Set up load balancing for a high availability dashboard environment

IBM Tivoli Monitoring > Version 6.3 Fix Pack 2 > Administrator's Guide > Prepare your dashboard environment > Roadmaps
IBM Tivoli Monitoring, Version 6.3 Fix Pack 2

Set up load balancing for a high availability dashboard environment

To create a high availability dashboard environment, you can use an HTTP server configured for load balancing between your dashboard users and a cluster of Dashboard Application Services Hub nodes, and also between Dashboard Application Services Hub nodes and multiple Tivoli Enterprise Portal Server.
Work load is distributed by session, not by request. When one of the servers fails, new and existing user sessions are directed to an operational server.
When you have multiple portal servers in a monitoring environment, you must designate one of the portal servers as the read-write portal server and the others must be read-only portal servers. Tivoli Enterprise Portal client users and tacmd CLI users who make customization changes must connect to the read-write portal server to make their updates. The content from the database for the read-write portal server must be periodically exported and then imported into the database for each read-only portal server. Because the dashboards in Dashboard Application Services Hub do not make customization changes, the HTTP server can redirect dashboard requests to any of the portal servers for the monitoring environment. In a load balancing environment, you might not know which portal server (the read-write portal server or a read-only portal server) is serving your requests when you launch the portal browser client from Dashboard Application Services Hub. Because of this limitation, best practice is to not use the portal browser client to make configuration changes when the portal client is launched from the dashboard server. If you need to make configuration changes, configure the portal client to connect to the read-write portal server directly and then start the client.
Tip: When using launch in context in a load balancing environment you might receive a message if, you have already launched into the portal client and the portal server that was serving its requests goes down and a secondary portal server begins servicing requests. The portal client cannot register this switch and you might receive the message KFWITM094W: The Tivoli Enterprise Client has lost contact with the Tivoli Enterprise Portal Server. You must close the browser window and log in again to clear this message.
If you have multiple Dashboard Application Services Hub nodes and use the Authorization Policy Server, the policy server can only be installed on one of the dashboard nodes because it does not support load balancing. When you enable authorization policy checking for each portal server, you specify the hostname and port for the Dashboard Application Services Hub where the policy server is installed. For information on what happens if the Dashboard Application Services Hub where the policy server is installed is not available, see Manage the authorization policy store.
The following figures show two types of load balancing environments with default port numbers:

An environment that includes a single Dashboard Application Services Hub node and multiple portal servers.

An environment with load balancing for both Dashboard Application Services Hub and Tivoli Enterprise Portal Server.

The portal server also has a local IBM HTTP server. When the load balancing HTTP server sends requests to the portal server, it is sending those requests to the portal server's local HTTP server on port 15200 (for HTTP) or 15201 (for HTTPS). Then the local HTTP server is responsible for forwarding the requests to the other portal server components (such as the dashboard data provider or the components that handle portal client requests).
Figure 1. An environment that includes a single Dashboard Application Services Hub node and multiple portal servers
Figure 2. An environment with load balancing for both Dashboard Application Services Hub and Tivoli Enterprise Portal Server
The following roadmap describes the steps for configuring load balancing for your dashboard environment. It assumes that you have an existing dashboard environment with single sign-on support and now you are adding load balancing to the environment. The roadmap takes you through the steps to add multiple portal servers to your environment and then it optionally adds additional Dashboard Application Services Hub nodes.

Roadmap for setting up load balancing for your dashboard environment

Step Task Where to find information
1 Install and configure the additional portal servers. Also install application support on each portal server.
When you configure each portal server, enable the dashboard data provider. If you already have authorization policies enabled in the dashboard environment, enable authorization policy checking in each portal server specifying the hostname and port number of the Dashboard Application Services Hub node where the Authorization Policy Server is installed.
When you enable authorization policies and specify HTTPS for the protocol used to retrieve policies from the Authorization Policy Server, you must also configure TLS/SSL communication between the portal server and the Authorization Policy Server.
"Installing IBM Tivoli Monitoring" in the IBM Tivoli Monitoring Installation and Setup Guide.
Configure TLS/SSL communication between the portal server and the Authorization Policy Server
2 Determine which portal server you want to use for read-write operations and the approach you want to use to periodically export data from the database for the read-write portal server into the database for each read-only portal server.
The export and import of the portal server database can be done in two ways:

Use RDBMS backup utilities such as DB2’s db2 backup and db2 restore commands.

Use the migrate-export and migrate-import command provided by the Tivoli Monitoring product.

