Technical White Paper

Enterprise Linux Servers

SAP Solutions—High Availability

on SUSE Linux Enterprise ®

Server for SAP Applications

All best practices have been developed jointly between
Hewlett-Packard and SUSE, as well as with the following
hardware and software providers:

CC Computersysteme und
Kommunikationstechnik GmbH

Table of Contents page

Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3
Find the Right Best Practices for Your Requirements. . . . . 5
Best Practices Explained in Detail . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Credits . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
Enterprise Linux Servers Technical White Paper
SAP Solutions—High Availability on SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications

Executive Summary
SAP Business Suite is a sophisticated application
platform for large enterprises and mid-size
companies. Many critical business environments
require the highest possible SAP application availability.
SUSE Linux Enterprise High Availability Extension,
®

running on the modern x86-64 hardware platform,

satisfies this requirement.
Modern SAP systems, running critical workloads, have to meet HP delivers SAP-certified, enterprise-class hardware such as
the highest standards for availability of their SAP services. the HP ProLiant blade servers and HP EVA storage arrays. .
SAP already comes with some basic redundancy mechanisms Together with various management technologies, the SUSE
out of the box. However, for a full high availability, SAP relies delivers the SAP-recommended Linux operating system,
on third-party, high availability cluster solutions, that are SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 11. It is fully validated and cer-
designed to cover all components in the SAP solution stack tified by SAP for almost all SAP products. Together with the.
that could fail and cause an interruption of the SAP services. High Availability Extension, SUSE offers a complete Software
The protected components include for example the SAP stack to make SAP systems high available. Third-party high
NetWeaver software, SAP databases, the network, server availability cluster solutions are no longer needed. SUSE Linux
hardware and the underlying storage systems. Enterprise Server for SAP Applications, which was de­vel­
oped specifically for SAP workloads, includes the operating.
The goal of most businesses is to reach an availability of up system and the high availability extension with the required
to 99.999 percent. This is less than five minutes of service SAP resource agents. No additional software is needed.
outage per year. This goal is attainable only when all single
points of failure are eliminated and when takeover proce- Once they have these hardware and software technologies,
dures happen reliably, smoothly and very fast in the event cluster architects need additional resources. High availability
of an outage. SAP systems tend to be very complex, and individual require-
ments for storage replication, network connectivity and soon
HP and SUSE offer the right hardware and software tech- result in an enormous number of architecture possibilities for
nologies to run fully redundant, high available SAP systems just one SAP cluster. Extensive resources would be needed to
for critical SAP workloads. design, implement and test a cluster that fulfills all individual
requirements.

2
To minimize the planning, implementation and testing re- support and services. Because Linux is supported on a very
quired, HP, SUSE and several other hardware and software wide range of server hardware, customers now have the pos-
partners have developed a set of best practices that describe. sibility to escape from vendor lock-in. In terms of administra-
the most common SAP high-availability scenarios at a detailed. tion, SAP customers see little difference between Linux and
technical level. Cluster architects can use these best practices proprietary UNIX-like operating systems. Linux is well accepted
as implementation guides and combine them as needed to in all areas of data center computing. Through open interfaces
setup their individual SAP high-availability clusters. and a wide range of supported applications, Linux is capable
of providing all required services for standalone SAP workloads
Each best-practice has been professionally designed, planned and integration in existing SAP environments.
and tested by an inter-disciplinary team of high-availability
clus­ter and SAP experts. Each best-practice document focuses. SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications
on a dedicated technical topic. Combined, these make up SAP recommends SUSE Linux Enterprise Server as a preferred
a powerful documentation collection that covers almost all Linux platform. Since the very beginning of SAP involvement
high-availability requirements. with Linux, SUSE has been the number one Linux platform for
SAP. SUSE Linux Enterprise Server has become the reference
This white paper provides an overview of the best practices. platform for SAP software development. SAP now actively sug-
For more details on each scenario please refer to the docu- gests SUSE Linux Enterprise Server when customers want to
ment collection at: www.suse.com/products/sles-for-sap/ run SAP workloads on Linux. Recently, SAP chose SUSE Linux
resource-library/sap-best-practices.html Enterprise Server as the operating system for the fast-start
program of its Business All-in-One solutions.
Introduction
SAP on Linux SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications is opti-
SUSE and SAP have a strong partnership and cooperate on a mized to provide the best Linux platform for SAP software.
wide range of technologies and solutions. Besides the Linux
operating system layer, SUSE and SAP work closely together YaST®, the SUSE Linux Enterprise Server main installation and
to integrate identity and security management solutions from administration tool, provides an SAP software pattern that in-
SUSE with the SAP NetWeaver platform and business software stalls the prerequisites needed for running SAP software. Also,
applications. some system parameters are fine-tuned in preparation for the
SAP workload.
SUSE has multiple dedicated resources working at the SAP
headquarters and the SAP Linux Lab to ensure maximum inter­ Support and Certification
operability between our products and services. For SAP customers, SUSE offers a priority support service that
provides customers with a single point of contact for support,
SAP established the SAP Linux Lab back in 1999, to support from the operating system through the application. This offer-
SAP software on Linux. The Linux Lab assists other SAP de- ing is valid in combination with SUSE Linux Enterprise Server
partments with software development on the Linux platform, or SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications.
processes Linux-specific support problems and acts as an in­
for­mation hub to all SAP partners in the Linux ecosystem. SAP and SUSE are working together to ensure that SUSE Linux
Enterprise Server service packs always match the certification
Linux enables customers to reduce their total cost of ownership of the respective product. In fact, SAP recommends always
(TCO). Linux distributors do not charge a license fee for Linux using the latest available service pack.
because it is open source, so customers need to pay only for

