Implementing Failover through Load Balancing within IBM Cognos 8

Guideline 

Implementing Failover through 

Load Balancing within IBM 

Cognos 8 

Product(s): IBM Cognos 8 

Area of Interest: Infrastructure

Implementing Failover through Load Balancing within IBM Cognos 8 2 

Copyright and Trademarks 

Licensed Materials - Property of IBM. 

© Copyright IBM Corp. 2010 

IBM, the IBM logo, and Cognos are trademarks or registered trademarks of 

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While every attempt has been made to ensure that the information in this document 

is accurate and complete, some typographical errors or technical inaccuracies may 

exist. IBM does not accept responsibility for any kind of loss resulting from the use 

of information contained in this document. The information contained in this 

document is subject to change without notice. 

This document is maintained by the Best Practices, Product and Technology team. 

You can send comments, suggestions, and additions to cscogpp@ca.ibm.com. 

Microsoft, Windows, Windows NT, and the Windows logo are trademarks of 

Microsoft Corporation in the United States, other countries, or both.


Contents 

INTRODUCTION.........................................................................................................4 

PURPOSE..............................................................................................................................4 

APPLICABILITY.........................................................................................................................4 

ASSUMPTIONS AND EXCLUSIONS.....................................................................................................4 

THE IBM COGNOS 8 APPLICATION TIER...................................................................5 

CONFIGURATIONS.....................................................................................................5 

IMPLEMENTING THE FAILOVER CONFIGURATION.....................................................................................6 

IMPLEMENTING THE LOAD BALANCE CONFIGURATION...............................................................................9 

TESTING THE FAILOVER..........................................................................................10 

ABOUT THE AUTHOR(S)............................................................................................................11


1 Introduction 

1.1 Purpose 

This paper talks about the implementation of failover through load balancing 

within the IBM Cognos 8 Application tier. 

1.2 Applicability 

The steps outlined in this document were validated using: 

• One server with a full base install of IBM Cognos 8 including gateway, 

dispatcher, content manager and content store. 

• One server with only the dispatcher installed. 

1.3 Assumptions and Exclusions 

This document assumes that the reader has a basic understanding of the IBM 

Cognos 8 installation and configuration. 

This document also assumes that: 

• Only one IBM Cognos 8 instance is running on each server.


2 The IBM Cognos 8 Application Tier 

The Application tier of IBM Cognos 8 is where the majority of the processing 

is performed. Components of the Application Tier receive user requests from 

the Web Tier components or directly through rich clients and must fulfil them 

appropriately. In turn, the Application Tier will often have to query the data 

and process the results and send them back to the presentation layer. 

Due to this it may be necessary to provide failover and load balancing to the 

application tier through the addition of another IBM Cognos 8 dispatcher 

which shares a common IBM Cognos 8 gateway and IBM Cognos 8 content 

manager. The following sections will provide the detailed implementation 

steps required to perform this task. 

3 Configurations 

For the purpose of this document an IBM Cognos 8 full base installation is 

installed on Machine 1. This machine will be named ajay_j. The machine 

with only the dispatcher is installed; Machine 2; will be named s_singh. This 

is illustrated in the figure below.


The installation options can be picked up for both the machines as: 

Machine 1 (ajay_j) 

Machine 2 (s_singh) 

3.1 Implementing the Failover Configuration 

1. Open IBM Cognos configuration window of full base installation 

(ajay_j). 

2. Go to “Environment” “Gateway Settings” “Dispatcher URIs for 

gateway”. 

3. Include dispatcher URI of dispatcher only IBM Cognos installation 

(s_singh). 

Once complete the configuration should represent the following 

screen capture.


4. Click OK to return to the main configuration. 

5. Click on “Save Configuration” and then click on “Restart” to restart the 

service as shown below. 

6. Open Cognos configuration window of only dispatcher IBM Cognos 8 

installation (s_singh) 

7. Modify values of “Gateway URI” and “Content Manager URIs” to 

reflect values pertaining to full base IBM Cognos Installation. This is 

illustrated by the following image.


8. In the same window, delete the original content store connection and 

create a new content store connection which points to the content 

store of full base installation (ajay_j). 

9. Give an appropriate name to the connection. 

10. Right click on the connection and click on “Test”, to test the 

connection to content store. 

11. Save the configuration and restart the service as illustrated earlier. 

12. Using a browser, log in to IBM Cognos Connection using the gateway 

URL as an administrator and go to Launch IBM Cognos 

Administration System. 

13. Check that both the systems are now registered and marked as 

“Available” as shown in the following image. 

This completes the failover configuration of two dispatchers.


3.2 Implementing the Load Balance Configuration 

Load balancing, using IBM Cognos 8 capability, is achieved using a weighted 

round-robin algorithm. An administrator can assign a weight to each 

dispatcher. The higher the weight of a dispatcher the more it will be 

favoured during the work assignment. 

In IBM Cognos 8, you can set process capacity settings using the following 

steps. 

1. Click on the dispatcher which needs to be configured for load 

balancing, click on “Set Properties”. 

2. Then click on “Settings”. Under “Category” tab, then click on 

“Tuning”. 

3. Set an appropriate value for processing capacity based on the load 

balancing requirements. 

4. Click on “OK”. 

5. Follow this step for both the IBM Cognos 8 installations as shown 

below.


4 Testing the Failover 

Once the configuration is complete, it is advisable to test whether it is 

working as expected. This can be done by alternately stopping the individual 

dispatchers and running a report. A report executed within a new session 

should be unaffected by stopping of a single dispatcher. The image below 

illustrates the stopping of a dispatcher within IBM Cognos Administration.


4.1 About the Author(s) 

Ajay S Joshi works for IBM Cognos on system Z team out of IBM - India 

Software Lab, Pune. 

He has extensive experience in back end testing of UNIX based business 

applications. During his free time, he likes playing chess. 

Sachchidanand Singh works with the IBM Cognos on system Z team and 

works out of IBM - India Software Lab, Pune. 

He has been involved in the analysis, design, enhancement, maintenance and 

testing of business application software’s involving Mainframe, UNIX, BI & 

Data Warehouse technologies. During his free time, he enjoys watching 

cricket.

Implementing Failover through Load Balancing within IBM Cognos 8

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