3.6.2 HP PolyServe Software for Microsoft SQL Server release notes (T5392-96040, June 2009)

• Support for completely stock installations of SQL 2005 and SQL 2000 instances. It is no longer
necessary to install data locations for instances on PSFS filesystems.
• For SQL Server 2005 instances, the ability to configure mixed-mode authentication in the
template file (template.ini) is now supported.
• The installation media can now be located on either a CIFS share or a PSFS filesystem.
• The new Multi-Node Upgrade Wizard for SQL Server can be used to install service packs and
hotfixes on multiple nodes.
• Instance Aliasing. This feature can be used to map your existing legacy SQL connections to the
Virtual SQL Server connections used with Matrix Server. SQL clients can then continue to use the
legacy connection string to access the SQL database in its new location.
• MSDTC support. MSDTC can now be virtualized or devirtualized on-the-fly.
• Role-based security. Using the role-based security feature provided with Matrix Server, you can
create a role to manage Virtual SQL Servers and Virtual SQL Instances.
New Active-Passive Architecture
In the 3.4 release, MxDB for SQL Server used a Primary-Backup architecture. For example, when you
virtualized a SQL server instance in a two-node cluster, you would declare one node to be the primary
for the instance and the second node to be the backup. The high-availability engine provided with
MxDB for SQL Server would then create a profile for each node.
A profile is a container consisting of the SQL data (that is, databases and logs) and the corresponding
registry setting necessary for starting an instance of SQL Server. With the Primary-Backup architecture,
also called the “N model,” the total number of profiles for a virtualized SQL instance is equal to the
number of nodes participating in the Virtual SQL Server. If the primary node goes down, the SQL
high-availability engine will mount the profile from that node onto the backup node and then bring
up the SQL instance on that node. Although this architecture provides high-availability, it can be
susceptible to duplicate registry issues.
The new Active-Passive architecture provided with the 3.6 release is very flexible and highly resistant
to the duplicate registry issue. This new architecture provides an “N+1 model.” For a two-node cluster,
there are now three profiles: the two local profiles (N) and a clustered profile (+1). The clustered
profile can move around the cluster, and when mounted on a node, it turns the state of the node from
passive to active. At any one point in time, the node running with the clustered profile (the “+1”
profile) is the active node and all other nodes are passive (that is, running with their local “N” profiles).
On the PolyServe Management Console, the active node is specified as the primary node and the
passive nodes are specified as backup nodes.
Prerequisites
HP PolyServe Matrix Server 3.6.1 on a supported Microsoft Windows operating system
Installation instructions
New installations
See the HP PolyServe Matrix Server installation guide for installation information.
6