Crystal Reports Server 2008

system · August 17, 2011, 9:16pm

Hello,

I have inherited an existing configuration that is currently not working as designed, and I am trying to identify first what is the optimal configuration for a 2 node cluster and then to identify what is wrong with the current configuration.

The current configuration is that Crystal Reports Server 2008 is installed on 2 separate Linux Servers (1st is an Application server and the 2nd is a Web server), and it appears that both servers have full Crystal Reports Server 2008 installations on them along with 2 separate instances of Tomcat (1 on each server). Is this the correct type of configuration for a 2 node cluster?

Or is the correct configuration require one installation of Crystal Reports Server 2008 on 1 server along with 2 separate instances of Tomcat on each server?

Thanks!!

Nodak7 (BOB member since 2007-01-02)

system · August 18, 2011, 8:10pm

Please do not let the fact that this is Crystal Reports Server 2008 scare you. It is more or less the same product as BOE.

How about this question. Does anyone know or had experiences with running 2 separate instances of Tomcat while deploying BOE?

Or had experience with splitting the Application on one server and running the web server piece (Tomcat) on another server for security reasons?

What issues did you run into, and how did you resolve them?

Thanks!

Nodak7 (BOB member since 2007-01-02)

system · August 18, 2011, 8:15pm

I have found that Crystal Reports Server and Business Objects Enterprise and essentially the same product Architecturally.

I found this:

Setting up server communication

Crystal Reports Server requires a database server and web application server software to be installed and configured if you want to use an existing database or web application server. You can also choose to install a database server (MySQL) and a Web application server (Apache Tomcat 5.5) during your installation of Crystal Reports Server.

You must ensure that all Crystal Reports Server machines can communicate properly with one another:

Each Crystal Reports Server machine must be able to communicate over TCP/IP with the machine that runs your Central Management
Server(CMS). The CMS is responsible for maintaining a database of information about your Crystal Reports Server system, which other
components can access as required. The data stored by the CMS includes information about users and groups, security levels, Crystal Reports
20 Crystal Reports Server 2008 Installation Guide for Linux

Nodak7 (BOB member since 2007-01-02)

system · August 18, 2011, 8:45pm

And this might be helpful as well.

2 Preparing to install Crystal Reports Server 2008 Setting up server communication
Server content, and servers. For more information about the CMS, see the Managing and Configuring Servers chapter in the BusinessObjects
Enterprise Administrators Guide.

If the host machine has more than one Network Interface Card (NIC), the CMS may automatically bind to a primary NIC. If the primary NIC is not
routable, you may have to reconfigure your servers after installation. Alternatively, you could make the primary NIC routable before installing
Crystal Reports Server. For more information on how to reconfigure to bind to routable NICs see the Managing and Configuring Servers chapter
in the BusinessObjects Enterprise Administrators Guide.

Linux servers that run Crystal Reports Server must have a fixed hostname. You must have root privileges to set or modify a fixed host name on your
system. However, you do not require root privileges to perform a user installation of Crystal Reports Server. If you are unfamiliar with these
procedures, consult your Linux system documentation.

Note: Please ensure that the host name you use does not include any of the following characters: an underscore, a period, or a slash.

Ensure that your database client and server are set up to use Unicode character encoding(such as UTF-8). Consult your database documentation
to determine the settings required for a Unicode configuration.

If you connect Crystal Reports Server to a web application server, the web application server must be able to communicate with all Crystal
Reports Server machines. If you plan to use a Java application server and your existing application server does not include a version of the
Java Development Kit (JDK) supported by Crystal Reports Server, you will need to install it.

If you are installing Crystal Reports Server in a firewall environment, you will need additional configuration details. See the “Working with Firewalls”
section of the BusinessObjects Enterprise Administrators Guide

Nodak7 (BOB member since 2007-01-02)