Upgrading High Availability and Cluster Support

There are two ways to upgrade the cluster subsystem.

This Adaptive Server release supports the following cluster platforms for high availability:

HP-UX – MCSG 11.17
HPIA – MCSG 11.18
IBM AIX – HACMP 5.4
Sun Solaris – VCS4.0, SunCluster 3.2
Linux-AMD – VCS4.1
Win2003 – Cluster Manager 5.2

Perform a major upgrade, which involves cluster downtime, then shutting down and restarting all servers. In this case, you must:
1. Run sp_companion suspend, as described in Using Sybase Failover in a High Availability System.
2. Offline the resource groups of primary and secondary companions on both nodes. Ensure that the companion server and corresponding resource groups are not automatically brought online until the cluster system upgrade is complete.
3. Upgrade the cluster subsystem following the instructions from the cluster system vendor. You may find options to migrate the current resource groups to the new cluster version. If such an option is not available (or if the resource groups get deleted or corrupted), re-create the resource groups and configure them appropriately after you have upgraded the cluster system.
4. Bring the resource groups online. This should bring primary and secondary companions online on their respective nodes.
5. Run sp_companion resume as described in Using Sybase Failover in a High Availability System.
Perform a minor upgrade, to avoid cluster downtime. Nodes are failed over to other nodes and upgraded one at a time. For example, assuming ASE1 is the primary companion on node N1, and ASE2 is secondary companion running on node N2:
1. Upgrade the primary companion:
  1. Failover ASE1 from N1 to N2. Achieve this by relocating the primary resource group to N2 or by shutting down ASE1.
  2. Upgrade the cluster subsystem on N1 following the upgrade instructions provided by the vendor.
  3. Fail back ASE1 from N2 to N1. See the appropriate cluster chapter in Using Sybase Failover in a High Availability System for more details on Adaptive Server failback.
2. Upgrade the secondary companion. If you are using a symmetric configuration, follow the steps in “upgrade the primary companion,” above, for ASE2. If you are using an asymmetric configuration:
  1. Take the secondary resource group offline and verify ASE2 is shut down. ASE2 is not available during this upgrade.
  2. Upgrade the cluster subsystem on N2 following the upgrade instructions from the vendor.
  3. Start ASE2 by bringing the secondary resource group online to N2.