Coupling Clusters

You can use the Admin Interface to couple local and foreign clusters to enable inter-cluster communication.

To couple clusters, follow these steps:

1. On the local host, select Local Cluster under Clusters at the bottom of the left-hand menu.

2. Select the Configure tab to display the Edit Local Cluster Configuration page.

3. Enter the cluster name. Each cluster to be coupled must have one or more bootstrap hosts that store the configuration information needed to establish an initial connection to foreign clusters. You must identify the bootstrap hosts in each cluster before attempting any of the configuration procedures described in this section.
   
   The clusters in a production system typically have more than one bootstrap host to ensure availability. When establishing an initial connection with a local cluster, a foreign cluster connects to the first available bootstrap host.

4. In the Edit Local Cluster Configuration page, select one or more hosts to serve as the bootstrap hosts for this cluster.

   Note:
   
   It is best to choose the host that hosts your security forest as your bootstrap host. If you have configured your security forest for local disk failover, then also choose the host that hosts your replica security forest as a bootstrap host.

   

5. Click ok to save the Local Cluster Configuration.
   
   The remaining steps in this procedure describe how to couple a foreign cluster configuration to the bootstrap host on your local cluster. If you have designated more than one bootstrap host on your local cluster, then pick any one of them.

6. In the Edit Local Cluster Configuration page, select the Couple tab.

7. In the Foreign Cluster portion of the page, enter the Host Name for any host in the foreign cluster to be coupled. You can also specify the Admin Port (if necessary) and the communication protocol to be used between the clusters (HTTP or HTTPS). When you have SSL enabled on the Admin App Server on the bootstrap host in the foreign cluster, set the protocol to https. Click ok.

   

8. In the Foreign Cluster Configuration page, if you are using SSL for inter-cluster communication, then configure the SSL security settings and timeout values.

9. In the Verify Add Foreign Cluster page, confirm all of the settings are correct and click ok.

10. Click ok for any subsequent validate screens.

11. When validation is complete, the Summary page appears with the summary for the Foreign Cluster configuration.
    
    Bootstrapped indicates whether the foreign cluster configuration has been received by the local cluster.
    
    Last Bootstrap indicates the last time that the foreign cluster configuration was received by the local cluster.
    
    Initially, Bootstrapped may appear false and Last Bootstrap as never. Refresh your browser page to see the current status.