In an Composite Active/Active topology, a switch or a failover not only promotes a Replica to be a new Primary, but also will require the ability to reconfigure cross-site communications. This process therefore assumes that cross-site communication is online and working. In some situations, it may be possible that cross-site communication is down, or for some reason cross-site replication is in an OFFLINE:ERROR state - for example a DDL or DML statement that worked in the local cluster may have failed to apply in the remote.

If a switch or failover occurs and the process is unable to reconfigure the cross-site replicators, the local switch will still succeed, however the associated cross-site services will be placed into a "SHUNNED(SUBSERVICE-SWITCH-FAILED)" state.

The guide explains how to recover from this situation.

The examples are based on a 2-cluster topology, named NYC and LONDON and the composite dataservice named GLOBAL. The cluster is configured with the following dataservers:

The cross site replicators in both clusters are in an OFFLINE:ERROR state due to failing DDL.

A switch was then issued, promoting db3 as the new Primary in NYC and db5 as the new Primary in LONDON

shell> cctrl -multi -expert
Tungsten Cluster 7.0.3 build 141
nyc: session established
[LOGICAL:EXPERT] / > use london_from_nyc
london_from_nyc: session established, encryption=false, authentication=false
[LOGICAL:EXPERT] /london_from_nyc > ls

COORDINATOR[db6:AUTOMATIC:ONLINE]
 
ROUTERS:
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|connector@db1[26248](ONLINE, created=0, active=0)                                |
|connector@db2[14906](ONLINE, created=0, active=0)                                |
|connector@db3[15035](ONLINE, created=0, active=0)                                |
|connector@db4[27813](ONLINE, created=0, active=0)                                |
|connector@db5[4379](ONLINE, created=0, active=0)                                 |
|connector@db6[2098](ONLINE, created=0, active=0)                                 |
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
 
DATASOURCES:
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|db5(relay:SHUNNED(SUBSERVICE-SWITCH-FAILED), progress=6, latency=0.219)          |
|STATUS [SHUNNED] [2018/03/15 10:27:24 AM UTC]                                    |
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|  MANAGER(state=ONLINE)                                                          |
|  REPLICATOR(role=relay, master=db3, state=ONLINE)                               |
|  DATASERVER(state=ONLINE)                                                       |
|  CONNECTIONS(created=0, active=0)                                               |
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|db4(slave:SHUNNED(SUBSERVICE-SWITCH-FAILED), progress=6, latency=0.252)          |
|STATUS [SHUNNED] [2018/03/15 10:27:25 AM UTC]                                    |
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|  MANAGER(state=ONLINE)                                                          |
|  REPLICATOR(role=slave, master=db5, state=ONLINE)                               |
|  DATASERVER(state=ONLINE)                                                       |
|  CONNECTIONS(created=0, active=0)                                               |
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|db6(slave:SHUNNED(SUBSERVICE-SWITCH-FAILED), progress=6, latency=0.279)          |
|STATUS [SHUNNED] [2018/03/15 10:27:25 AM UTC]                                    |
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------------+
|  MANAGER(state=ONLINE)                                                          |
|  REPLICATOR(role=slave, master=db4, state=ONLINE)                               |
|  DATASERVER(state=ONLINE)                                                       |
|  CONNECTIONS(created=0, active=0)                                               |
+---------------------------------------------------------------------------------+

In the above example, you can see that all services are in the SHUNNED(SUBSERVICE-SWITCH-FAILED) state, and partial reconfiguration has happened.

The Replicators for db4 and db6 should be Replicas of db5, db5 has correctly configured to the new Primary in nyc, db3. The actual state of the cluster in each scenario maybe different depending upon the cause of the loss of cross-site communication. Using the steps below, apply the necessary actions that relate to your own cluster state, if in any doubt always contact Continuent Support for assistance.