploying Windows Server 2008 for workloads that will gain the most benefit – this will allow you take advantage of it immediately. Then follow with Windows 7 when you are ready.
Do terminal servers have central management to manage users and applications?
There are a number of tools to centrally manage the environment. R2 adds a connection broker component that will publish apps from multiple servers. However, apps still need to be published on each server, and permissions need to be set that way as well. Citrix provides some great centralized mgmt tools that enhance the native tools.
Will 2008 support XP clients?
Yes. 2008 will support XP for many things including Terminal Services, with RDP 6.1 client, NAP, with XP Sp3, Group policy preferences and many other features. Windows Vista and Windows 7 however, are able to take advantage of more features.
I have two Windows 2008 servers that are going to be setup as a cluster for Exchange 2007. Is there a document for setting up the “heartbeat” connection between the two servers?
There are many documents on technet that will help. When you build the cluster, the validation wizard will check the configuration of the heartbeat network to make sure its configured appropriately. Typically, a 2 node cluster will use a cross-over cable, although a non-routed VLAN on a switch also works. Some docs:
Regarding the NAP, once a client is quarantined, is there a policy or rule that the admin must create to get the client healthy? Meaning, is it automatic or does the client sit there until someone checks the quarantined clients and fixes the issues?
NAP can be configured to auto-remediate certain things – turning firewall on, turning on autoupdate, etc. For AV, or patches, users can be directed to a web page with simple instructions or links to update the client.
Has load balancing improved with 2008 and TS?
It has been made simpler. Many customers found NLB to be complicated for what was needed on Terminal Services. TS on 2008 uses DNS round robin for initial connection with the TS Farm, then load balancing across nodes is handled by using RDP session load balancing.
How many machines can run on a single user MS Windows Server 2008, because we want to move to VMware soon.
Microsoft supports up to 192 VMs on Windows Server 2008, and 384 on Windows Server 2008 R2. Typically numbers will not be anywhere near this, as other system resources will bottleneck. Details can be found here: http://www.microsoft.com/windowsserver2008/en/us/hyperv-faq.aspx#HyperVWindowsServer2008Specific
Is MS Windows Server 2008 VMware built-in?
Microsoft’s virtualization solution, Hyper-V, is built in to Windows Server 2008 and R2.
How would Hyper-V handle the VMware over committing resources, for example, is ESX server only have 8GB RAM but it can assign 16GB RAM to the VMs because it holds the memory and only releases it when it is required. The main reason for Exchange on a ESX box is not a good idea.
Hyper-V does not support over-commit of memory resources. To assign 8gb of RAM to a VM, you must have 8gb available. This improves performance and security.
What happens when a file which has been transferred/shared to a branch using Branch Cache is opened in the main office? Will the branch be informed about this and vice versa?
When clients use branch cache, each file is referenced by a hash. When a client tries to retrieve a file from the central office, it checks the hash of the file, then compares it to what is in the local cache. If the file has changed, then the hash would have changed, and the client would retrieve the updated version. The branch is not informed if the central copy is opened, only if it is changed, through the hash mechanism.
What is the maximum supported DFS server in 2008? In 2003 I think it is less than 70GB and that was not enough for me.
The File Replication Service in Windows Server 2003 had trouble with replication when data sizes got too big. Windows Server 2008 uses DFS-R (Distributed File System Replication) for replication – this uses an algorithm call Remote Differential Compression, which compresses files, and replicates only changes. This makes replication more efficient, an able to support large volumes of data. The limits that existed in 2003 for data size are either removed, or raised greatly.
What is the standard vs. reduced footprint for Windows 2008?
Processor requirements for Server Core and full Windows Server 2008 are the same. Minimum memory recommendations of 512mb are also the same. While the system requirements on Microsoft.com don’t list separate requirements for Server Core, it typically requires less disk space than a full installation. Additionally, Server Core has fewer roles to install (only 9), fewer services running, and has no GUI.
Are there any plans to integrate snapshot technology within Hyper-V?
Hyper-V already supports snapshots at two levels. First, it supports snapshots of the Virtual Machine itself, through use of memory copies and differential disks. The other snapshot capability is a snapshot backup, performed by the host Hyper-V system, using Volume Shadowcopy Services to back up the running VMs.
Can everRun protect a workload that is physical on one side and virtual on the other? everRun does not install INTO a Windows system, so it isn’t able to protect a ‘physical’ system in this sense. Many of our customers choose to keep some of their applications isolated to a physical server with no other applications or VMs on that host while protecting them with everRun. This is done by creating a single Windows environment within the everRun environment. Although the capability is there to create multiple, a single is the desired approach.
How does everRun handle data stored on NAS?
everRun can use any product data that resides on any type of storage. everRun sees the storage repository as a disk volume and can mirror between any two.
How many licenses for the operating system do I need for this solution? Do I need two licenses for the application (i.e. Exchange) as well?
Typically two licenses of Windows are required, however the Enterprise edition provides benefits when running in virtual environments. Please check with Microsoft on this and with your application vendors as all vendors have different licensing terms for redundant/high availability systems.
How well does everRun work with dissimilar hardware (i.e. at the DR site using older servers)?
There are some requirements for similar server components. If two supported servers are utilized and one happens to have a slower processor, the application may run at the slower speed, depending on the level of protection chosen within everRun.
Does everRun replicate all server data including application data like SQL databases?
