Quorum location for Failover cluster file share witness

So, I've done quite a bit of searching for what I'm about to propose and I've been able to find nothing.
I currently have a multi site failover cluster hosting separate 2-node SQL clusters at each site connected through an Availability Group. For the failover cluster I am using a file share witness hosted on a server at the primary site. Both sites
are built entirely on vSphere 5.5 and have full replication for the production servers. If the primary site goes down (disaster), I'll need to force quorum in the secondary site to a new file share witness.
Well, I got to thinking...
Why not just replicate the server hosting the file share? I completely understand the reasoning behind not putting the file share witness on DFS, but a replicated virtual server, why not? If the primary site fails, the replicated server hosting
the file share witness is brought online with the rest of the production servers in the DR site. In that case, the only thing that changes is the server IP address, but ultimately, the server name and share where quorum is hosted all stays the same.
Ultimately this prevents needing to find a 3rd geographical/cloud location to host a quorum/witness at. I can't imagine it's this "simple", but maybe it is. If this is possible, and there's not something I'm missing, this essentially
makes the quorum file share witness site agnostic, meaning it could live or be moved anywhere that replication is allowed.
Ideas, thoughts? Am I missing something?
Thanks!
Chris Miller

Most likely it would be better to put this question to the High Availability forum -
https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/home?forum=winserverClustering
But, might need a more complete definition of your environment. Are you saying that you have multiple 2-node clusters, each with one node in the primary and the second node in the DR site? And you have a single file share server located in primary that
is used to host the file share witnesses for all these clusters? You want to use VMware to replicate the file share server to the DR site so that it can be made available should the primary site fail?
It should work, but it will not be automatic. After all, the replicated VM will need to be brought online at the DR site so the SQL cluster will recognize it. That is not an automatic process. So the cluster will be down until
you bring the file share server online so it can be recognized. Not a whole lot different that simply forcing the DR SQL host to run without quorum.
. : | : . : | : . tim

Similar Messages

Exchange Server CCR 2007 unable to see the File Share Witness resulting in mailbox failover ?

Hi people,
Here's my Exchange Server 2007 SP3 in the ideal and normal situation:
Mailbox Server (CCR – Stretched Cluster) Nodes
PRODEXMBX01-VM (Active Mailbox, Quorum) – 10.1.1.53
DREXMBX01-VM (Passive mailbox) – 192.168.1.88
Hub Transport and Client Access Server Nodes
PRODEXHTCAS02-VM – 10.1.1.54
PRODEXHTCAS03-VM (FSW holder) – 10.1.1.55
DREXHTCAS02-VM – 192.168.1.89
Saturday early morning, for some unknown reason the Active Mailbox Server (PRODEXMBX01-VM)
cannot access or see the FSW on the HT server PRODEXHTCAS03-VM, thus
the mailbox gets failover to the DR Mailbox server (DREXMBX01-VM).
Here’s the Events logged:
Log
Name:      System
Source:        Microsoft-Windows-FailoverClustering
Event ID:      1564
Task Category: File Share Witness Resource
Level:Critical
User:          SYSTEM
Computer:      PRODEXMBX01-VM.domain.com
Description:
File
share witness resource 'File Share Witness (\\PRODEXHTCAS03-VM \FSM_DIR_ExMbxCluster01)'
failed to arbitrate for the file share '\\ PRODEXHTCAS03-VM \FSM_DIR_ExMbxCluster01'.
Please ensure that file share '\\ PRODEXHTCAS03-VM \FSM_DIR_ExMbxCluster01'
exists and is accessible by the cluster.
Log Name: System
Source: Microsoft-Windows-FailoverClustering
Event ID:      1177
Task Category: None
Level:       Critical
User:     SYSTEM
Computer:PRODEXMBX01-VM.domain.com
Description:
The Cluster service is shutting down because quorum was lost.
This could be due to the loss of network connectivity between some or all nodes
in the cluster, or a failover of the witness disk.
Run
the Validate a Configuration wizard to check your network configuration. If the
condition persists, check for hardware or software errors related to the
network adapter. Also check for failures in any other network components to
which the node is connected such as hubs, switches, or bridges.
So I had to perform manual failover back from DR to production so that both Active mailbox and the Quorum
are held by the Production Mailbox server (PRODEXMBX01-VM).
On Sunday Morning, the Event ID Critical 1564 occurred again thus causing only the quorum only to failover
to the DR mailbox server (DREXMBX01-VM) but the Active mailbox role is still held by the Production Exchange server (PRODEXMBX01-VM).
So now the situation is like the following:
Mailbox Server (CCR – Stretched Cluster) Nodes
PRODEXMBX01-VM (Active Mailbox) – 10.1.1.53
DREXMBX01-VM (Passive mailbox, Quorum) – 192.168.1.88
Hub Transport and Client Access Server Nodes
PRODEXHTCAS02-VM – 10.1.1.54
PRODEXHTCAS03-VM (FSW holder) – 10.1.1.55
DREXHTCAS02-VM – 192.168.1.89
So what causing the mailbox servers unable to contact the File Share Witness?
/* Server Support Specialist */