www.suse.com 3
Enterprise Linux Servers Technical White Paper
SAP Solutions—High Availability on SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications

SUSE provides at least five years of general support for plat- Distributed
 replicated block devices (DRBD8), which ­
form and operating system products, including its revisions, provide fast data resynchronization capabilities over a
starting at the date of a product’s general availability. When LAN and replicated SAN semantics, allowing customers to
general support ends, SUSE offers extended support for a mini- use cluster-aware file systems without additional SANs
mum of two years. This gives SAP customers long product life, High-availability GUI and various command-line tools
ensuring a low total cost of ownership.
Availability is a result of the interaction of cluster software with
SUSE Linux Enterprise High Availability Extension application services on the front side and the operating system
Your data is the most valuable asset that you have. It is what and hardware resources on the other side.
your business depends on. Robust, scalable and manageable
storage is a top priority for your IT department. High availability Following this basic idea, cluster software like OpenAIS could
storage, applications and services are critical for your business not increase the availability on its own. It needs a lot of modules,
to be competitive. But even as data grows, you can lower stor- such as services, resource agents, a messaging layer, network
age management costs and still benefit from an easy-to-man- and file system availability, and a stable Linux kernel designed
age, high availability storage foundation that scales as needed. and configured for productive server systems in data centers.

The SUSE Linux Enterprise High Availability Extension, a fea- SUSE Linux Enterprise High Availability Extension integrates
tured addition for SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 11, satisfies these open source technologies and enables you to support
these needs. line-of-business workloads traditionally reserved for UNIX and
mainframe systems.
It includes high availability service and application clustering, file
systems and clustered file systems, network attached storage SAP Resource Agents
(NAS), network file systems, volume managers, storage area. The SAP Instance Resource Agent is responsible for starting,
network (SAN) and drivers, and the means to manage of all stopping and monitoring the services in an SAP instance. The
these components working together. The SUSE Linux Enterprise resource agent monitors the following services: disp+work,
High Availability Extension 11 is included in the SUSE Linux msg_server, enserver, enrepserver, jcontrol and jstart.
Enterprise Server for SAP Applications product from SUSE.
The SAP Instance Resource Agent can be used to manage the
Unlike proprietary solutions, SUSE Linux Enterprise High Avail­ following SAP instances:
ability Extension keeps costs low by integrating open source,
enterprise-class components. The key components of the ex- SAP
 WebAS ABAP Release 6.20–7.30
tension are: SAP WebAS Java Release 6.40–7.30
(For 6.40 please also read SAP note 995116.) SAP WebAS
OpenAIS,
 a high availability cluster manager that supports ABAP + Java Add-In Release
multi-node failover Resource agents to monitor availability 6.20–7.30
 (Java is not monitored by the cluster.)
of resources, including SAP instances and SAP databases
Oracle Cluster File System 2 (OCFS2), a parallel cluster The purpose of the SAP database resource agent is to start,
file system that offers scalability stop and monitor the database instance of an SAP system.
Cluster Logical Volume Manager (cLVM2), a logical volume Together with the relational database management systems
manager for the Linux kernel, which provides a method (RDBMS) it will also control the related network service for
of allocating space on mass storage devices that is more the database.
­flexible than conventional partitioning schemes