Yes. The entire operating environment and all disks, including the OS, application, and application data are mirrored.
Is everRun effective for small companies? For example, an Exchange environment for less than 200 users?
Absolutely. Many of our customers are smaller to mid-sized businesses who require an availability solution that is simple, effective, and doesn’t require SAN storage or dedicated IT staff to manage.
Does everRun support MS Small Business Server?
Yes. Our everRun solution will work with any version of Windows Server, 64-bit or 32-bit. We work for small scale solutions all the way up to enterprises.
Will everRun support Exchange 2010 DAG location geographically?
We are still researching Exchange 2010 capabilities and how they can best be supported by everRun. At this time we are not yet clear on how DAG will or can be supported.
How are system upgrades handled in the everRun environment?
A single upgrade is performed on the single exposed Windows environment. Both of the redundant systems will be updated automatically by everRun. everRun also offers mechanisms to reduce the risk and associated downtime of system upgrades.
How does the actual SQL server app run in the everRun environment?
Exactly the same as it does in a non-everRun environment. everRun sits below the Windows environment therefore there are no application changes required.
The everRun software sounds great, but it requires two physical servers. Any hope of moving forward to do the same work within a VMware or Hyper-V environment?
Today everRun supports virtualized environments running on Citrix XenServer. We announced a joint development agreement with Microsoft back in early 2009 to provide everRun Fault Tolerance within a future version of Windows/Hyper-V.
How is everRun migrated with Windows 2008 hypervisor?
everRun will support a future Windows/Hyper-V release as part of the joint development effort between Microsoft and Marathon.
What system resources are used by everRun?
A small (varies a bit by the application that is running) bit of CPU and memory overhead is consumed by everRun.
If you’ve been thinking about upgrading to Windows Server 2008, be sure to attend our July 30th webinar featuring guest speaker David Hanna, Information Architect at Microsoft. David will review the new Web tools, virtualization technologies, security enhancements, and management utilities available in Windows Server 2008. You’ll also have a chance to ask David any specific questions you have about Windows Server 2008 during the live Q&A portion of the webcast.
In preparation for the webinar, we asked David to answer a few of the common questions that we have been hearing from our customers in recent months.
Q: One of the biggest concerns we hear from our customers and partners is that in this current economy, IT departments are being asked to do a lot more with less people. How can Windows Server 2008 help with this issue?
Across all of my customers, everyone is talking about cutting costs, and getting more out of their current investments. When we start digging into the features of Windows Server 2008, customers are finding tremendous opportunity to optimize their environments. A few of the major areas of cost savings I’m seeing are:
Reduced deployment time and costs with Windows Deployment Services
Reduced management cost and effort with PowerShell and Server Manager
Hardware and Workload Consolidation with Hyper-V
Licensing consolidation with Enterprise and Datacenter models for virtual environments.
Q: What about the challenge of managing remote and branch office locations?
Branch offices have consistently been a challenge to manage, primarily due to lack of on-site staff. Windows Server 2008 brings some major new components to the picture that will greatly ease branch office management. These features include the Read-Only Domain controller, which makes the remote DC secure, and replaceable, Distributed File System, Windows Remote Management, Server Core (lower surface attack area), and improved Terminal Services for application delivery.
Q: A lot of our customers work in “always-on” industries like manufacturing, healthcare and broadcast media, where server downtime can be very disruptive to their business. How does Windows Server 2008 support these demanding environments?
Windows Server has always addressed high availability with Clustering Services. Windows Server 2008 has brought some huge enhancements to the Cluster Service that will reduce the complexity of clustering, while increasing availability. Failover Clustering in Server 2008 has a new validation wizard that will validate hardware and software configurations, resulting in easier, more reliable cluster deployments. The reliance on a quorum drive has also been removed, so there is no longer a single point of failure in the cluster. Also, Failover Clustering has been enhanced to support multi-site clusters to support organizations that need site-to-site failover. And, as always, when organizations need to take availability to the next level, Microsoft continues to work with partners like Marathon to extend the native capabilities of Windows Server.
During the webinar, Michael Bilancieri, Sr. Director of Products for Marathon, will discuss how to extend the high availability features of Windows Server 2008 to fault tolerant protection with Marathon’s everRun software and how organizations can now confidently migrate mission critical applications from Unix or proprietary platforms to realize big cost savings.
Registrations for this webinar are limited and we are expecting a large turnout, so be sure to save your spot by registering today.
We had a number of questions during the Q&A session of our June 24th webinar with Stephen Wynkoop, founder of SSWUG.org. I’ve posted the questions and responses here on our blog for everyone’s benefit. This webinar was recorded in case you weren’t able to attend, click here to view the webcast!
Q: Does everRun require a SAN? A: It doesn’t require a SAN. We can also mirror storage between two different systems, if that’s what you chose to do. A lot of our customers do that, either locally or separated geographically. We can support a SAN in multiple ways. We can support a SAN where you have a single copy of the data. And both servers will connect too the single copy of the data. We also support a SAN where one of the servers is connected to that SAN and the other server has its own storage and we can mirror between that. A lot of our customers are using that option to provide data protection and fault tolerance at the data level. We can use different types of storage on either side.
Q: With your SplitSite product, are there distance requirements?
A: There are no pre-determined distance limitations – it’s really the latency and bandwidth requirements that determine the distance that can be supported.
Q Does everRun work with Exchange 2007 as well?
A: Yes it does. everRun supports any Windows application without requiring changes or customization.