Did you check the blog above?
The account used in the clustered machine should have access to
\\PRODEXHTCAS03-VM\FSM_DIR_ExMbxCluster01. Please check the permissions. Try giving full permission to admins as well (just to try)
MAS
I've followed this (http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb124922(v=exchg.80).aspx) instruction and there is no mentioning other than the Cluster Service Account.
/* Server Support Specialist */

Configuring quorum file share witness access denied

in failover cluster administrator, when I try to configure the quorum for file share witness, it keeps coming up and say access denied.
any idea? I created the share as a domain admin and I am running the failover cluster admin as a domain admin

Hi JonDoe321,
From the error information It must the file share folder don’t meet the permission requirement, For the folder that the file share uses, make sure that the administrator has
Full Control share and NTFS permissions, grant the CNO on the file share with full control right, you can refer the following KB to realize the detail requirement.
Failover Cluster Step-by-Step Guide: Configuring the Quorum in a Failover Cluster
http://technet.microsoft.com/zh-cn/library/cc770620(v=ws.10).aspx#BKMK_requirements
More related third party article:
How to configure a Node and File Share Majority quorum
http://www.howtonetworking.com/server/cluster12.htm
I’m glad to be of help to you!
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AlwaysOn Cluster reboot due to file share witness unavailability

Hi Team,
Anyone came across this scenario in AlwaysOn Availability Group (two node), file share witness times out and RHS terminate and cause the cluster node to reboot. File share witness is for continuous
failover and if the resource is unavailable my expectation was that it should go offline and should not impact Server or Sql Server. But its rebooting the cluster node to rectify the issue.
Configuration
Windows Server 2012 R2 (VMs) - two node, file share witness (nfs)
Sql Server 2012 SP2
Errors
A component on the server did not respond in a timely fashion. This caused the cluster resource 'File Share Witness' (resource type 'File Share Witness', DLL 'clusres2.dll') to
exceed its time-out threshold. As part of cluster health detection, recovery actions will be taken. The cluster will try to automatically recover by terminating and restarting the Resource Hosting Subsystem (RHS) process that is running this resource. Verify
that the underlying infrastructure (such as storage, networking, or services) that are associated with the resource are functioning correctly.
The cluster Resource Hosting Subsystem (RHS) process was terminated and will be restarted. This is typically associated with cluster health detection and recovery of a resource.
Refer to the System event log to determine which resource and resource DLL is causing the issue.
Thanks,
-SreejitG

Thanks Elden, We were using DFS name for the file share! We gave the actual file share name and looks good now.
Few interesting facts, the failure happens exactly between window 12:30 PM to 1:30 AM and it never recorded any error specific to DFS! Not sure if there was any daily maintenance or task happens during the window pertaining to DFS.
+ DFS is not supported or recommended by Microsoft
Do not use a file share that is part of a Distributed File System (DFS) Namespace.
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc770620%28v=ws.10%29.aspx?f=255&MSPPError=-2147217396
Thanks,
-SreejitG

The "Cluster Group" does not contain a File Share Witness or a Witness disk.