4
As with Oracle Listener and the xserver of MaxDB, the resource HP StorageWorks 6400/8400 Enterprise Virtual Array (EVA)
agent expects a standard SAP installation and therefore needs The HP StorageWorks 6400/8400 Enterprise Virtual Array
fewer parameters to be configured. The monitor operation of (EVA) family is an enterprise-class storage array system de-
the resource agent can test the availability of the database by signed to aggregate and automate array management tasks
using SAP tools such as R3trans or jdbcconnect. This ensures to manage more storage capacity with fewer resources. The
that the database is accessible for the SAP system. EVA family is designed specifically for customers in the busi-
ness-critical, enterprise marketplace and is a scalable, highly
The SAP database resource agent supports the following data­ available and highly reliable virtual-array storage solution. The
bases in an SAP installation: EVA 6400/8400 saves time, space and costs compared to
traditionally architected storage. It is supported by a power-
Oracle 10gR2 and 11gR2 fully simple suite of management software, making it easy for
DB2 UDB for Windows and UNIX 9.x users to provision storage and to achieve the highest level of
SAP-DB / MaxDB 7.7 productivity. The HP StorageWorks 6400/8400 Enterprise
Virtual Array family is designed for the data center where im-
The resource agents are part of the SUSE Linux Enterprise. proved storage utilization and scalability are critical needs. The
High Availability Extension. EVA meets application-specific demands for transaction I/O
performance for midrange and enterprise customers. It pro-
HP Hardware vides easy capacity expansion, instantaneous replication and
HP ProLiant Systems simplified storage administration. EVA products combined with
HP ProLiant systems offer simplicity, manageability and flexi­ HP StorageWorks Command View EVA software provides a
bility to ideally position them for SAP Business Suite environ- comprehensive solution designed to simplify management and
ments. The broad range of SAP applications cover the full range. maximize performance.
of business solutions, including a middleware stack. HP ProLiant
servers meet such sometimes complex IT infrastructures by Find the Right Best Practices for Your
offering the industry’s broadest range of infrastructure solu- Requirements
tions. The ProLiant server range comprises the ML, DL and BL Following is a set of best practices that we developed to cover
blade series, which offer customers the possibility to deploy as many of the most- common scenarios as possible. We do not
either two-, four- or eight-CPU rack-mounted or standalone expect one best practice to fit all customer needs. While each
machines. The DL series is density optimized for flexibility and best practice focuses on a specific scenario, most of these best
manageability and ideal for multi-server SAP deployments, practices can be combined to fit your more complex situation.
while the ML series is suitable for standalone systems that
require maximum internal storage capacity. HP BladeSystem Depending on the scenario you want to implement, you can
infrastructures offer a highly flexible and scalable environment select one or more of these best practices from SUSE. To help
that enables enterprises to embrace change while dramatically you decide which best practice matches your preferred ar-
reducing their total cost of ownership. HP also offers a set of chitecture and system management principles, we describe
software tools called ProLiant Essentials that extends server each of the best practices in a short top-level view. This will
functionality for dynamic resource optimization, automated help you implement the optimal infrastructure for running SAP
and intelligent management, and continuous, secure opera- NetWeaver on SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 11 with the SUSE
tions. HP BladeSystems and some ProLiant Essentials mod- Linux Enterprise High Availability Extension.
ules make up the infrastructure that supports both the SAP
Adaptive Computing concept and the HP Virtual Infrastructure The following best-practices have been developed together
Solution for SAP Business Suite. with customers, partners and our consulting experts:

www.suse.com 5
Enterprise Linux Servers Technical White Paper
SAP Solutions—High Availability on SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications

Simple
 stack high availability with two SAP systems To learn more about the architecture, technical details and how
active/active to implement this high availability scenario, please read our
Enqueue replication high availability active/active document SAP on SUSE Linux Enterprise—Best Practices for
DRBD data replication high availability active/active Running SAP NetWeaver on SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 11
with High Availability Simple Stack at: www.suse.com/products/
The best-practices described in this whitepaper are available sles-for-sap/resource-library/sap-best-practices.html
at: www.suse.com/products/sles-for-sap/resource-library/
sap-best-practices.html Enqueue Replication High Availability Active/Active
The best practice Enqueue Replication High Availability sup-
Best Practices Explained in Detail ports running an entire SAP system balanced on both cluster
Simple Stack High Availability with Two SAP Systems nodes. The master/slave mechanism of the SAP instance re-
Active/Active source agent for the SCS/ASCS instances allows it to run the
This best practice defines an entire SAP system, including the enqueue replication server. This increases the availability of the
database and all cluster-controlled instances, on a single cluster SCS/ASCS instances by providing a replication of the central
node running within a single resource group. The cluster uses locking table. In the case of a cluster failover, the SCS/ASCS
shared storage devices such as SAN devices to provide the instances are able to take over the replicated locking table.
data to all cluster nodes. However, to minimize cluster complex- This mechanism improves the availability of the SAP system.
ity, the file systems are mounted by one cluster node at a time.
This gives you the free choice of using any supported Linux
standard file system such as ext3, reiserfs and xfs.