Q: Does everRun work with iSCSI?
A: We have an agnostic approach to storage as well. Pretty much any type of storage will work. iSCSI, fiber, direct attached, etc.
Q: What are the requirements between the paired local servers?
A: A gigabit Ethernet connection with crossover cables is usually used between the two servers.
Q: What is the performance impact of using everRun with SQL?
A: Our preliminary testing has shown that the overhead is very small. There are variance rates depending on the servers and applications that you are using, but the impact has in general been shown to be very small.
Q: How does everRun handle the mirroring of data that’s loaded in the memory?
A: With our level 3 fault tolerance, we actually mirror the memory and CPU between the two systems, so they are running in lockstep. This provides a 100% uptime solution. Our everRun software makes sure that the memory and CPU state are mirrored and completely synchronized between the two servers at all times.
Q: Does everRun work with SQL 2008?
A: Yes. everRun supports any Windows application without requiring changes or customization. Because everRun resides below the operating environment, we are protected underneath that. We have a number of ISVs that use our software with their applications and they use us because they don’t have to make any changes to their software. It’s not tied into the application, and doesn’t need to be “cluster aware” or anything similar to that.
Q: Does everRun work with the free XenServer?
A: Yes, everRun VM for XenServer supports the free version of XenServer as well as Essentials for XenServer Enterprise and Platinum Editions.
Q: How would you tackle a shift from a single server to an everRun setup to have minimal downtime during the changeover?
A: It’s pretty straight forward. You could buy new servers if you wanted to refresh your hardware. Then you would perform a P2V migration. There are tools like PlateSpin to help you do that. It’s a standard migration process. If you wanted to use your existing server, you could buy one additional server and pair those up. We also offer migration services if you want additional help with the process.
Q: If using everRun with SQL Server, is the secondary server available for query/reports by other processes?
A: It‘s not because the two SQL environments have the same identity and exposed to the network as just a single server instance. Since they both have the same identity,you can’t access one by its production identity and then the other. They look and act as a single environment. They have the same MAC address, host name, and IP address. If you make a change, it happens to both of them.
Q: In a SplitSite implementation, if one hardware platform fails and the backup is used, how is the data re-synchronized once the primary hardware is available again?
A: everRun is completely automated, including the recovery process. When you have a failure and get that system back online, everRun will automatically synchronize the two systems to be identical again. There’s no additional work to do the syncing, it’s completely automated.
Protecting SQL Server and its related applications continues to be one of the most common concerns we hear from our customers. With that in mind, we’ve pulled together some SQL-related info and links for your reference below.
While you’re here, be sure to sign up for our free June 24th webinar “SQL Availability: Protecting Your Database and Applications”. The featured speaker will be SQL MVP Stephen Wynkoop, founder and editor of the SSWUG.com website and user group.
We had some great questions during the Q & A session of our May 20th webinar with myself, Michael Bilancieri, along with Tom Reed here at Marathon. I’ve posted the questions and responses here on our blog for everyone’s benefit. This webinar was recorded in case you weren’t able to attend, click here to view the webcast!
Q: Does everRun work on all XenServer versions?
A: Yes, everRun VM for XenServer supports the free version of XenServer as well as Essentials for XenServer Enterprise and Platinum Editions.
Q: When there is geographic diversity - what level of protection is reasonable?
A: This depends on the distance between the two sites and the network connecting them. For metro or regional separation (campus, across town, etc.) everRun fault tolerance can be implemented to provide resiliency to hardware and site failures. For longer distances or between sites that have slower/smaller networks, a disaster recovery solution may be appropriate. Disaster recovery typically involves asynchronous replication and failover capabilities.
Q: What amount of bandwidth is required between the main site and the disaster site?
A: This is going to vary depending on workloads protected and how high the activity level is. Higher activity requires higher bandwidth. At a minimum 150Mb is required.
Q: Can everRun be used in a remote location situation where there is geographic diversity for DR capabilities?
A: Yes. However this dependent on where your DR site is located in relation to your main site (metropolitan/campus wide vs. cross-country).
Q: Are there vLAN dependencies for SplitSite for Exchange? A: A common subnet is required between the two locations. A vLAN would work fine.
Q: Are you currently developing for Exchange 2010?
A: everRun supports any Windows application without requiring changes or customization. Exchange 2010 should not add any additional requirements to everRun and should be seamlessly supported..
Q: Are there minimum requirements for ISCSI or fiber SAN?
A: We are storage agnostic and we don’t require shared storage or have specific requirements for storage connectivity. However There are some best practices that will help to ensure optimal performance. These can be found in our advanced concept guide, available on our website.
Q: Do you have a solution for SMB that works in the 50 user range?
A: Yes. Our everRun solution will work with any version of windows 2003 or 2008, 64-bit or 32-bit. We work for small scale solutions all the way up to enterprises.
Q: Can this be used with VMware as well? A: Not at this time.
Q: Do you also support Exchange 2003?
A: Yes. We support Exchange Windows 2003 and 2007. everRun supports any application running on Windows Server 2003 and 2008.
Q: Do you work with other applications? A: Our architecture sits underneath the operating environment, not at the application level, which allows us to support any and all Windows applications without changes or customization.
I recently blogged about how to apply the three levels of availability to Exchange 2007 mailbox servers. By splitting the amount of users across multiple VM’s you can provide a level of availability to each set of users based upon your SLA with each business unit in your company.
