Core groups (high availability domains)
A core group is a set of processes in the same cell with high availability relationships. Components fail over to another process in the same core group. Replication occurs between members of the same core group.
A cell must contain at least one core group, although multiple core groups are supported. Each core group contains a core group coordinator to manage its high availability relationships, and a set of high availability policies that are used to manage the highly available components within that core group.
Core group members
Every...
- deployment manager
- node agent
- application server
- proxy server
...is a member of a core group. When a process is created it is automatically added to a core group. The core group membership is stored in a WAS configuration document. We can move processes from one core group to another. The following rules govern the core group membership:
- Every process is a member of exactly one core group.
- All members of a cluster must be members of the same core group.
- Each core group must contain at least one node agent or the deployment manager.
A core group member has a well-defined life cycle. When the first core group member starts, the transport that is dedicated to that core group automatically starts. The Discovery Protocol, View Synchrony Protocol, and Failure Detection Protocol for that core group member also start and run for the entire lifetime of the core group member:
Discovery Protocol Discovers when other core group processes start, and for opening network connections to these other members. View Synchrony Protocol Establishes reliable messaging with other core group members after the connections are opened. Failure Detection Protocol Detects when other core group members stop or become unreachable because of a network partition.
Core group coordinator
The core group coordinator is responsible for coordinating high availability activities between the core group members for which View Synchrony Protocol is established.
Core group transport
Network communication between all the members of a core group is essential. The network environment must consist of a fast local area network (LAN) with full Internet Protocol (IP) visibility and bidirectional communication between all core group members. Each core group member must be able to receive communications from any of the other core group members.
Multiple core groups
A cell, by default, contains a single core group, called DefaultCoreGroup.
All processes in the cell are initially members of this core group. A single core group is usually sufficient. However, some topologies or special circumstances require multiple core groups. There are also topologies that do not require multiple core groups but having them is a good practice. For example, you might want to define multiple core groups if :
- There are one or more firewalls within a cell. A core group can not contain members from multiple firewall protection domains.
- A large number of processes in the cell and the core group protocols, such as the View Synchrony Protocol, consume correspondingly large amounts of resources such as CPU.
- Core group protocols, such as the Failure Detection Protocol, need tuning or configuring to use values that work best with smaller numbers of core group members.
If members of different core groups need to share WLM routing information, use the core group bridge service to connect these core groups. The core group bridge service uses access point groups to connect the core groups. A core group access point defines a set of bridge interfaces that resolve to IP addresses and ports. The core group bridge service uses this set of bridge interfaces to enable members of one core group to communicate with members of another core group.
Sub-topics
Core group migration considerationsCore group coordinator
Core group administration considerations
Core group scaling considerations
Core group transports
Core group Discovery Protocol
Core group Failure Detection Protocol
Core group View Synchrony Protocol
Core group protocol versions
Related concepts
Core group communications using the core group bridge serviceHigh availability manager
Related tasks
Change the number of core group coordinatorsConfigure core group preferred coordinators
Configure the Discovery Protocol for a core group
Configure the Failure Detection Protocol for a core group
Configure a core group transport
Create a new core group (high availability domain)
Move core group members