STT - Moving to Shared Persistence

[Bjorn_Wedbratt]

In this webinar we will discuss:

• The shift to Shared Persistence
• Guidance when upgrading to Qlik Sense June 2017 release
• Live demonstration and takeaway

For best viewing, we recommend you set the highest video resolution

Q&A - Moving to Shared Persistence

Q: ­Does this mean we would never have Cassandra DB for QRS instead we will still have PostgreSQL? ­

A: At this time, there is no plan to implement Cassandra for QRS. I understand that there were complications that stalled moves in that direction.

Q: ­Any new installation will implicitly be in "Shared Persistence" mode? I do don't need to do anything, right? ­

A: That is correct, new installations will use Shared Persistence, you will need to create a file share, and can optionally set up your own database installation, but no other preparations are required

Q: ­Would you mandate to restart the server after uninstallation? ­

A: I do not normally find it necessary to restart the server after uninstalling Qlik Sense

Q: ­Also, in that case, do you confirm we do not have to delete the Qlik Folder in C:\ProgramData? the new database would be created in the same place inside a different version. ­

A: That is correct, the old version of the database is uninstalled and the new version is installed to a slightly different path %ProgramData%\Qlik\Sense\Repository\PostgreSQL\9.6\

Q: Why do we need to change the DB pass? I know it and get a DB dump every day­

A: There are 2 different database users created when you set up Qlik Sense. One is the superuser (username postgres), whose password is requested but is never written to any file. Instead we create one for the QRS (username qliksenserepository) and under synced persistence each install sets a randomly generated 10-character password for this account. In later versions of Qlik Sense we have a tool in the install\Repository\Util\ folder called the ConnectionStringEditor. This lets you decrypt the password, but in 3.0 that utility is not available so we use the alternative method of resetting the passwrod.

Q: Since shared persistence cannot span multiple geographic locations. What is the solution to having a global deployment without the sync persistence? If not, is there a timeline to bring the sync persistence or replacement back? ­

A: Unfortunately, there is not a simple solution for a deployment like this under shared persistence. In general, you can approach your partner or account manager and ask about splitting your license to do multiple, smaller Qlik Sense installations and then use the API or other tools to keep applications or settings mirrored between environments, but the specifics may vary significantly depending upon your circumstances. It is possible to arrange for one of our consultants to provide more detailed advice, again I would suggest discussing this with your partner or account manager.

There are no plans to bring back synced persistence, but we are looking into ways to achieving the same effect

Q: ­What services are running on the rim nodes? ­

A: In this demo, all the Qlik Sense services are running on the rim nodes. Though after the upgrade they do not have a Qlik Sense Repository Database anymore as that is only present on the central node.

Q: How do you get the operations monitor to work after the upgrade? ­

A: While we didn't have time to look into it during the demo, a restart of the Qlik Sense services on the central node allowed the operations monitor to migrate successfully and for the new versions of the License and Operations Monitor to be automatically imported by the repository service.

Q: Does the Repository ­Snapshot Manager works for shared persistence?

A: At this time the repository snapshot manager does not work under shared persistence, it is removed when Qlik Sense June 2017 is installed, we do have good documentation on taking a manual backup however and we plan to provide a similar backup utility that does support shared persistence in the future.

Q: ­Are there available any how to guides?­

A: I am not entirely sure what you mean by this question. If you mean how to upgrade your Qlik Sense system then yes, with the release of Qlik Sense June 2017 our help site has been updated with documentation to handle this upgrade.

Q: ­You showed us how to upgrade without going to 3.1 sr1 first? ­

A: Yes, that is correct

Q: ­How does this affect a single server deployment? ­

A: A single node running Qlik Sense 3.0 still needs to follow this same procedure, except for the steps that involve the rim nodes.

Q: ­What is the procedure if I would like to upgrade from 3.1.2+ to June with Shared on the same server? ­

A: That is the simplest upgrade scenario. You should:

1) Backup your Qlik Sense system

2) Shut down the services on all nodes

3) Run the upgrade on the central node using the installer

4) Confirm the system is running correctly (everything has migrated, the hub is accessible etc)

5) Delete the Qlik Sense certificates on the rim nodes (see our help site for where they are stored)

6) Upgrade a rim node using the installer

7) In QMC redistribute certificates to that rim node

😎 Confirm the rim node is working as normal

9) Repeat steps 6-8 until all nodes are up and running.

Deleting and redistributing certificates is necessary because of the floating central node feature in Qlik Sense June 2017

Q: ­Where there any changes to folder structure required for Shared Persistence after 3.2.4?

A: There are no changes to the folder structure requires for Shared Persistence in Qlik Sense June 2017

Q: ­Best practices we can follow to Migrate QS from 2.2.4 to 3.2.4 in multi-node environment­

A: Are you migrating to Shared Persistence? If so first follow the migration guide on our help site

Then run the upgrade process

Q: Is there a list of issues customers have reported issues after the upgrade? and resolutions? ­

A: Not at this time

Q: What rights do the file share and what security rights does the file share need? ­

A: The service account needs full access to the file share

Q: ­For good performance what is the hardware requirements for primary node and remote nodes? ­

A: This largely depends on your own requirements. I would recommend checking our scalability center in Qlik Community for information on how to test and scale your Qlik Sense environment

Q: ­Will there be a performance issues - if I have the shared folder on NAS or SAN instead of having it on same machine? ­

A: As long as the SAN or NAS has good performance and is mounted and accessed as standard windows share it should be okay.

Q: When going from 3.1 SR 1 to 3.2 SR 4 is this automatically applied or is this a separate process? ­

A: I am sorry, I am not entirely sure what "this" refers to in this question. The database changes our installer requires for upgrading to Qlik Sense June 2017 are made, but the file share is never automatically prepared so you may need to create that.

Q: ­Do you have any suggestions on having the file share being more resilient/robust/redundant in case the file share itself fails? Best Practices that you would implement in your environment?

A: Not really. Any system that allows for transparent redundancy for the file share would probably work best.

Q: ­Can we restore the security rules if we migrate QS from 2.2.4 to 3.2.4 in multi node environment­

A: The security rules are stored in the database, they should be preserved through the upgrade process

Q: ­Is there a document for multi node setup? ­

A: Please see our help site for information on setting up a multi-node site.

Q: ­Operations Monitor to failed as the location of logs changed or location of files changed? ­

A: We would need to adjust the data connection the operations monitor uses in this environment because the location of the logs has changed, the old value has been carried through the upgrade. This is pretty quick to fix in QMC however.

Q: ­Monitors are the "Achilles heel" of QS upgrade.  What do U think if we delete and reinstall after upgrade? ­

A: Deleting and reimporting after the upgrade does have the advantage of not storing multiple versions of the applications, just keep in mind you may want to make other configuration changes, such as updating the folder data connections in QMC

Q: Can we backup Share folder on line? Is there any lock? ­

A: I am not sure on this one, our documentation for the backup process suggests it should be done while the services are down.

Q: Where I can find more info about Qlik Sense Storage Service (QST)?­

A: I am sorry, I don't have any information on that, it is not part of Qlik Sense June 2017