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Management High Availability

In This Section:

Overview of Management High Availability

Management High Availability Video

The High Availability Environment

Configuring a Secondary Server in SmartConsole

Synchronizing Active and Standby Servers

Changeover Between Active and Standby

Changing a Server to Active or Standby

High Availability Troubleshooting

Environments with Endpoint Security

High Availability Disaster Recovery

Overview of Management High Availability

High Availability is redundancy and database backup for management servers. Synchronized servers have the same policies, rules, user definitions, network objects, and system configuration settings.

Management High Availability uses the built-in revisions technology and allows the High Availability procedure to synchronize only the changes done since the last synchronization. This provides:

The first management server installed is the primary. If the primary Security Management Server fails, or is off line for maintenance, the administrator can initiate a changeover, so that the secondary server takes over.

Notes:

Management High Availability Video

The High Availability Environment

A Management High Availability environment includes:

For full redundancy, the active management server at intervals synchronizes its database with the secondary server or servers.

Active vs. Standby

In a standard High Availability configuration there is one Active server at a time. The administrator uses the Active server manage the High Availability configuration. The Active server automatically synchronizes the standby server(s) at regular intervals. You can open a Standby server only in Read Only mode. If the Active server fails, you can initiate a changeover to make a Standby server become the Active server. If communication with the Active server fails, there may be more than one Active server. This is called Collision Mode.

Primary Server vs. Secondary Server

The sequence in which you install management servers defines them as Primary or Secondary. The first management server installed becomes the Primary active server. When you install more Security Management Servers, you define them as Secondary. Secondary servers are Standby servers by default.

Important notes about backing up and restoring in Management High Availability environment:

For more information:

Configuring a Secondary Server in SmartConsole

In the SmartConsole connected to the Primary server, create a network object to show the Secondary Security Management Server. After you publish, synchronize starts between the primary and secondary servers.

To configure the secondary server in SmartConsole:

  1. Open SmartConsole.
  2. In Object Categories, click New > More > Network Object > Gateways and Servers > Check Point Host.
  3. On the General Properties page, enter a unique name and IP address for the server.
  4. In the Software Blades section, select the Management tab.
  5. Select Network Policy Management.

    This automatically selects the Secondary Server, Logging and Status, and Provisioning.

  6. Create SIC trust between the Secondary Security Management Server and the Primary:
    1. Click Communication.
    2. Enter the SIC Activation Key of the secondary server.
    3. Click Initialize.
    4. Click Close.
  7. Click OK.
  8. Click Publish to save these session changes to the database.

    On publish, the initialization and synchronization between the servers start.

  9. Monitor these tasks in the Task List, in the SmartConsole System Information area. Wait for the Task List to show that a full sync has completed.
  10. Open the High Availability Status window and make sure there is one active server, and one standby.

Synchronizing Active and Standby Servers

At intervals, the Active server synchronizes with the standby server or servers, and when you publish the session. Sessions that are not published are not synchronized.

Monitoring High Availability

The High Availability Status window shows the status of each Security Management Server in the High Availability configuration.

To see the server status in your High Availability environment:

  1. Open SmartConsole and connect to a primary or secondary server.
  2. On the Menu, click High Availability.

The High Availability Status window opens.

For the management server and its peer or peers in the High Availability configuration, the High Availability Status window shows:

Monitoring Synchronization Status and Actions

Status messages can be general, meaning that they apply to the full system, or they can apply to a specified active or standby server. General messages show in the yellow overview banner.

General Status messages in overview banner

Description

 

The database of the primary Security Management Server is identical with the database of the secondary.

Some servers could not be synchronized

A communication issue prevents synchronization, or some other synchronization issue exists.

 

The active and standby servers are not communicating.

Communication Problem

Some services are down or cannot be reached.

Collision or HA conflict

More than one management server configured as active. Two active servers cannot sync with each other.

When connected to a specified active management server:

Status window area:

Peer Status

Additional Information

Connected to:

Active

SmartConsole is connected to the active management server.

Peers

Standby

The peer is in standby. The message can also show:

  • Sync problem, last time sync
  • Synchronized successfully. Last sync time: <time>
  • No communication

 

Not communicating, last sync time

 

 

Active

A state of collision exists between two servers both defined as active.

When connected to a specified standby management server:

Status window area:

Peer Status

Description

Connected to:

Standby

Also shows: last sync time.

Peers

Active

The peer is in standby. The message can also show:

  • No communication, last sync time
  • OK., last sync time: <time>
  • Sync problem, last sync time (in any direction)

 

Standby or Unknown

Can also show: no communication.

Changeover Between Active and Standby

Changeover between the primary (active) and secondary (standby) management server is not automatic. If the Active fails or it is necessary to change the Active to a Standby, you must do this manually. When the management server becomes Standby it becomes Read Only, and gets all changes from the new Active server.