Hi,
I've been given a 4 node Server 2008 R2 cluster to work on. I have a couple of file servers under services and applications (file1 and file2). If I look under storage I see my quorum disk listed in Disk witness under quorum and then I see the file1
and file2 disk resources. Should I be concerned with this warning?

Hi,
Do you mean that you are expecting that you saw the File Share Witness under "Disk Witness in Quorum"?
I just created a cluster and set FSW like this:
However it will not displayed under Disks. It should be caused by design.
My test machines are Windows Server 2012 R2.
If you have any feedback on our support, please send to [email protected]

NIC configuration for File Share Witness server

Best practices for a DAG is segment the MAPI or production network and the replication network. On the mailbox servers that are members of a DAG, we have two NICs that are configured differently.
What about the server with the File Share Witness (in my case, we are using a file server, there is not an extra Hub Transport server available).
Should this server be configured for two networks as well?
I'm thinking that the heartbeat traffic would be on the replication network? Or not?
I've read numerous documentation on the subject (Technet, MSExchange, ExchangeServerPro, SimpleTalk, etc..) and have never noticed a section about configuring dual NICs on the FSW server. Which leads me to think... that it is actually the "regular"
NIC that is used.
Can anyone confirm that?
Thanks in advance!
Please mark as helpful if you find my contribution useful or as an answer if it does answer your question. That will encourage me - and others - to take time out to help you.

Right, FSW server doesn't need multiple NICs... FSW server is to just give a vote when you have even number of DAG members to make majority. Exchange is going to just lock a small file on the FSW server on the Witness directory, that is all...

Can I Load Balace a file share witness?

Hi,
I got AlwaysOn Availability Group working with a file share witness.
The file share reside on a server in my network, hence it's a single point of failure.
Can I put a load balancer endpoint for the file share path when configuring the quorum? (After the configuration I will manually copy the files from file share A to file share B, so they will be the same).
My concern is that I don't know if the quorum configuration changes(making the file shares not the same) without me initiating that change(failover or some other event).
Thank You!
(Originally I posted that question in "SQL Server High Availability and Disaster Recovery", but I was asked to move it to here.)

David,
on one hand you say that it is not a single point of failure, but on the other hand you say "or if you have other nodes fail in addition to the FSW". That means that if the FSW is offline I can't have automatic failover, a thing which puts my application
in danger since I relay on automatic failover.
For me not having automatic failover is very bad.
My network is in Azure, the FSW is on one of my web servers(web servers and the database cluster are on different cloud services), since I'm using availability sets I know that at least one web server will be up at any given time. It is possible
that Microsoft will do maintenance or there will be a failure on the infrastructure and the FSW plus one of my sql nodes will be down, I won't have automatic failover in that case.
If you got a solution for me I will be happy to implement it.
Thank You.

File Share Witness Resouces Errors in a SQL 2012 Alwayson Availability Group Environment

Hi I am getting the following error in WFC Manager and in my system event log:
Event ID1564:
File share witness resource 'File Share Witness' failed to arbitrate for the file share '\\SQL2012ClusterWitnessPath'. Please ensure that file share '\\SQL2012ClusterWitnessPath' exists and is accessible by the cluster.
Event ID 1069:
Cluster resource 'File Share Witness' of type 'File Share Witness' in clustered role 'Cluster Group' failed.
Based on the failure policies for the resource and role, the cluster service may try to bring the resource online on this node or move the group to another node of the cluster and then restart it. Check the resource and group state using Failover Cluster
Manager or the Get-ClusterResource Windows PowerShell cmdlet.
Event ID 1205:
The Cluster service failed to bring clustered service or application 'Cluster Group' completely online or offline. One or more resources may be in a failed state. This may impact the availability of the clustered service or application.
These errors showed up every hour on the hour and then suddenly stopped. I tried looking at the cluster.log file but there wasn't anything recorded there. The file share witness shows to be online and my AG did not fail over to another node.
The cluster has read and write permissions to the share. I did not find any error messages about the witness share on the remote server.
I am wondering what caused these series of events to occur?
Thanks.