Since Exchange is more than just a mailbox server, we thought it would make sense to provide you with a deeper look at how to protect all of the components of your Exchange environment. I’ll be co-hosting a webinar on this topic on May 20th. You can register for this webinar here. We'll provide an in-depth look at a new approach that allows you to tailor the levels of availability by user groups and Exchange components.
We’ve also published a new whitepaper on this topic, “Optimizing Exchange High Availability—A New Approach,” which is available for download in our Resource Center.
We received over a hundred questions during the Q & A session of our April 29th webinar where we covered our new everRun technology. I've posted the questions and responses here for everyone's benefit.
Q: Level 3 will support 2 Socket Processors? A: A level-3 protected workload must be single-CPU configurations. With the ability to now support multiple workloads with everRun 2G, multiple single-CPU workloads can be protected at level-3 on the same pair of servers, allowing utilization of multi-processor systems.
Q: How does everRun handle custom application? From the answer, it only has to be on 1 machine then everRun will handle the redundancy for the second machine?
A: everRun runs below the operating system which enables it to support any Windows application without any customization. everRun automatically mirrors the entire workload to a second system and maintains redundancy in a synchronous manner.
Q: For Level 2 and 3 protection, does the application (Exchange, SQL, etc) have to be installed on both servers (in your example, everRun1 and everRun2)?
A: everRun automatically mirrors the entire operating environment, including the OS, application, and data, to a second system. This eliminates the need to manually install and maintain the OS and application a second time.
Q: Please define a "workload"
A: A workload is a complete and independent operating environment, consisting of its own OS, applications, etc.
Q: What is difference from the last generation product? Also, is 2G just an upgrade or is it a completely different product than HA and FT?
A: everRun 2G is the next generation product following everRun HA and FT yet it is not an upgrade to HA and FT. It is a separate product that requires a new installation. everRun 2G is designed on a completely new base platform, utilizing Xen rather than Windows as is used by HA & FT. This design provides improved flexibility, scalability, and ease of use and management. One of the major advantages of this new design is the ability to create and protect multiple workloads on the same pair of physical servers.
Q: What about copy protected applications that use hardware serial numbers for activation?
A: For applications that use hardware-based license keys, such as a dongle, please contact Marathon to discuss the specific details of your application.
Q: Do you offer support? online? 24/7?
A: everRun solutions include 1st-year maintenance which includes 24/7 technical support (online, email, phone) as well as product updates.
Q: Can the physical server / host server be considered as a workload?
A: We don’t refer to the physical host as a workload. However additional workloads can be created on the physical hosts. These workloads do not need to be protected/cloned by everRun. You have the choice of protecting them or not.
Q: Is it also possible to use NAS technology instead of SAN storage? A: Certainly. Any type of storage can be used on either host, and one huge advantage of everRun is that these do not need to be the same. One host can have NAS while the other host has locally-attached storage.
Q: Can everRun be used to keep 1 host running for the end-users while the application on the other host is being upgraded?
A: Yes, one side of the protected environment can be taken offline for upgrades and testing while the other side remains online servicing clients.
Q: What are the bandwidth requirements when I run 2 hosts over a WAN?
A: 150mb connection with a maximum latency of 10ms roundtrip between the two hosts.
Q: Can everRun protect against OS failures?
A: With level-2 protection, an OS failure will result in a restart of the application environment. With level-3 protection, the result will vary depending on the cause of the failure. If the application causes a bugcheck within the OS, this will happen on both systems and the OS will restart. If the failure is caused by faulty hardware the OS and application will continue to run on the paired system without interruption.
Q: What happens if WAN-line fails?
A: Communication failures between the two hosts will result in one of the systems taking itself offline to prevent a split-brain scenario. everRun utilizes a quorum service to negotiate which system is to remain online and which is not. When the failure is rectified, everRun will automatically synchronize the systems to regain full redundancy.
Q: How many hosts can be supported in the config?
A: Currently we have tested up to 4 hosts in a single pool.
Q: Can these network adapters be bonded at the OS level? Meaning I get a level of local redundancy as well before failing over traffic to another system.
A: Yes
Q: What host OS does this solution run on? A: Citrix XenServer
Q: How does this product compete or work with technologies like VMware or Hyper-V? esp Hyper-V R2.
A: Marathon has recently announced a joint development effort with Microsoft to provide fault tolerance within a future release of Hyper-V. VMware is not currently supported by everRun.
Q: In a FT configuration, what is the system resource overhead? is this on a system wide, or per workload (i.e. VM and app) which are configured for FT?
A:Overhead varies depending on the hardware and the actual applications. We have tested various applications including SQL Server, Exchange, and XenApp and found CPU overhead to be anywhere between 3% to 14% over a non-protected workload. This information is available on the Marathon website under the Solutions section for Exchange and XenApp. SQL Server will be available soon. We are in the process of quantifying overhead with level-3.
Q: At what interval do you monitor the standby components? And is this different than the online/active components?
A: everRun is constantly monitoring all active and standby components to ensure any failure is identified so that it can be rectified. This is one of the major differences in the everRun architecture. Typical availability systems don’t monitor the health of the standby system and components. If one of these should fail without notification, a failure on the active system will result in the system not being able to recover.
Q: Can you use hardware capabilities? Such as replication?
