multi-cast ip in weblogic cluster

[Shivkumar]

Hi,

Do we need multi-cast ip to install WebLogic 9.1 on HUPX 11.23 ?

We used multi-cast ip in weblogic 7.0 for the cluster.

Thanks,
Shiv

[Arunvijai_4]

Hi Shiv,

Here is Weblogic 9.1 Installation guide, http://edocs.bea.com/common/docs91/install/index.html

Hope this helps you..

-Arun

[Michael Steele_2]

Yes you do. Multicast will have problems with a firewall or if its not supported on your WAN. See below:

http://e-docs.bea.com/wls/docs91/cluster/setup.html

[Steven E. Protter]

Shalom Shiv,

Its quite important to coordinate this with network administration. We've just fixed a series of machines that were doing multi-cast and our team was well, unaware.

For some reason it really upsets the network people. Probably causes a lot of congestion.

SEP

[Shivkumar]

Steven,

I just wanted to understand why weblogic cluster stressed using multicast ip ?

Was there particular reason behind this ?

Thanks,
Shiv

[Michael Steele_2 · Accepted solution]

Sorry, not Steve, but I do know your answer. Multicast is a one to many sync signal for updating objects being deployed or removed. The weblogic server also multicasts its heartbeat to its client instances.

[Shivkumar]

Michael, In that case it seems like we must provide a multi-cast ip to the cluster.

However, the managed server instances should be provided with "Broadcast IP addresses".

Appreciate more viewpoint on this.

Regards,
Shiv

[Michael Steele_2]

Multicasting is to a group of NIC's while broadcasting is to every NIC. A broadcast will also increase latentcy. Increased latency might cause client instances to miss a weblogic heartbeat and get faked out.

There are also issues of instances listening to only one NIC, and not every NIC of on the network for the same problems with latentcy.

Broadcasting won't support streaming video, etc. While multicasting will. So there are some obsoleteness issues with broadcasting while newer networking technologys use multicasting.