If the various portal server databases are not running on the same OS version, then the RDBMS backup and restore utilities might not work.
See your database server documentation if you decide to use RDBMS backup utilities.
If you choose to use the portal server migrate-export and migrate-import commands, see Replicating the Tivoli Enterprise Portal Server database.
3 Ensure the time is synchronized to UTC on the new portal servers and configure single sign-on on each new portal server.
Ensure that all of the portal servers and Dashboard Application Services Hub nodes are using the same LTPA key.
For each new portal server, perform steps 4-10 in Set up a monitoring dashboard environment with single sign-on and with per user authorization controls.
Perform step 5 only on the read-write portal server. Before performing steps 6-10 on a read-only portal server, ensure that the customization updates for step 5 are exported from the database for the read-write portal server and then imported into the database of each read-only portal server.
4 Install and configure an HTTP server to load balance across the multiple portal servers.
Best practice is to install an HTTP server that is dedicated to Tivoli Enterprise Portal Server load balancing.
Configure an HTTP Server to load balance multiple Tivoli Enterprise Portal Servers
5 If dashboard users will launch the Tivoli Enterprise Portal client, you must configure the browser client to only use HTTP requests and instruct existing portal client browser users to clear their browser's application and jar file cache so that they can pick up the configuration change.
In addition, the portal client user IDs must be assigned either the Tivoli Enterprise Portal <All Application> or Tivoli Monitoring Server application.
See "Configuring HTTP communication between the portal client and server" in the IBM Tivoli Monitoring Installation and Setup Guide and "Clear the JAR cache" in the Troubleshooting Guide.
6 If you are using HTTPS in your dashboard environment, perform these steps:
1. Configure TLS/SSL communication between the load balancing HTTP server and each portal server's HTTP server. Configure TLS/SSL communication between the load balancing HTTP Server and each portal server's local HTTP server
2. Configure TLS/SSL communication between the Dashboard Application Services Hub and the HTTP server used for load balancing multiple portal servers. Configure TLS/SSL communication between Dashboard Application Services Hub and an HTTP server used for load balancing multiple portal servers
7 Login to IBM Dashboard Application Services Hub as an LDAP user who is also a dashboard hub administrative user. Delete the dashboard data provider connection in Dashboard Application Services Hub and add a new connection that specifies the fully qualified hostname and port number of the load balancing HTTP server in place of the fully qualified hostname and port number of a portal server.
Typically, the HTTP port number is 80 and the HTTPS port number is 443. Ensure the box Use the credentials of the user (requires SSO configuration) is selected.
Create a connection to the IBM Tivoli Monitoring dashboard data provider
8 Login to IBM Dashboard Application Services Hub as an LDAP user who has permission to view your dashboard pages and their content. Then launch the dashboard applications, and verify data is displayed. See your dashboard application's user guide for details on how to launch and use the dashboard.
Tip: First select System Status and Health > Dashboard Health Checks to verify your environment is working correctly. Then if you are using Infrastructure Management Dashboards for Servers, select System Status and Health > Server Dashboards.
For more information on using Infrastructure Management Dashboards for Servers, see the OS agent user's guides.
9 To use multiple Dashboard Application Services Hub nodes in your dashboard environment, perform these steps:
1. Configure load balancing for Dashboard Application Services Hub and ensure that your monitoring dashboard applications such as Infrastructure Management Dashboards for Servers are installed on each dashboard node.
Install the Authorization Policy Server only on a single node in the Dashboard Application Services Hub cluster.
See the Jazz for Service Management Configuration Guide for details on configuring load balancing across multiple Dashboard Application Services Hub nodes.
2. If you are using HTTPS in the dashboard environment, configure TLS/SSL communication between each new Dashboard Application Services Hub node and the HTTP server used for load balancing multiple portal servers. Configure TLS/SSL communication between Dashboard Application Services Hub and an HTTP server used for load balancing multiple portal servers
3. On each new Dashboard Application Services Hub node, login to the IBM Dashboard Application Services Hub node as an LDAP user who is also a dashboard hub administrative user. Add a new connection that specifies the fully qualified hostname and port number of the load balancing HTTP server in place of the fully qualified hostname and port number of a portal server.
Typically, the HTTP port number is 80 and the HTTPS port number is 443. Ensure the box Use the credentials of the user (requires SSO configuration) is selected.
Create a connection to the IBM Tivoli Monitoring dashboard data provider

