Need to add a second weblogic server for high availability

Question

I have a weblogic 10.3.3 server with forms and reports 11.1.1.3.
I have an adminServer, WLS_FORMS and WLS_REPORTS managed servers setup.
This was setup with the wizard, so the WLS_FORMS is in the cluster_forms cluster group and WLS_REPORTS in the cluster_reports group.
I now need to add a second server with forms and reports also to act as one big server and provide high availability and load balancing.
How do I achieve thsi, is there a wizard that will do this?
The two servers are setup in exactly the same way, with the same versions of Weblogic and Forms and Reports.
Thanks in advance.

Answer 1

I do not know "reports 11.1.1.3" application, but from your description this application is already targeted on a clustered configuration.
So it should be sufficient to add 2 new instances in the WebLogic domain "WLS_FORMS_2", "WLS_REPORTS_2", include them into the existing clusters and add a load balancer (like apache + wleblogic-plugin) that will balance requests on instances.
I never heard of wizards to create such clustered environments. However it is not hard to do:
1- Install binaries on the new machine
2- Create the domain configuration directory on the new machine using config.sh wizard in the same way you have aleady done with the first machine.
In this step you can create a clone of the existing domain, but it is enough to create a domain with the same name and the same admin instance.
Instead of using config.sh, you can also copy the domain directory from the existing machine and change diretories in scripts if needed.
The domain configuration is needed only to find the binaries, the basic domain files common to all installations, and to allow startup scripts (see point 4-) to connect to the admin and download the domain/instance configuration.
3- Configure the new instances on the existing WebLogic console
4- Create startup scripts for "WLS_FORMS_2", "WLS_REPORTS_2" on the second machine
Bye
Mariano