A: everRun offers two different storage protection options; everRun mirrored storage in which everRun mirrors all data between the two hosts for full fault tolerance at the storage level, and also supports a shared-LUN model wherein there is just a single copy of the data which both systems can access. When a shared-LUN model is used everRun does not protect the data and assumes that the storage subsystem has been configured to cover this.
Q: Does it sync memory pages and system registers, etc. - so the OS/App is running on both nodes in lock step?
A:Yes
Q: What are levels of protection? What criteria defines each level? Level 1 requires shared storage? Level 2 - mirroring/replication? Level 3 - FT?? Please clarify.
A: Check out The Three Levels of Availability Whitepaper, as well as a breakdown here:
Level-1 protection provides basic failover of workloads when a host fails. There is no redundancy maintained so if resources are not available on other hosts to restart the workload, it will not be restarted. Level-1 does require shared-storage/shared-LUN.
Level-2 provides fault tolerance at the storage, data, and network levels, meaning that a failure in those areas will not impact the application. A complete system failure will result in the application being restarted on the secondary host. The entire workload is mirrored to the secondary host with memory, CPU, storage, and networks allocated to ensure it can restart if necessary. Level-2 supports separate storage on each host or a single shared-storage configuration
Level-3 provides full system-level fault tolerance, meaning that the application will remain running without interruption during component and even complete system failures. Level-3 also supports separate storage as well as a shared-storage configuration.
Q: Is there a limitation on the number of processors for the VM or Physical Processors? I heard that ESX has a limit of one VM for their proposed Virtual Cluster in VM4.x
A: Level-2 component –level fault tolerance can support workloads up to 8 vCPU’s. Level-3 system-level fault tolerance supports 1 vCPU.
Q: If we have an application that is licensed per CPU socket, how will that be licensed since it sounds like it will be running on two separate servers now?
A: Licensing requirements vary by application vendor. Please contact your Marathon reseller or Marathon directly to discuss your specific applications.
Q: With the newer version of Marathon, is there network improvements where the software can be used with a smaller network bandwidth?
A: everRun 2G has the same latency bandwidth requirements as everRun HA and everRun FT.
Q: If we have an application that uses 4 Gbytes RAM and normally use Windows Server 2003 Sandard Edition. If we have 3 workloads (total of 12 Gbytes), the servers must have (for example) Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition.
A: Each workload has its own instance of Windows OS and is limited by the amount of RAM within each specific workload, not the amount of RAM on the physical host. Enterprise edition offers some licensing concessions when used in this environment which may help to save on Windows licensing costs.
Q: When will the software be released?
A: May 18, 2009
Q: What is the maximum number of workloads that can be run?
A: There is no hard limit configured into everRun. The number of workloads will be dependent on the hardware and the applications being run.
Q: Do each of our workstations need to have Windows 2003 Enterprise installed or can continue to use Windows 2003 Standard Edition?
A: everRun does not require Windows Enterprise edition. Windows Standard edition is support as well.
Q: Does this work with VMs with multiple processors?
A: Yes, depending on the level of protection desired.
Q: What are the specifications in terms of bandwidth and latency for level 3 ft? can this go over the WAN? Site to site? A: Site-to-site is what Marathon refers to as SplitSite. This capability is available for level-2 and level-3 protection. Bandwidth required is 150mb with latency of 10ms or less roundtrip.
Q: What happens if a protected VM bluescreens or stops functioning?
A: This depends on the level of protection and the cause of the bluescreen. With level-2 protection, the application will be restarted. With level-3, if the bluescreen is caused by a software issue within the OS or application, then both sides of the protected environment will bluescreen and the system will restart. If the bluescreen is caused by a hardware issue (faulty memory, etc.) the second side will not be affected.
Q: What version of XenServer does this work with? The newest free version, or essentials only? 5.1 u3? 5.5?
A: This latest release of everRun availability on May 18 will support XenServer 5.0 Update 3. It will fully support all versions including Free and the Essentials packs.
Q: Did the db server get affected by exchange server failure demo?
A: No. The database server is a completely separate workload and was not affected by the failures that I invoked on the Exchange server. Throughout the entire demo as failures were introduced, both the Exchange server and database server remained active and available, as was shown by the use of LoadSIM.
Q: What OS does it support?
A: Windows Server 2003 Standard and Enterprise, 32-bit and 64-bit , as well as Windows Server 2008 64-bit.
Q: Is there limits to rolling upgrade method?
A: Please contact Marathon to provide further details on your question so we can be sure provide the correct answer. Contact us via email or call 888-682-1142.
Q: What is the distance limit for latency support between hosts?
A: Distance is a factor of latency of the specific network being utilized. We have customers running at distances of over 100 miles between the two everRun systems.
Q: Are you considering a version that will replace the Microsoft Windows OS? This would remove a level of security support and target only Marathon for security.
A: No. Marathon does not build operating systems.
Q: Is there a performance graph during failures?
A: Results of our performance tests can be found on our website under the Solutions section.
Q: Do you have rolling upgrade support?
A: Yes
Q: Is VMWare supported?
A: No
Q: How much hardware similarities must exist between hosts in pool?
A: Same make and family processor
Q: Do u install everRun inside XenServer? Or is it a seperate server?
A: everRun installs on top of XenServer.
Q: Does it support Linux VMs? A: Level-1 protection supports Linux. Level-2 and level-3 do not at this time.
Q: Does level 3 protection require shared storage?
A: No. Both level-2 and level-3 can mirror data between hosts using similar or dissimilar storage, as well as supportinga shared-storage/shared-LUN configuration wherein everRun does not mirror the data.