Hi Kevin Ni,
Thanks for your reply. I have ran the validation test and I have 2 warnings. My environment has 2 nodes and 2 AG's with each node a failover for each AG. So that each node hosts and primary and a secondary of an AG. Both nodes are
on the same subnet. Here are the errors.
- Validate Multiple Subnet Properties
The RegisterAllProvidersIP property causes the network name to register all dependent IP addresses whether they are online or offline. Some DNS servers and clients in multi-subnet (multi-site) environments can identify the IP address that is in their subnet
and attempt connections only to that address. In such environments, it is usually best to set RegistrerAllProvidersIP to 1. This reduces DNS replication delays.
The RegisterAllProvidersIP property for network name 'Name: Listener1' is set to 1. For the current cluster configuration this value should be set to 0.
The RegisterAllProvidersIP property causes the network name to register all dependent IP addresses whether they are online or offline. Some DNS servers and clients in multi-subnet (multi-site) environments can identify the IP address that is in their subnet
and attempt connections only to that address. In such environments, it is usually best to set RegistrerAllProvidersIP to 1. This reduces DNS replication delays.
The RegisterAllProvidersIP property for network name 'Name: Listener2' is set to 1. For the current cluster configuration this value should be set to 0.
- Validate Network Communication
Node ONE.domain.com is reachable from Node TWO.domain.com by multiple communication paths, but each path includes network interface TWO.domain.com - TWO_NIC_Team. This network interface may be a single point of failure for communication within the
cluster. Please verify that this network interface
is highly available or consider adding additional networks or network interfaces to the cluster.
Node TWO.domain.com is reachable from Node ONE.domain.com by multiple communication paths, but each path includes network interface TWO.domain.com - TWO_NIC_Team. This network interface may be a single point of failure for communication within the
cluster. Please verify that this network interface
is highly available or consider adding additional networks or network interfaces to the cluster.
I have node TWO setup with NIC Teaming. Node ONE is also setup with NIC teaming but it also has a second IP address but the second IP address cannot communicate with node TWO.

Exchange 2010 SP3 DAG Flip Flop File Share Witness Issue

Hi All,
We are facing one strange issue with Exchange 2010 SP3.
Our environment is as below
a single DAG spanned accross 2 AD sites with 6 MBX server.
Each site have 3 MBx server.
File Share Witness is on Hub server in primary site.
Note: The DAG IP is from Primary DC VLAN and which cant be streched accross DC due to network restrictions/limitations.
It was working fine till date.
But, yesterday onwards we are facing issue.
All DB dismounted and DAG name disappear from EMC and while doing refresh its giving error as below
Exception type: Microsoft.Exchange.Data.DataValidationException
Exception message: Could not convert property WitnessServer to type UncFileSharePath. Error while converting string 'vesthub700.mydomain.com\DAG1.mydomain.com' to result type Microsoft.Exchange.Data.UncFileSharePath: "vesthub700.mydomain.com\DAG1.mydomain.com"
is not an acceptable path. You must use an absolute, local, long file path, that doesn't contain '~', or a UNC path. Parameter name: path
We are not able to execute any cmdlets related to databaseavailabilitygroup from EMS and its giving same error.
Failover Cluster DAG resource is Flip/Flip continuously.
Its only become stable after reboot of the hub server holding FSW and the 1st mailbox server.(Cluster Owner)
We are even not able to move cluster group to different server.
Performed ExBPA no such issues found which related to DAG.
Performed clsuter validation.
Only generic cluster events in Mailbox servers.
Observation:
Its only become stabe if we remove the msExchFileShareWitness Value for DAG1 using ADSIEdit.
And the problem recurs if we set it back again.
Any help or suggestion is appreciated.
Thanks,
soumen
Soumen Ghosh

