users@glassfish.java.net

Best place to go to understand servers, domains, nodes, clusters?

From: Laird Nelson <ljnelson_at_gmail.com>
Date: Fri, 23 Mar 2012 13:23:50 -0400

Hello; happy Friday. I'd like to know if there's an existing resource out
there to help me better understand the relationships between domains,
server instances, clusters, nodes and instances.

I am working my way through the administration guide and the
high-availability guide and the reference manual, and they are certainly
helpful, but I was hoping for something a bit higher level to help my head
get wrapped around the overall concept. Right now I'm finding that I have
to kind of assemble all the raw materials together in my head myself.

What I've gotten so far:

A domain is a logical grouping--for configuration and auth purposes--of
either standalone, shared or clustered server instances.
A server instance is an actual Glassfish program launched on a VM somewhere.
A server instance has exactly one domain associated with it.
A server instance and a VM have a one-to-one relationship with each other.
A domain has at least one server instance associated with it.
A domain has a DAS which is the special server instance where the domain's
configuration is stored and manipulated.
A cluster is a collection of server instances that are essentially
interchangeable.
A shared server instance is a server instance that shares a server
configuration with another server instance. (But this is still overall
managed by the DAS/domain, yes?)
A standalone server instance is a server instance that has its own server
configuration. (But still managed by a DAS, right?)
A clustered server instance is a server instance that belongs to a cluster.
A node is another term for a host with Glassfish software on it. A node
does NOT correlate one-to-one with a VM (you could have many VMs/server
instances running on a node.

Please correct me where I've gotten things wrong. Any pointers to
elsewhere are welcomed!

Best,
Laid

-- 
http://about.me/lairdnelson