CA Performance Management Center - Server Host file system

[Tao Yang]

I am preparing a CA PM migration from old servers(RHEL 6) to new servers, with new servers(RHEL 7.x) being prepared by other people previously;

Today when I about to start the installation, I just found that Data Repository servers need file system to be EXT4, when the new servers are prepared as XFS;

So I just sent an urgent request to ask server group to help to change file system from XFS to EXT4 before anything else start;

Then I checked my old DA, PC, DC servers, found out that all of them were configured as EXT4 :(

So should I also request to modify all DA, PC, DC servers file systems to EXT4 as well ? I have to migrate tons of data/files/folders/DBs from old servers so I guess, to make all of them as EXT4 will be easier?

[Purneswara Rao Konda]

Hi Doug Yeong,

I believe it is not necessary to change the filesystem to EXT4 in DA, PC and DC servers.

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Regards,

Eshwar
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[Al Audet]

If I recall correctly the only partitions that need to be on ext4 on the repository server are the data and catalog directories as Vertica supportes ext4.  In a virtualized environment they should also be on different physical volumes/mount points for performance reasons.

The rest of the servers do not need to be ext4.

[Jeffrey Pinard]

The ONLY requirement for EXT4 is the data and catalog partitions for the vertica nodes, at this time.
The DA/DC/PC and /opt/vertica can be non-EXT4.

The reason XFS isn't supported in vertica is we are on an older version of vertica that doesn't support XFS.
https://www.vertica.com/docs/9.1.x/HTML/index.htm#Authoring/InstallationGuide/BeforeYouInstall/filesystem.htm

In 21.2.3+, we moved to vertica 10.1.1 which does support XFS now.
https://www.vertica.com/docs/10.1.x/HTML/Content/Authoring/InstallationGuide/BeforeYouInstall/filesystem.htm

[Tao Yang]

Thanks @Al Audet @Jeffrey Pinard  @Purneswara Rao Konda   !!!

So if I understood it correctly, it will be fine for me to copy any stuff from old DA, PC and DC servers(with EXT4 file system) to the new DA, PC and DC servers (with XFS file system).

My servers are in VMware virtual environment, ​most likely have to mount a separate volume from physical volume, My home directory would be /opt/xxx/CA, to be easy I requested to make /opt/xxx/CA mount to EXT4.

Current old servers are all mounted as EXT4(all directories), I would keep other servers as xfs, only make /opt/xxx/CA on DR servers to EXT4(if possible from server guys);

For ver 21.2.3+, unfortunately we are not ready yet for this year as this will cause Spectrum/NFA to go to 21.x as well.

[Jeffrey Pinard]

When migrating the vertica machine, the paths have to exact.   Copycluster will only work if data and catalog are located using the same path as the source machine.

As for DA/DC/PC, there are config files/etc to modify to if the path now includes an extra directory layer.

[Tao Yang]

Hi Jeff, good to know this. Currently we have mounted /data and /catalog as EXT4 file system under /opt/xxx/CA/, which is one level deeper from the source. If what you mentioned is required, we will have to remount and make them consistent with the source DR path.
We have not got to this yet as we were stopped at "./dr_install.sh -p propertiesfile" errors with other issues. I think if confirmed, we should correct it before getting to "vbr.py --task copycluster --config-file CopyClusterConfig.ini"

[Jeffrey Pinard]

Yeh, in order for copycluster to work, the source and destination catalog/data paths need to match.  It's a requirement vertica has in their docs.

[Tao Yang]

Hi Jeff,
Thanks again for double-confirm for me !!!