HACMP = High Availability Cluster MultiProcessing

HACMP is a software package that enables a fail-over system for Services

running on AIX (clustering). The software can reassign certain IP's (called service
IP's) from one node to another node. In HACMP there are 3 types of IP
addresses:

• Service IP: the IP at which the service (eg. Oracle) on a server can be
reached
• Boot IP: the address that is assigned to a ethernet adapter/system
• Standby IP: an address that is assigned to a different card then the first 2
IP addresses

There are certain rules attached to the IP ranges. The Boot IP must be in a
different range then the service IP. The Standby IP must be on a card that is not
used by the boot IP or the Service IP.

The Boot IP and the Standby IP are persistant IP's, meaning they belong to the
partion and not the service and cannot be moved from server to server by
HACMP. This ensures that an administrator can always log on to an IP address
and know he/she logs on to a certain server.

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Manual update

You can perform changes in the LVM components in the cluster manually,
outside
of the control of HACMP. In this case, you should make sure as soon as possible
that the updates are made on all nodes in the cluster.
When changing the LVM components, we recommend that you follow these
procedures:
1. Stop the cluster services on the node owning the shared volume group
(sometimes just stopping the applications may be enough).
2. Make the changes to the shared LVM components.
3. Unmount all the file systems belonging to the shared volume group.
4. Varyoff the shared volume group.
5. Export the volume group definition on the other nodes (alternately, you can
use the importvg -L command without exporting the VG definition).
6. Import the volume group again to the other node to update the AIX ODM, and,
if you are using NFS mounts, make sure that you are using the same Major
Number.
7. Change the characteristics of the volume group needs.
8. Varyoff the volume group of this node.
9. Start the cluster services again on the node with the highest priority (home
node) for the resource group.
Lazy update

For LVM components under the control of HACMP for AIX, you do not have to
explicitly export and import to bring the other cluster nodes up to date. Instead,
HACMP for AIX can perform the export and import when it activates the volume
214 IBM Eserver pSeries HACMP V5.x Certification Study Guide Update
group during a failover. (In a cluster, HACMP controls when volume groups are
activated.) HACMP for AIX implements a function, named “lazy update”, by
keeping a copy of the VGDA time stamp for the shared volume groups.
AIX updates the VGDA time stamp whenever a LVM component is modified.
When another cluster node attempts to varyon the volume group, HACMP for
AIX
compares its copy of the VGDA time stamp with the time stamp in the VGDA on
the disk. If the values are different, HACMP exports and re-imports the volume
group before activating it. If the time stamps are the same, HACMP activates the
volume group normally (without exporting and re-importing).

Note: HACMP V5.1 does not require lazy update processing for enhanced
concurrent volume groups, as it keeps all nodes in the resource group updated
with the LVM information.