Expand a single host installation to a cluster

When you first install Symphony DE, you install on a single host. Before you can add more hosts to create a cluster, you need to convert your single host to a management host. This topic guides you through the process of converting your host to a management host, and then adding compute hosts to create the cluster.

Convert your single host to a management host

A management host is a host that runs processes to schedule and manage workload: the session director process, repository service, GUI service, and the session manager process run on the management host.

  1. Log on to the single host on which you installed Symphony DE.
  2. If Symphony DE processes are running on the host, shut down Symphony DE:

    soamshutdown

  3. Edit the vem_resource.conf configuration file (located in the conf directory under SOAM_HOME).
  4. Look for the following lines and replace localhost with the actual name of your host. For example:
    ...
    SD_SDK:15051:myhost:sd
    SD_ADMIN:15050:myhost:sd
    ...
    RS_DEPLOY:15052:myhost:rs
    ...
    WEBGUI:18080:myhost:startguiservice
  5. Look for the AGENT line and replace localhost with the actual name of your host. For example, on Windows:
    AGENT:8000:myhost:5:0:NTX86:1

    Note that the number of slots for SIMs is set to 0 to prevent application workload from running on the management host. In this example, the management host runs the session director process, the repository service, the GUI service, and up to 5 session manager processes.

  6. Save the file.

Install Symphony DE on a compute host

A compute host is a host that runs services and performs computations.

If this is the first compute host you are adding to your cluster, you must first convert your single host to a management host.

Install Symphony DE on the host that you want to add to your cluster.

Configure management host to recognize compute hosts

  1. Log on to the management host.
  2. If Symphony DE is running on the management host, shut down the processes on the management host:

    soamshutdown

  3. Edit vem_resource.conf (located in the conf directory under SOAM_HOME) and add one AGENT line per compute host:
    ...
    AGENT:8000:myhost:5:0:NTX86:1
    AGENT:8000:mysecondhost:0:5:NTX86:1
    AGENT:8000:mythirdhost:0:5:NTX86:1
  4. For each new AGENT line, ensure the maximum session managers and maximum service instance manager values are set correctly:
    1. In the first AGENT line (the management host), set the values to 5:0, indicating that up to five session managers and no application workload can run on the management host.
    2. For each compute host, set the values to 0:5, indicating that no session managers, and up to five service instance managers per application can run on the compute host.
  5. Save vem_resource.conf.
  6. Start up Symphony DE processes on the management host.

    On Windows:

    soamstartup

    On Linux:

    soamstartup &

Synchronize configuration files

  1. All hosts in the cluster should use the same configuration. To synchronize the files, you may copy the vem_resource.conf file from the management host to the shared location on each compute host, overriding the existing configuration on each compute host.

    If you make any changes to vem_resource.conf in future, such as changing ports, you must synchronize the configuration across all compute hosts again.

  2. Start up Symphony DE processes on each new compute host.

    soamstartup

    Note:

    On a Windows host, if you installed Symphony DE with an account that is not a local administrator, soamstartup holds the window. Closing the window shuts down Symphony DE.

    Note:

    On a Windows host, if you installed Symphony DE with a local administrator account on all hosts, you can start or stop Symphony DE processes on the local host or on all hosts in your cluster menus on the Symphony DE Windows tray. Right-click on the Symphony DE icon in the Windows tray to display menus. A green color indicates Symphony DE processes are running locally on the host. A blue color indicates Symphony DE processes are not started on the host.