Linux and High Availability Go Hand in Hand

SAP core infrastructure components such as servers including VMs, storage, database, operating system or networks undoubtedly have a high level of maturity and fulfill their intended tasks for SAP use on a daily basis. And yet it can happen that a kind of SOS alarm goes off at the company's IT department because business-critical applications such as S/4 either no longer support the business processes as they should or, in the worst-case scenario, no longer support them at all. This is caused by failures in the SAP infrastructure or components thereof.

High Availability is therefore an important topic for IT and SAP decision makers to ensure business continuity. SAP partners are usually the ones responsible for implementing HA solutions for customers.

What’s Linux got to do with HA?

Suse offers a High Availability Extension (HAE) including disaster recovery (DR) for Hana on Linux—meaning Hana on Suse Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications (SLES for SAP). Additionally, Suse offers DR functionalities for AnyDB customers as well.

More and more companies using Hana and SLES for SAP Applications also leverage Suse HAE. It’s a complete HA package based on open source and can be implemented free of charge as part of a SLES for SAP subscription. Consequently, customers do not need to invest in additional cluster resource management solutions.

Numerous SAP customers switching to Hana or Hana-based applications like S/4 replace existing HA solutions with Suse HAE. With Suse’s solution, they are able to optimize high availability and minimize potential downtimes significantly. HAE as part of SLES for SAP Applications is based on an open source solution called Pacemaker (successor to Heartbeat 2). Suse has been and continues to be closely involved with Pacemaker’s development.

Incidentally, HAE is integrated with SAP’s management system (SolMan), just like Suse Linux Enterprise Server for SAP Applications.

Hana System Replication

A central component of the Hana HA concept is Hana System Replication (SR). In general, SR is done manually. If SR is automated, customers experience several benefits, one of them a service level agreement improvement. For example, a German company was able to reduce system recovery time from 45 minutes to 5 minutes.

Hana Resource Agents, integrated in SLES for SAP Applications and jointly created by Suse and SAP, can help with that as well. They are optimally equipped to administer and manage Hana database instances and replications. First available in SLES 12 for SAP Applications, Hana Resource Agents efficiently support intelligent and simplified cluster configurations.

In conclusion, Suse’s High Availability Extension is a powerful, tried-and-tested HA solution. It helps improve business continuity and disaster recovery for SAP solutions.