Foglight 5.9.8 - Installing Foglight on Windows with an External Microsoft SQL Server Database

Automatic restart: The restart process (FoglightHA Daemon) runs on the same host as the Management Server it is monitoring and monitors the state of the server. If the server stops responding or has a fatal error, then the restart process stops and restarts the server automatically. The process can also send out email notifications about various conditions of the server.


	NOTE: The default value for the restart process is 10 minutes (600 seconds). Machines with a slower processing speed take longer to reboot. You can modify the default time by editing the startup.grace variable in the restart_monitor.config file (located in the config directory).

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Standby Server: To reduce outage times, a standby server instance is created (for a particular Foglight Management Server), and forms a partition. One server becomes the primary server and communicates with the agents, receives and processes data, and processes rules. All other servers are standby servers. If a primary server stops responding, one of the standby servers resumes service and becomes the primary server.

Considerations for running the Management Server in HA mode

If you plan to run the Management Server in HA mode, there are certain considerations:

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Specific ports are required for the HA setup to work:

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HA Pooled Invoker Port

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HA JNDI UDP Group Port

All of these ports must be set to the same values for all Management Servers in the HA cluster. See the Administration and Configuration Guide for port descriptions and default port assignments.

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By default, HA mode works only within the local subnet and uses UDP (User Datagram Protocol) for communication. You can reconfigure your HA cluster to use TCP (Transmission Control Protocol), which can work outside of the local subnet. This alternative is the recommended option if your HA cluster consists of a few designated HA Management Servers. See the High Availability Field Guide for more information.

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In both High Availability Mode and Single Server Mode, the database must be running for Foglight to operate. You may have to implement a combined database-backup and High Availability solution to achieve true failover of all components. Failover ensures that monitoring operations are not interrupted.

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A server running in HA mode can only use an external database.

For more information about installing and configuring HA mode, see the High Availability Field Guide.

Using an external database

An external instance of the Microsoft® SQL Server® database can be used if your database administrator has installed one. For information about the external databases supported for Foglight, see the System Requirements and Platform Support Guide.


	NOTE: The Management Server supports connecting to the Microsoft SQL Server database by using the SQL Server Authentication or Windows® Authentication.

A setup with an external database has the advantage of using existing infrastructure. For setup, a remote administrator user/password (with rights to create users, tables, and databases) is required. Remote administrator access must be granted.


	NOTE: SQL Server databases must be configured to use a case-sensitive character set collation (for example, UTF-8).


	IMPORTANT: If you are using a SQL Server default or named instance, the SQL Server Browser Service must be running in order for Foglight to start up and connect correctly.