vCenter Server Heartbeat 6.4 Split-Brain Avoidance

   El problema que puede ocurrir al tener dos sites con vCenter protegido con Heartbeat, es que se llegue a perder la conectividad entre ambos y se produzca una bicefalia o split-brain, en la que ambos vCenter se creen que tienen el control de la infraestructura. 

Para evitarlo, VMware nos deja una serie de pasos en la configuración respecto a la prevencion del failover:

 "To enable Split-brain Avoidance, open the Server: Monitoring page in the vCenter Server Heartbeat Console, click Configure Failover, and select Prevent failover if channel heartbeat is lost but Active server is still visible to other servers (recommended)."

Tambien debemos configurar una serie de ip´s de gestion para que entre ambos sites se hagan ping las ethernet para comprobar el estado entre el site pasivo y el activo:

1 Open the network properties for the Principal (Public) network connection.


2 Double-click TCP/IP to display the properties.


3 Click Advanced.


4 Enter an additional (currently unused) IP address in the table.

5 Reposition the IP addresses in the list so that the additional (Management) IP address appears first, and the Principal (Public) network address (by which clients connect to the server) appears second.

6 Click OK on all three dialogs to accept the configuration changes to the network connection.


7 After completing all of the steps click Next or Finish.

El servidor activo debera responder antes del valor de tiempo fijado en el "Failover timeout" para prevenir que el failover ocurra, que esta fijado en 60 segundos por defecto.

1 Click Configure Failover to open the Server Monitoring: Failover Configuration dialog.


2 Type a new numeric value (seconds) in the Failover timeout text box or use the arrow buttons to set a new value.


3 Mark or clear the check boxes to select the actions to take if the specified Failover timeout is exceeded. Click OK to finish.