Evidian SafeKit brings high availability to Hanwha SSM (Samsung Security Manager), the CCTV video surveillance system. This article explains how to implement quickly a Hanwha SSM (Samsung Security Manager) cluster without shared disk and without specific skills. The high availabity module hanwha_ssm.safe and a free trial are offered in the installation instructions section.
Note that you can implement with the same product real-time replication and failover of other applications (database or other): see examples of mirror modules here.
This clustering solution is recognized as the simplest to implement by our customers and partners. It is also a complete solution that solves hardware failures (20% of problems) including the complete failure of a computer room, software failures (40% of problems) including smooth upgrade server by server and human errors (40% of problems) thanks to its simplicity of administration.
On the previous figure, the server 1/PRIM runs Hanwha SSM (Samsung Security Manager) services (any edition). Users are connected to the virtual IP address of the mirror cluster. SafeKit replicates files opened by Hanwha SSM (Samsung Security Manager) services in real time. Only changes in the files are replicated across the network, thus limiting traffic (byte-level file replication). Names of file directories containing Hanwha SSM (Samsung Security Manager) services data are simply configured in SafeKit. There are no pre-requisites on disk organization for the two servers. Directories to replicate may be located in the system disk. SafeKit implements synchronous replication with no data loss on failure contrary to asynchronous replication.
In case of server 1 failure, there is an automatic failover on server 2 with restart of Hanwha SSM (Samsung Security Manager) services. Then, when server 1 is restarted, SafeKit implements automatic failback with reintegration of data without stopping Hanwha SSM (Samsung Security Manager) services on server 2. Finally, the system returns to synchronous replication between server 2 and server 1. The administrator can decide to swap the role of primary and secondary and return to a server 1 running Hanwha SSM (Samsung Security Manager) services. The swap can also be done automatically by configuration.
Note that SafeKit is able to automatically re-synchronize a failed server without any manual operation and without stopping the critical application. It is an important differentiator when comparing SafeKit to replication solutions whose failover only works once: reintegrating the failed server in the cluster requires complex and non-automated manual operations.
On both Windows servers
The configuration is presented with the web console connected to 2 Windows servers.
Important: all the configuration is made from a single browser.
Launch the web console in a browser by connecting to http://localhost:9010 (next image)
Enter IP address of the first node and click on Confirm (next image)
Click on New node and enter IP address of the second node (next image)
Click on the red floppy disk to save the configuration (previous image)
In the Configuration tab, click on hanwha_ssm.safe (xxx.safe in the next image) then enter hanwha_ssm as the module name and Confirm
Click on Validate (next image)
Change the path of replicated directories only if necessary (next image) and enter a virtual IP address. A virtual IP address is a new unused IP address in the same IP network as the IP addresses of the two nodes. The virtual IP address automatically switches in case of failover.
For information:
Click on Validate (previous image)
Click on Configure (previous image)
Check the success green message on both servers and click on Next (previous image).
Select the node with the most up-to-date replicated directories and click on start it to make the first resynchronization in the right direction (previous image). Before this operation, we suggest you to make a copy of replicated directories before starting the cluster to avoid any errors.
Start the second node (previous image) which becomes SECOND green (next image) after resynchronisation of all replicated directories (binary copy from node 1 to node 2).
The cluster is operational with Hanwha SSM (Samsung Security Manager) services running on the PRIM node and nothing running on the SECOND node (previous image). Only modifications inside files are replicated in real-time in this state.
Be careful, components which are clients of the Hanwha SSM (Samsung Security Manager) services must be configured with the virtual IP address. The configuration can be made with a DNS name (if a DNS name has been created and associated with the virtual IP address).
Check with Windows Microsoft Management Console (MMC) that the Hanwha SSM (Samsung Security Manager) services are started on the primary server and stopped on the secondary server.
Stop the PRIM node by scrolling down the menu of the primary node and by clicking on Stop. Check that there is a failover on the SECOND node. And check the failover of Hanwha SSM (Samsung Security Manager) services with Windows Microsoft Management Console (MMC).
To understand what happens in the cluster, check the SafeKit logs of the primary server and the secondary server.
To see the module log of the primary server (next image):
To see the application log of the primary server (next image):
To see the logs of the secondary server (previous image), click on W12R2server75/SECOND (it will become blue) on the left side and repeat the same operations. In the secondary module log, you will find the volume and the reintegration time of replicated data.
In Advanced Configuration tab (next image), you can edit internal files of the module: bin/start_prim and bin/stop_prim and conf/userconfig.xml (next image on the left side). If you make change in the internal files here, you must apply the new configuration by a right click on the blue icon/xxx on the left side (next image): the interface will allow you to redeploy the modified files on both servers.
Configure boot start (next image on the right side) configures the automatic boot of the module when the server boots. Do this configuration on both servers once the high availability solution is correctly running.
