Rejoining a Down or Disabled Server to the Cluster

This section contains the following information:

Introduction

Rejoining a Disabled Server Back Into the Cluster

Removing a Server from the Cluster

Introduction

When a server loses communication with the cluster for a period greater than 24 hours, the Publisher designates that server as down.

To rejoin a down or disabled server to the cluster, you can simply rejoin the server back to the publisher using the procedure described in Rejoining a Down or Disabled Server to the Cluster. Alternatively, you can remove the server from the cluster, reset the configuration on the out-of-sync server, then rejoin the server to the cluster.

Rejoining a Disabled Server Back Into the Cluster

To rejoin a disabled server back into the cluster:

1. Access the Publisher server and navigate to the AdministrationServer Manager > Server Configuration page . Figure 1 shows that one of the Subscribers in the cluster is disabled.

Figure 1  Server Configuration Page Showing Disabled Cluster Server

2. Select the disabled Subscriber server that you want to rejoin to the cluster. The Server ConfigurationSystem dialog opens for the selected server. As shown in Figure 2, the dialog includes the Join server back to cluster option.

Figure 2  Join Server Back to Cluster Option Displayed

3. Click Join server back to cluster. A confirmation window appears, providing the option to promote the current server to Publisher status.

Figure 3  Option to Promote Disabled Server to Publisher

4. To proceed (without promoting the disabled server to Publisher), click Yes. The Join server back to cluster window displays the log entries for each completed task during this process.

 

The process to rejoin a disabled server back to the cluster may take several minutes.

Figure 4  Example log entries showing successful rejoin operation

Removing a Server from the Cluster

To remove a Subscriber server from the cluster:

1. From the Publisher server, navigate to Administration > Server Manager > Server Configuration.

2. From the Server Configuration screen, select the Subscriber you want to remove.

Figure 5  Selecting the Subscriber to Remove

3. Click Drop Subscriber. You are prompted to confirm the drop action.

Figure 6  Confirming the Drop Subscriber Operation

4. To remove the selected Subscriber server, click Yes (or press Cancel to cancel the operation). When you proceed, you are presented with a set of options to further refine the Drop Subscriber operation:

Figure 7  Drop Subscriber Confirmation Options

This window includes the following Drop Subscriber Node options:

Drop a server even if it is down.

Do not reset the database on the dropped server.

Do not back up the existing databases before this operation.

5. Click the check box for each confirmation option you wish to enable, then click Yes. The Drop Subscriber Node status screen is displayed.

 

If you plan on resetting the configuration on the down node and then rejoining it back to the cluster, select just the first option, drop a node even if it is down.

6. When the status is complete, click Close. The server is removed from the cluster.

7. To rejoin the server to the cluster, refer to Rejoining a Disabled Server Back Into the Cluster