8.5. Cloning the Satellite with Embedded DB
You may limit outages caused by hardware or other failures by cloning the Satellite with Embedded Database in its entirety. The secondary Satellite machine can be prepared for use if the primary fails. To clone the Satellite, perform these tasks:
- Install RHN Satellite with Embedded Database (and a base install of Red Hat Enterprise Linux AS) on a separate machine, skipping the SSL Certificate generation step.
- Back up the primary Satellite's database daily using the commands described in Section 8.4.2, “Backing up the Database”. If this is done, only changes made the day of the failure will be lost.
- Establish a mechanism to copy the backup to the secondary Satellite and keep these repositories synchronized using a file transfer program such as rsync. If you're using a SAN, copying isn't necessary.
- Use RHN DB Control's
restoreoption to import the duplicate data. - If the primary Satellite fails, transfer the SSL certificates from it to the secondary. Refer to the Deploying the CA SSL Public Certificate to Clients section of the RHN Client Configuration Guide for precise instructions.
- Change DNS to point to the new machine or configure your load balancer appropriately.