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Step	Task	Where to find information
1	Install and configure the additional portal servers. Also install application support on each portal server. When you configure each portal server, enable the dashboard data provider. If you already have authorization policies enabled in the dashboard environment, enable authorization policy checking in each portal server specifying the hostname and port number of the Dashboard Application Services Hub node where the Authorization Policy Server is installed. When you enable authorization policies and specify HTTPS for the protocol used to retrieve policies from the Authorization Policy Server, you must also configure TLS/SSL communication between the portal server and the Authorization Policy Server.	"Installing IBM Tivoli Monitoring" in the IBM Tivoli Monitoring Installation and Setup Guide. Configure TLS/SSL communication between the portal server and the Authorization Policy Server
2	Determine which portal server you want to use for read-write operations and the approach you want to use to periodically export data from the database for the read-write portal server into the database for each read-only portal server. The export and import of the portal server database can be done in two ways: Use RDBMS backup utilities such as DB2’s db2 backup and db2 restore commands. Use the migrate-export and migrate-import command provided by the Tivoli Monitoring product. If the various portal server databases are not running on the same OS version, then the RDBMS backup and restore utilities might not work.	See your database server documentation if you decide to use RDBMS backup utilities. If you choose to use the portal server migrate-export and migrate-import commands, see Replicating the Tivoli Enterprise Portal Server database.
3	Ensure the time is synchronized to UTC on the new portal servers and configure single sign-on on each new portal server. Ensure that all of the portal servers and Dashboard Application Services Hub nodes are using the same LTPA key.	For each new portal server, perform steps 4-10 in Set up a monitoring dashboard environment with single sign-on and with per user authorization controls. Perform step 5 only on the read-write portal server. Before performing steps 6-10 on a read-only portal server, ensure that the customization updates for step 5 are exported from the database for the read-write portal server and then imported into the database of each read-only portal server.
4	Install and configure an HTTP server to load balance across the multiple portal servers. Best practice is to install an HTTP server that is dedicated to Tivoli Enterprise Portal Server load balancing.	Configure an HTTP Server to load balance multiple Tivoli Enterprise Portal Servers
5	If dashboard users will launch the Tivoli Enterprise Portal client, you must configure the browser client to only use HTTP requests and instruct existing portal client browser users to clear their browser's application and jar file cache so that they can pick up the configuration change. In addition, the portal client user IDs must be assigned either the Tivoli Enterprise Portal <All Application> or Tivoli Monitoring Server application.	See "Configuring HTTP communication between the portal client and server" in the IBM Tivoli Monitoring Installation and Setup Guide and "Clear the JAR cache" in the Troubleshooting Guide.
6	If you are using HTTPS in your dashboard environment, perform these steps:
1. Configure TLS/SSL communication between the load balancing HTTP server and each portal server's HTTP server.	Configure TLS/SSL communication between the load balancing HTTP Server and each portal server's local HTTP server
2. Configure TLS/SSL communication between the Dashboard Application Services Hub and the HTTP server used for load balancing multiple portal servers.	Configure TLS/SSL communication between Dashboard Application Services Hub and an HTTP server used for load balancing multiple portal servers
7	Login to IBM Dashboard Application Services Hub as an LDAP user who is also a dashboard hub administrative user. Delete the dashboard data provider connection in Dashboard Application Services Hub and add a new connection that specifies the fully qualified hostname and port number of the load balancing HTTP server in place of the fully qualified hostname and port number of a portal server. Typically, the HTTP port number is 80 and the HTTPS port number is 443. Ensure the box Use the credentials of the user (requires SSO configuration) is selected.	Create a connection to the IBM Tivoli Monitoring dashboard data provider
8	Login to IBM Dashboard Application Services Hub as an LDAP user who has permission to view your dashboard pages and their content. Then launch the dashboard applications, and verify data is displayed.	See your dashboard application's user guide for details on how to launch and use the dashboard. Tip: First select System Status and Health > Dashboard Health Checks to verify your environment is working correctly. Then if you are using Infrastructure Management Dashboards for Servers, select System Status and Health > Server Dashboards. For more information on using Infrastructure Management Dashboards for Servers, see the OS agent user's guides.
9	To use multiple Dashboard Application Services Hub nodes in your dashboard environment, perform these steps:
1. Configure load balancing for Dashboard Application Services Hub and ensure that your monitoring dashboard applications such as Infrastructure Management Dashboards for Servers are installed on each dashboard node. Install the Authorization Policy Server only on a single node in the Dashboard Application Services Hub cluster.	See the Jazz for Service Management Configuration Guide for details on configuring load balancing across multiple Dashboard Application Services Hub nodes.
2. If you are using HTTPS in the dashboard environment, configure TLS/SSL communication between each new Dashboard Application Services Hub node and the HTTP server used for load balancing multiple portal servers.	Configure TLS/SSL communication between Dashboard Application Services Hub and an HTTP server used for load balancing multiple portal servers
3. On each new Dashboard Application Services Hub node, login to the IBM Dashboard Application Services Hub node as an LDAP user who is also a dashboard hub administrative user. Add a new connection that specifies the fully qualified hostname and port number of the load balancing HTTP server in place of the fully qualified hostname and port number of a portal server. Typically, the HTTP port number is 80 and the HTTPS port number is 443. Ensure the box Use the credentials of the user (requires SSO configuration) is selected.	Create a connection to the IBM Tivoli Monitoring dashboard data provider