Q: When will Lunix be supported? A: A data for Linux support has not been defined.
Q: Support on a mac environment with virtualization?
A: No
Q: If you lose Adapter 0 in everRun1 and Disk 0 in everRun2 would things still run?
A: Yes. All workloads would continue to run uninterrupted as if nothing has happened. everRun masks the failures from the application.
Q: If you set up a server as a level3 and realize you need additional processors can you roll back to a level2 protection?
A: Yes, you can easily change levels of protect via the protection wizard.
Q: Will level 2 mirror data as well so if you are running on host1 and a failover occurs and you come up on host2 you will have essentially the same data as when host1 went down?
A: Yes
Q: For level 2 for Exchange will Mx-records be an issue? Same question for level 3 A: No. The all everRun protected workloads have a single IP and MAC address, regardless of which host the application workload may be active on. This eliminates the need to make DNS or MX-record changes, allowing immediate redirection of network I/O to the second host without interruption.
Q: Does 2G support Windows Server 2000, 2000 Advanced Server?
A: No
Q: What do you consider a Virtual Machine? You use that terminology, is that a function of your software or other virtualization products such as VMWare
A: A virtual machine, or workload, or guest refer to the same thing. It is a complete and independent operating environment. In everRun 2G, everRun utilizes XenServer to create and manage these while everRun provides fault tolerant protection to them.
Q: What performance enhancement/degradation has been seen in testing with 2G over no FT/HA solution and also over previous releases?
A: Initial tests have shown similar and even improved performance over everRun HA and FT.
We had an incredible amount of great questions during the Q & A session of our April 16th webinar with myself, and John Humphreys of Citrix Systems, and Doug Strain of HP. I’ve posted the questions and responses here on our blog for everyone’s benefit. This webinar was recorded in case you weren’t able to attend, click here to view the webcast!
Q: Is everRun VM ready to work with free of charge XenServer?
A: The new version of everRun VM software (available mid-May) works with the new free enterprise-ready version of Citrix XenServer as well as Citrix Essentials.
Q: Is a SAN required to implement these fault tolerant solutions?
A: No, SAN is not required, but is certainly supported.
Q: How much does the license for everRun cost? Where do I go for everRun Pricing?
A: For more information on pricing, please contact the Marathon Sales Department at 888-682-1142 or info@marathontechnologies.com , or contact your Marathon reseller.
Q: How does everRun synchronize, and how often?
A: everRun VM performs an initial mirror of the entire VM upon protecting it and continuously mirrors it in a synchronous manner to ensure that the two paired systems are always identical.
Q: What are the overheads CPU, memory, and bandwidth for running everRun?
A: Overhead varies depending on the hardware, storage, applications and load. We will have performance data available shortly that shows the variance between a standalone VM and one that is protected with everRun.
Q: To summarize Marathon Technologies’ solution, is it replication of VMs between two VM Hosts? How much resource does this take away from VMs / VM Host?
A: everRun is not a replication technology, but rather a fault tolerant solution that offers the ability to synchronously mirror the entire VM between two physical XenServer hosts. Should one host suffer a component or even system failure, everRun VM allows the application to continue running without interruption. Here is a flash demo that explains how everRun VM works. Overhead varies depending on hardware, resources, and application load. We are currently benchmarking performance characteristics and should have them available within the next few weeks.
Q: Does the restart disconnect users connected?
A: For most hardware failures, there is no restart. everRun VM simply redirect I/O (storage and network) to the secondary host. If level 2 protection is utilized and a host is powered off, there is a brief interruption while the VM is restarted on the secondary host. With level 3 protection, there is no interruption even when a host is powered off.
Q: How many servers can you have in a pool?
A: everRun VM is qualified for up to 4 XenServer hosts in a single pool.
Q: Does everRun provide offsite datacenters which host VMs? Or do they offer software, or both?
A: everRun is a software solution that mirrors the entire VM to a secondary XenServer host either locally or at a remote location. We do not offer hosting services.
Q: Does Citrix FT/HA need shared storage?
A: There are three levels of protection available within everRun VM; levels 1, 2, & 3. Level 1, XenServer HA, is included as part of Essentials for XenServer and does require shared storage. everRun adds level 2 and level 3 fault tolerant capabilities and allows the option of using shared storage or independent storage between which everRun will synchronously mirror the entire virtual machine and all its data.
Q: Any migration tools off VMware?
A: There are a number of migration tools that can perform virtual-to-virtual (V2V) migrations from VMware to Citrix XenServer where they can then be protected by everRun VM. Please contact Citrix or Marathon for further details.
Q: Does Geographic Fault Tolerance require the two servers to be on the same subnet or can they be across routed networks?
A: Yes, the servers within an everRun configuration must be in the same subnet or on a common vLAN.
Q: What is the support for Windows Server 2008 timeframe?
A: The new version of everRun VM (available mid-May) will support Windows Server 2008.
Q: Does Marathon’s product protect SMP VM’s, or just single processor VM’s?
A: everRun can support multi-processor VM’s.
Q: With everRun, is it possible to sync VM’s across a WAN without SAN block replication? ie: local storage to local storage?
A: Yes, everRun will mirror the entire VM, including OS, application, and data, between two XenServer hosts with separate storage. These two systems are kept synchronized continuously.
