Managing Systems and Workgroups: A Guide for HP-UX System Administrators

Setting Up and Administering an HP-UX NFS Diskless Cluster
Planning Your Cluster Policies
Chapter 10902
Planning Your Cluster Policies
Before you actually create your cluster and begin to add clients, you must
be prepared to set three sharing policies for your cluster. These policies
will determine much of the behavior of your cluster, your users’ view of it,
and the relative ease with which you can administer it.
When you add the first client to your cluster, SAM will require you to set
sharing policies for three functions of the cluster:
• Location of user and group data
• Location of home directories
• Electronic mail
NOTE Once you set these policies and add the first client, you cannot change
them unless you first remove all the clients.
You will make decisions about the sharing of other resources (file
systems and peripherals) when you add them to the server or clients.
There are two sharing policy types: shared and private. In a shared
policy, all members of the cluster use the same copy of a resource. In a
private policy, each cluster member has its own copy of a resource.
The usual arrangement for clusters is to have either all shared policies or
all private policies. If all shared policies are used, the cluster behaves
more like a single computer system (although important differences
remain). If all private policies are employed, the cluster behaves more
like a collection of standalone systems.
It is possible to set some policies shared and some private. This must be
done with care because complications can result. To understand the uses
and impacts of the various policies, see the following sections.