Hi Belinda,
Thanks! I have checked the Mailbox Server Application Log and found few 2155 Event Id generated at the time of the issue occured.
Process Microsoft.Exchange.ServiceHost.exe () (PID=9312). Configuration object CN=DAG1,CN=Database Availability Groups,CN=Exchange Administrative Group (FYDIBOHF23SPDLT),CN=Administrative Groups,CN=xxxxxx,CN=Microsoft Exchange,CN=Services,CN=Configuration,DC=mydomain,DC=com
read from DCTDK35.mydomain.com failed validation. DataValidationException will be thrown. Set event logging level for Validation category to Expert to get additional events about each failure.
One update is that the DAG is stable now after we set an alternate FSW last night.
Regarding the 2nd IP assignment for DAG for the 2nd subnet, we have gone through technet and other sites which refering to add the same from EMC or EMS.
Is it sufficinet to simply adding the 2nd IP to DAG from EMC or EMS? Or do we need to take any other special consideration.
Also, adding another IP it will create one more IP address resource to Failover Cluster, but I belive at a time both the IP wont be online. Do we need to keep it offline manually or its automatically taken care by Exchange.
Please suggest.
Also, regarding executing the CollectOverMetrics.ps1 we are following
http://www.msexchange.org/articles-tutorials/exchange-server-2010/monitoring-operations/monitor-dag-database-failover.html
but failed to execute. Can you suggest the correct parameter.
Thanks,
Soumen
Soumen Ghosh

Using an instance in a failover cluster as a witness server

Firstly I absolutely hate the idea of doing this with a passion . . . and then some, in my mind a witness server should have as few if not zero dependencies on any other SQL Server HA technology as possible, it should be a stand alone SQL Server instance.
However, technically would you be able to use an instance which is already in a failover cluster as a witness for a mirrored pair of databases ?.

Yes you can use cluster instance as witness.
https://msdn.microsoft.com/en-IN/library/ms191309.aspx

Migrating single file server to failover cluster file server

Hi,
Currently we have one file server which is our Domain controller also. File Server data stored in SAN storage lun. Users home folders also resides at file server.Now we want to create 2 node failover cluster file server.
Questions:
1)Can we assign same storage lun to failover cluster?
2)Do we need to assign all permissions and storage quota again?
What is the best option to achieve this goal.

Hi,
if you attach the same LUN to the failover cluster the NTFS permission (security tab) are retained because they are stored in the LUN itself
Share permission are lost because they are stored in the registry of the file server. If you have few share with a simple share permission structure, simply recreate them in the cluster. If you have a lot of shares and complex permission tree, you have to
export registry hives related to lanmanserver\shares

What is the location for the swatches file in the illustrator product part of Adobe Creative Suite 3 Design Premium for windows (date and lenght)? File that manges its funcionallity. Thanks

As per adobe agent chat representative, the following question is posted on the fórum to obtain an answe from adobe.
What is the location for the swatches file in the illustrator product part of Adobe Creative Suite 3 Design Premium for windows (date and lenght)? File that manges its funcionallity.
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<moved from downloading,installing,setting up - kglad>

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Event Trace Session missing for Failover Cluster

I have a failover cluster setup and is managed via a Windows Domain controller for the failover cluster network. I am troubleshooting a potential issue with the failover cluster and the recommendation is to go into event viewer, app & service
logs, Microsoft, windows and look for failover cluster diagnostics and operations logs and these do not exist.
It appears they are created by having an event trace session associated with windows failover clustering but apparently it was't created when the cluster was created for some reason. I am wondering how to create the proper event trace session
in order to get these additional failover cluster logs created?