For getting support on the call desk of https://support.evidian.com, get 2 Snaphots (2 .zip files), one for each server and upload them in the call desk tool (next image).
userconfig.xml
<!DOCTYPE safe>
<safe>
<service mode="mirror" defaultprim="alone" maxloop="3" loop_interval="24" failover="on">
<!-- Heartbeat Configuration -->
<!-- Names or IP addresses on the default network are set during initialization in the console -->
<heart pulse="700" timeout="30000">
<heartbeat name="default" ident="flow">
</heartbeat>
</heart>
<!-- Virtual IP Configuration -->
<!-- Replace
* VIRTUAL_TO_BE_DEFINED by the name of your virtual server
-->
<vip>
<interface_list>
<interface check="on" arpreroute="on">
<real_interface>
<virtual_addr addr="VIRTUAL_TO_BE_DEFINED" where="one_side_alias" />
</real_interface>
</interface>
</interface_list>
</vip>
<!-- Software Error Detection Configuration -->
<errd polltimer="10">
<!-- Samsung SSM process -->
<proc name="pg_ctl.exe" atleast="1" action="restart" class="prim" />
<proc name="ServiceManager.exe" atleast="1" action="restart" class="prim" />
<!--
<proc name="HAServerService.exe" atleast="1" action="restart" class="prim"/>
-->
</errd>
<!-- File Replication Configuration -->
<!-- Adapt with the directory of your PostgreSQL database and logs
-->
<rfs async="second" acl="off" nbrei="3">
<replicated dir="C:\PostgreSQL\9.1\data" mode="read_only">
<notreplicated path="pg_log"/>
<notreplicated path="postmaster.pid"/>
</replicated>
<replicated dir="C:\Program Files (x86)\Samsung\SSM\SystemManager\MapFile" mode="read_only"/>
</rfs>
<!-- User scripts activation -->
<user nicestoptimeout="300" forcestoptimeout="300" logging="userlog" />
</service>
</safe>
start_prim.cmd
@echo off
rem Script called on the primary server for starting application services
rem For logging into SafeKit log use:
rem "%SAFE%\safekit" printi | printe "message"
rem stdout goes into Application log
echo "Running start_prim %*"
set res=0
rem TODO: set to manual the start of services when the system boots
net start "postgresql-9.1 - PostgreSQL Server 9.1"
if not %errorlevel% == 0 (
%SAFE%\safekit printi "PostgreSQL (postgresql-9.1 - PostgreSQL Server 9.1) start failed"
goto stop
) else (
%SAFE%\safekit printi "PostgreSQL (postgresql-9.1 - PostgreSQL Server 9.1) started"
)
net start "SSM System Manager"
if not %errorlevel% == 0 (
%SAFE%\safekit printi "SSM System Manager start failed")
goto stop
) else (
%SAFE%\safekit printi "SSM System Manager started"
)
net start "SSM Watch Services Manager"
if not %errorlevel% == 0 (
%SAFE%\safekit printi "SSM Watch Services Manager start failed"
goto stop
) else (
%SAFE%\safekit printi "SSM Watch Services Manager started"
)
rem net start "HA Server Service"
rem if not %errorlevel% == 0 (
rem %SAFE%\safekit printi "HA Server Service start failed"
rem goto stop
rem ) else (
rem %SAFE%\safekit printi "HA Server Service started"
rem )
if %res% == 0 goto end
:stop
set res=%errorlevel%
"%SAFE%\safekit" printe "start_prim failed"
rem uncomment to stop SafeKit when critical
rem "%SAFE%\safekit" stop -i "start_prim"
:end
stop_prim.cmd
@echo off
rem Script called on the primary server for stopping application services
rem For logging into SafeKit log use:
rem "%SAFE%\safekit" printi | printe "message"
rem ----------------------------------------------------------
rem
rem 2 stop modes:
rem
rem - graceful stop
rem call standard application stop with net stop
rem
rem - force stop (%1=force)
rem kill application's processes
rem
rem ----------------------------------------------------------
rem stdout goes into Application log
echo "Running stop_prim %*"
set res=0
rem action on force stop
if "%1" == "force" (
%SAFE%\safekit printi "Force stop: kill processes of Samsung SSM application"
%SAFE%\safekit kill -name="watchservices.exe" -level="terminate"
%SAFE%\safekit kill -name="java.exe" -argregex=".*systemmanager.*" -level="terminate"
%SAFE%\safekit kill -name="pg_ctl.exe" -level="terminate"
%SAFE%\safekit kill -name="postgres.exe" -level="terminate"
%SAFE%\safekit kill -name="HAServerService.exe" -level="terminate"
%SAFE%\safekit kill -name="systemanager.exe" -level="terminate"
goto end
)
rem %SAFE%\safekit printi "Stopping HA Server Service"
rem net stop "HA Server Service"
%SAFE%\safekit printi "Stopping SSM Watch Services Manager"
net stop "SSM Watch Services Manager"
%SAFE%\safekit printi "Stopping SSM System Manager"
net stop "SSM System Manager"
%SAFE%\safekit printi "Stopping PostgreSQL (postgresql-9.1 - PostgreSQL Server 9.1)"
net stop "postgresql-9.1 - PostgreSQL Server 9.1"
del C:\PostgreSQL\9.1\data\postmaster.pid
rem Wait a little for the real stop of services
"%SAFEBIN%\sleep" 10
if %res% == 0 goto end
"%SAFE%\safekit" printe "stop_prim failed"
:end