Q: We have a custom application we currently run on a MS active/passive cluster. One of the useful things is we can update the code on the passive node, flip to it and if there is any issue, easily flip back to the original node. Is there a way to do this with everRun? ie: “pause” the sync and flip which is active VM?
A: For upgrades, everRun allows one side of the pair to be taken offline for applying and testing upgrades before applying them to the live running system.
Q: Is everRun part of Essentials, or is this a different product add-on? Does it require Essentials or just the hypervisor if it’s an add-on?
A: everRun is a separate product from Marathon Technologies and is not included in the Essentials offerings. everRun does support the Essentials offerings as well as the free edition of XenServer. everRun is simply installed on top of XenServer.
Q: Can you confirm that Marathon HA is an existing part of Citrix Essentials?
A: everRun VM is not bundled with Citrix Essentials for XenServer, however it can easily be installed on an Essentials deployment. Citrix Essentials for XenServer does include level 1 or auto-restart HA (XenServer HA) which was jointly developed by Marathon and Citrix.
Q: I have a question about switching virtual IP or domain name to the remote standby site in case any disaster happens to the primary site. Is this handled automatically without human interference? How is DNS cache updated in the domain name servers across the world?
A: everRun VM is a synchronous solution and as such has fairly stringent requirements for network latency. everRun VM is not a DR solution that can protect systems across thousands of miles, but rather a disaster tolerant solution that allows regional or metropolitan separation. The XenServer hosts being used by everRun must be in the same subnet or common vLAN, so there is no need to make DNS or Active Directory updates when the primary host/location fails and the VM is started on the secondary XenServer host. All error detection and error handling are completely automated with no human intervention required. For long-distance replication and failover, Marathon does offer an asynchronous DR solution.
Q: Regarding the Marathon HA tool; if your HA tool handles auto failover across sites by replicating the VM files at storage level, how do you manage the network differences (for example, how will tool know which IP address etc to assign to the mirrored/recovered VM) ?
A: everRun VM requires that the servers in the everRun pool be in the same subnet or common vLAN. This allows use of the secondary server and its components without any need to change any networking records or clients to point them to the secondary system. The VM/application environment are identical regardless of which XenServer host they may be running on. The IP address, hostname, and even MAC address are always the same, making any I/O redirection or VM failover completely transparent.
Q: If I have 24 VM’s that are hosted 3 XenServers won’t providing everRun as a fault tolerant solution require me to double up on XenServer hosts to accommodate mirroring VM’s across numerous hosts?
A: The number of VM’s possible is dependent on numerous factors, including hardware and application loads. everRun VM does create a mirrored VM on a secondary host. If there are enough resources available within your three hosts, you shouldn’t need additional hosts.
Q: Does Marathon have plans to support Linux based VM’s?
A: Yes, we do plan to support Linux VM’s but do not have a delivery date scheduled at this time.
Q: Does the everRun product (or another Marathon product) allow Linux virtual machines to run fault tolerant (zero downtime with a physical host failure)?
A: everRun VM does not currently support Linux VM’s, however the level 1 XenServer HA capability available within Essentials for XenServer can protect Linux VM’s.
Q: Fault tolerant VM replication is great, but does XenServer + everRun have a restore point like solution for guest OS corruption\malfunction?
A: everRun VM is licensed per XenServer host for level 2 protection, with level-3 protection being licensed per each VM you wish to protect with complete system-level fault tolerance.
Q: How does everRun differ from Double-Take?
A: everRun VM is a fault tolerant availability solution, while Double-Take is a replication and failover solution designed for long-distant DR. For DR needs, Marathon offers everRun DR, which provides similar capabilities to that of Double-Take.
Q: Referring to the two DL380 servers in your slide… What physical hardware is used to allow the two servers to communicate with each other?
A: The XenServer hosts within an everRun VM configuration are connected either with a direct-attached crossover using GigE interfaces when the pool consists of two XenServer hosts. If there are more than two hosts in the pool, these networks will need to be configured through network switches. We refer to these connections as Availability Links, or A-links.
Q: Is there a Sullivan Group case study or whitepaper?
A: You can view The Sullivan Group case study here. You can also read the other case study we talked about in the webinar, how Argo Capital uses everRun VM to protect Exchange, BlackBerry Enterprise Server and Citrix XenApp, here.
Q: In the pictured scenario of 2 Proliant DL380’s, does the everRun use local storage on each server, or does it use shared storage?
A: everRun has the options of using either shared storage or local independent storage.
We had a lot of great questions during the Q & A session of our February webinar with Stephanie Balaouras of Forrester Research. We’ve posted the questions and responses here on our blog for everyone’s benefit.
Questions from the webinar:
Q: In the architecture two "mirrored" VMs are shown which are connected. Does that mean that you have to install 2 application VM servers or do you have to install just one and Marathon makes the second?
A: You only need to create one application VM. After this is created, you can use everRun to protect that application. As part of the protection process, everRun creates a “cloned” instance of the application on the second host. The instance is completely identical to the original, with the same identity, MAC address, resources, etc. It is this redundancy created by everRun that protects the applications.
Q: In the Marathon license there is HA and FT. In which are the levels 1-2-3 available?
A: Levels 1, 2, and 3 are available in a single solution called everRun VM and any level of protection can be enabled on a VM. everRun VM level 3 protection will be available in Q2.
Q: The licensing question you just answered seems different from what you used previously. You previously only had to license the VMs OS in a fully protected system. Please explain.