Hello,
the following forum mat be the better one for your needs:
https://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/windowsserver/en-US/home?forum=winserverClustering
Best regards
Meinolf Weber
MVP, MCP, MCTS
Microsoft MVP - Directory Services
My Blog: http://blogs.msmvps.com/MWeber
Disclaimer: This posting is provided AS IS with no warranties or guarantees and confers no rights.
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Configuring Failover Cluster Server Share as a Distribution Point

Hello and thanks for this helpful forum!
I am trying to configure a server share as a Distribution Point and am running into problems. I am running SCCM R2 on Server 2008. I am trying to use a clustered share coming from 2008 R2 Failover Cluster.
I have been trying to get this working for the better part of 2 days now, and I have successfully created a Distribution Point to another 2008 Server (non-R2) by simply using the site system (not the server share).
When I try to use the server share option, I keep receiving an error with Message ID 4701 stating that the SMS Site System Status Summarizer cannot access storage object
\\servername\sharename$ on site system
\\servername\sharename$
The operating system reported error 2147942467: The network name cannot be found.
The server share is defined as a site system as
\\servername\sharename$
I am trying to create a "Packages" directory under it, so I'm using the option "Share the distribution folder" under the Data Access tab of the Package.
In addition, I have given local admin rights to the site server on both nodes of the cluster. I have given the site server modify rights to the share and NTFS permissions. I have given Authenticated Users Read access to the share and NTFS.
As I mentioned, I can take another server and define a Site System as a DP and everything will work properly. I am still missing something though regarding using a Server Share.
Thanks so much in advance for your assistance.

Hi,
No DP on NLBs:
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb735883.aspx
Yes, but that is NOT a failover file cluster. Is there a workaround? It seems silly to have to stand up an additional server for this. It also seems odd that the forthcoming version of SCCM would not have some support for failover clustering which was a HUGE
improvement over the previous clustering solutions from MS.Jeffrey S. Patton Assistant Director of IT School of Engineering Computing Services University of Kansas 1520 West 15th Street Lawrence, KS. 66045-7621

Failover cluster File Server role best practices

We recently implemented a Hyper-V Server Core 2012 R2 cluster with the sole purpose to run our server environment. I started with our file servers and decided to create multiple file servers and put them in a cluster for high
availability. So now I have a cluster of VMs, which I have now learned is called a guest cluster, and I added the File Server role to this cluster. It then struck me that I could have just as easily created the File Server role under my Hyper-V
Server cluster and removed this extra virtual layer.
I'm reaching out to this community to see if there are any best practices on using the File Server role. Are there any benefits to having a guest cluster provide file shares? Or am I making things overly complicated for no reason?
Just to be clear, I'm just trying to make a simple Windows file server with folder shares that have security enabled on them for users to access internally. I'm using Hyper-V Core server 2012 R2 on my physical servers and right now I have Windows
Server Standard 2012 R2 on the VMs in the guest cluster.
Thanks for any information you can provide.

Hi,
Generally with Hyper-V VMs available, we will install all roles into virtual machines as that will be easy for management purpose.
In your situation the host system is a server core, so it seems that manage file shares with a GUI is much better.
I cannot find an article specifically regarding "best practices of setting up failover cluster". Here are 2 articles regarding build guest cluster (you have already done) and steps to create a file server cluster.
Hyper-V Guest Clustering Step-by-Step Guide
http://blogs.technet.com/b/mghazai/archive/2009/12/12/hyper-v-guest-clustering-step-by-step-guide.aspx
Failover Cluster Step-by-Step Guide: Configuring a Two-Node File Server Failover Cluster
https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc731844(v=ws.10).aspx
Please remember to mark the replies as answers if they help and un-mark them if they provide no help. If you have feedback for TechNet Support, contact [email protected]

Quorum location for Failover cluster file share witness

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