Figure 2. This best practice runs an entire SAP system balanced on

both cluster nodes.

The advantages of this cluster model are:

Figure 1. Simple Stack High Availability with Two SAP Systems
Active/Active
Locking
 table replication using the enqueue replication
The advantages of this cluster model include: server improves availability of the SAP system
Load balancing (database/instances) over both cluster
Less
 complex cluster design nodes
Easy to expand with additional SAP systems You can also run the database on a separate cluster if you
Avoids domino effects, if running a single SAP system in the want to spread the workload
cluster

6
To learn more about the architecture, technical details of this
solution and how to implement this high availability scenario,
please read our document SAP on SUSE Linux Enterprise—
Best Practices for Running SAP NetWeaver on SUSE Linux
Enterprise Server 11 with High Availability—Enqueue Replication
High Availability Active/Active at: www.suse.com/products/
sles-for-sap/resource-library/sap-best-practices.html

DRBD Data Replication High Availability Active/Active

The best practice DRBD Data Replication High Availability
Active/Active supports two separated data centers and host-
based storage replication from one data center to the other.
One of the key cluster techniques is the distributed replicated
block device (DRBD). This technique is included in the product
SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications 11 SP1 and
SUSE Linux Enterprise High Availability Extension 11. Figure 3. DRBD Data Replication High-availability Active/Active.

DRBD allows you to transparently mirror data from one node to To learn more about the architecture, technical details of this
another via the network. DRBD can be understood as network- solution and how to implement this high availability scenario,
based RAID 1. please read our document SAP on SUSE Linux Enterprise—
Best Practices for Running SAP NetWeaver on SUSE Linux
The example configuration described in the best practice Enterprise Server 11 with High Availability—Storage Mirror with
below comprises four SAP nodes spread across two distinct DRBD at: www.suse.com/products/sles-for-sap/resource-
sites, with two nodes per site. The nodes in each site form an library/sap-best-practices.html
OpenAIS/Pacemaker high availability cluster. This architecture
assumes that both sites provide a local SAN with fully meshed
fibre channel connectivity. In the example, the cluster nodes are
Conclusion
HP and SUSE provide all the required hardware and software
assigned to two SCSI logi- cal units (LUNs) spread across two
components to successfully set up and run high availability SAP
different shared storage devices. Each cluster node has access
workloads in physical and in virtual environments.
to both LUNs with redundant, multipath connectivity and uses
Linux software RAID (MD) for host-based mirroring.
HP provides with the ProLiant server and blade solutions a
powerful platform for SAP workloads of all sizes. HP EVA stor-
For replication between sites, a DRBD device is layered on top
age arrays provide the optimal SAN back end to safely store
of the RAID mirror. Thus, asynchronous storage replication
critical SAP business data. Combined with the CLX extension
between sites requires no SAN connectivity—simple IP con-
for HP EVA storage systems, HP significantly improves the.
nectivity is sufficient.
redundancy of and thus the availability of SAP data stored.
in the SAN.
The advantages of this cluster model are:
SUSE provides SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Appli­
Data
 replication from one data center to another
cations, the most interoperable platform for mission-critical
Supports a wide area cluster
computing.
The solution could also be extended scenarios where the
data centers run different SAP systems

www.suse.com 7
SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications enhances Credits
SUSE Linux Enterprise Server with additional functions and All best practices have been developed jointly between HP
services, such as the SUSE Linux Enterprise High Availability and SUSE, as well as with the following hardware and software
Extension, which are tailored for SAP in the data center. They partners:
come with all necessary components to run the SAP Business
Suite applications as well as SAP certified databases in high
availability clusters. SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 11 is certified
for almost all SAP products.

Using SUSE Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications to-

gether with our comprehensive set of best practices, IT archi-
tects get a powerful tool box to design and implement even CC Computersysteme und

very complex and customized high availability SAP clusters Kommunikationstechnik GmbH

that fit individual business and IT infrastructure requirements. To address the demands of our customers and to develop
customer-proven solutions, we worked closely together with
SUSE and HP worked together with several hardware and soft- the following customers:
ware partners, as well as with customers, to develop solutions
that reflect real-world SAP scenarios rather than just theoretical BASF IT Services
setups. All described topics have been carefully chosen based HP Hosting Services
on specific customer demands. The developed best practices
have been planned, implemented and tested on the same hard- We would like to thank our partners and customers for their
ware that is commonly used in data centers running critical committed engagement. We would especially like to thank our
SAP systems. team members from seven different companies for their hard
and successful work. We believe that brilliant solutions have
their origin in the minds of brilliant people.

Contact your local SUSE Solutions Provider,

or call SUSE at:

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