Double Take and Shoretel

[w131jrd]

I am working on installing Double Take on our director server but I am first testing it in a VM environment. Here I have 2 director Servers both with double take installed and I am trying to get the Mirroring and Replication to work properly in my test. I have been following the Application Note off of Double Takes website but they created this with Shoretel version 5 release 1.2 and Double Take version 4.4.1.0 Build: 4.4.0.1352.5 . We are using Shoretel 7.0 build 12.5.9303 and Double Take version 5.0.2.3486. When I am running the mirror and replication to replace the shoreline data directory on the backup server it fails even though I followed the instructions via shoretel and Double Take.

I do know that in my experience of migrating this directory manually from one server to another I needed to shutdown all shoreware services and and also DCOM. When I did this migration I used safe mode to get the database copied over. Now that I want to do this with Double Take for a disaster recovery plan how do I get the mirroring and replication working.

This is the link to the documentation that I have been using:

http://www.doubletake.com/_docs/pdf/...TelAppNote.pdf

There's a newer app note ST-0122 get it here:
ST-0122

Additionally I don't believe ShoreWare supports VM yet, I thought it would be supported in a future release (not 100% sure though).

[VonZipper]

Shoretel does not support double-take

[w131jrd]

I have downloaded the App note ST0122 and that has the same processes in setting up the replication. Also this app note only goes up to 6.1 and we are running on 7.0. Do you know of any other documentation

[eazeaz]

I don't have the info you are looking for. But I do believe that Shoretel has plans for the Director to be fault-tolerant/redundant. It will be able to be access/used from the headquarters and Distributed voicemail servers. If the main server dies, one would be able to function off of the Distributed server.

Once this happens, one would think that Shoretel (if they do now) would no longer "support" doubletake and will "recommend" that you use their fault tolerant solution.

We were going to do the double take thing but we are now holding off until failover is available natively.

I did notice that in all of the shoretel notes I saw, it mentioned that both servers had to be in the same broadcast domain. To me an additional/duplicate/DR server would only be helpful if it was in a different location. Having two servers sit side by side in the same office for failover doesn't do much for me.

This is in no way trying to discourage you. I am interested in the outcome of your project, in case the shoretel solution doesn't ever materialize.

[VonZipper]

We ran Double-take for 6 years without a single issue, until now. Yes, we used their notes to install, and we never had to fail over, but it has been running all that time. Recently, running a custom version of 6, we started having some issues with the workgroup service failing. Through all of the debugs, Shoretel said it was a double-take issue. It was at that time they told us that they do NOT support double-take on thier servers. It was not a good day, and my boss's still have not came to terms with it at all. We are told that they are working on certifying double-take to be on their servers, but as of today, it still is not, and we are not running double-take until they do.

It is kinda a screwed up situation, they tell you how to do it, and they recommended it to us 6 years ago, but they will not support it on their server. Oh well I guess, we are just holding out until it is supported, and then we will turn it all back on. It really does do what it is supposed to. We only know because network managers have forgot to disable the service when they upgrade or patch the server. Double-take fails over and the other server takes over. Two things to remember, one, you need to make sure you get a license for the second server. You will need it to match your mac. The second is that double-take is a pain to fail back the the main server, just takes time.

Have fun all.

Originally Posted by w131jrd

I have downloaded the App note ST0122 and that has the same processes in setting up the replication. Also this app note only goes up to 6.1 and we are running on 7.0. Do you know of any other documentation

No; that is the most recent app note, apparently these are generated by Shoretel and there hasn't been much of a demand for an updated one. Although the process is the same from 6.1 to 7.0, the only difference is that you need to ensure that you replicate the MySQL databases and add "Net Start MySQL" to your failover scripts and "Net Stop MySQL" to your failback scripts.

[janderegg]

It's not that ShoreTel doesn't support VMWare;* the issue is that VMWare can't supports real*time media streaming. I talked to one of their engineers about this and they are working on the problem. I think he said that they were going to have to write their own audio drivers to make it work.

[Jlorenz]

Originally Posted by janderegg

It's not that ShoreTel doesn't support VMWare;* the issue is that VMWare can't supports real*time media streaming. I talked to one of their engineers about this and they are working on the problem. I think he said that they were going to have to write their own audio drivers to make it work.

Not sure who you talked too, but Engineering will not support VMware. It is as you explained a streaming issue, and Voice Quality suffers. as You know VQ is a major factor in VOIP and it is virtually impossible for ST to assure Toll Quality on VMware.

[janderegg]

Spoke with a VMware engineer, not ShoreTel engineering.