A: Microsoft licensing requires a valid Windows license for each side of the protected VM. Using Enterprise Edition can reduce the number of licenses required. Please refer to Microsoft licensing terms for specific details for your environment.
Q: How does the software communicate between disparate storage NAS to DAS, SATA to Fibre Channel?
A: everRun does not limit you to needing matching storage requirements on multiple hosts. Communication between hosts is done through Availability Links (A-Links), which are private networks between each host. everRun handles the mirroring at the host level, passing I/O through XenServer to write to the disks. The type of disk or connection is not relevant.
Q: How does this compare to VMWare's SRM & VDM products?
A: VMware SRM provides a mechanism to restart a VM on an alternate host, however it relies on other storage mirroring solutions (often within the storage system) to perform the mirroring. SRM does not move data or provide a comprehensive HA or FT solution.
Q: Is the product host based or a fabric based solution?
A: everRun VM is a host based solution, with a minimum of 2 hosts required.
Q: Do you need to keep a warm copy of the applications at the DR site?
A: During the protection process, everRun takes the chosen VM and clones it to the designate secondary host. This creates a complete and identical instance on the secondary host. everRun maintains these two synchronously so that they are always identical. everRun’s unique architecture exposes these two mirrored instances as a single entity; there is no need to install, manage, or update both sides, only the one single instance of the OS/application. Should the entire ‘primary’ host fail, the ‘secondary’ host will immediately start the cloned version. It comes up with the same IP address, hostname, and MAC address of the primary so that there are no client-side, DNS, Active Directory, or other infrastructure changes required.
Q: Is the DATA synchronous like SRDF or near synchronous?
A: everRun performs synchronous mirroring of the entire Windows environment, including the OS, application, and data.
Q: How does this compare to products like RecoverPoint/Replistore, InMage, Neverfail, Falconstor etc?
A: These products are disaster recovery products intended for long-distant asynchronous data replication and failover. everRun availability solutions provide true availability in a comprehensive and automated manner. Marathon also offers DR solutions for long-distant protection. Disaster recovery and availability are mutually exclusive in most cases and should generally be considered separately. They are complimentary more than competing solutions.
Q: What is the software support plan? What are the recurring costs for your product year to year?
A: We offer a Premier support plan or a Basic support plan. The only recurring cost year to year is the cost of support.
Q: What are the operating system requirements, how many copies of the OS do you need?
A: Each Windows environment is mirrored to a secondary host, requiring a second Windows license. Using Enterprise Edition of Windows allows for fewer licensed copies. Please refer to your Windows licensing terms for specific requirements.
Q: Regarding the 10ms sync time, what happens if that time increases to say 20ms due to network traffic?
A: If the latency increases beyond our requirement the paired systems may assume that one system is down and redundancy may be lost. In a properly configured environment the application should remain running while the secondary system is no longer maintained in a redundant fashion. Once the latency returns to within spec, the systems will re-sync automatically and return to a fully redundant state. Typically the application is not impacted.
Q: What are the bandwidth requirements?
A: Best practices state 155MB link between the two hosts. For local systems a simple crossover cable between the two systems is sufficient. When separating the systems the 155MB requirement becomes more relevant. This number can vary depending on the applications being protected and the amount of data being managed.
On February 24th, we’re going to be doing a webinar featuring Stephanie Balaouras, Principal Analyst at Forrester Research and co-author of the report, X86 Server Virtualization for High Availability and Disaster Recovery. Stephanie was good enough to sit down with us to answer a couple of questions we had before the webinar.
Q: Stephanie, can you give us the 10,000 ft. explanation of why server virtualization is a good alternative for high availability and disaster recovery?
A: In a nutshell, server virtualization facilitates a rapid — or even automatic — restart of applications after an IT failure, and when used in conjunction with data replication between data centers, it can restart applications at a recovery site following a primary site failure. In particular, x86 server virtualization can improve the availability of business-critical systems that are important to the business but not critical enough to warrant the investment in expensive and complex resiliency technologies like fault-tolerant hardware or clustering.
Q: You had mentioned that Forrester is seeing increased customer interest in active-active strategies for high availability. Is that just in Fortune 500 companies or is the interest broader than that?
A: Active-active isn’t just for the largest of companies. Companies of all sizes are under increasing pressure to improve their recovery capabilities but at the same time, they are under pressure to reduce costs and achieve greater operational efficiencies. Companies need an alternate site so they can failover critical business operations in the event of a primary site failure. Given the necessary investment, an alternate data center simply can't remain idle waiting for some disaster to occur. Companies must determine ways to maximize this investment to improve business operations, accelerate growth, or elevate availability.
Q: What’s changed that is driving the greater interest in active active for HA?
A: There are a couple of reasons why there is a growing interest in active-active strategies. First, as I mentioned, most companies are under increasing pressure to improve recovery objectives. In fact, most companies that I speak with have recovery time and recovery point objectives measured in hours, not days. To achieve this type of recovery, today you need to have dedicated infrastructure (servers, storage etc.) at the alternate site.
In the past, many companies might have turned to a DR services provider for their needs. For cost reasons, they subscribe to shared infrastructure services. Because the infrastructure is shared, recovery is limited to recovery of system configurations and data from tape, which means that best case scenario for recovery is 24 hours to 48 hours. As result, many companies are brining DR “back in-house” and making the business case with better recovery objectives and the ability to use the investment in the alternate site for multiple purposes.
