Installation guide

22 Chapter 2. Hardware Installation and Operating System Configuration
2.3.4. Setting Up a Network Switch or Hub
A network switch or hub, although not required for operating a two-node cluster, can be
used to facilitate cluster and client system network operations. Clusters of more than two
nodes require a switch or hub.
Set up a network switch or hub according to the documentation provided by the vendor.
After setting up the network switch or hub, connect it to each node by using conven-
tional network cables. A terminal server, if used, is connected to the network switch or hub
through a network cable.
2.4. Installing and Configuring Red Hat Enterprise Linux
After the setup of basic cluster hardware, proceed with installation of Red Hat Enterprise
Linux on each node and ensure that all systems recognize the connected devices. Follow
these steps:
1. Install Red Hat Enterprise Linux on all cluster nodes. Refer to Red Hat Enterprise
Linux Installation Guide for instructions.
In addition, when installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux, it is strongly recommended to
do the following:
• Gather the IP addresses for the nodes and for the bonded Ethernet ports, before
installing Red Hat Enterprise Linux. Note that the IP addresses for the bonded
Ethernet ports can be private IP addresses, (for example, 10.x.x.x).
• Do not place local file systems (such as /, /etc, /tmp, and /var) on shared
disks or on the same SCSI bus as shared disks. This helps prevent the other cluster
nodes from accidentally mounting these file systems, and also reserves the limited
number of SCSI identification numbers on a bus for cluster disks.
• Place /tmp and /var on different file systems. This may improve node perfor-
mance.
• When a node boots, be sure that the node detects the disk devices in the same order
in which they were detected during the Red Hat Enterprise Linux installation. If
the devices are not detected in the same order, the node may not boot.
• When using certain RAID storage configured with Logical Unit Numbers (LUNs)
greater than zero, it may be necessary to enable LUN support by adding the fol-
lowing to /etc/modprobe.conf:
options scsi_mod max_scsi_luns=255
2. Reboot the nodes.