I am working on setting up DR for Octopus. I am planning of using VMWare SRM for Octopus server and DB log shipping for Database. Please suggest if there is an alternative way of setting up DR for Octopus.
I have explored the HA configuration for Octopus but does not suit my needs since DR site has to be in different network than prod.
Also in documentation I came across that Log Shipping is not tested with Octopus. Would this be a concern.
Any suggestions would help.
Octopus Version 5.14
Database: MS SQL Server
Thanks for inquiring about physically separated DR approaches to using Octopus.
We haven’t really come across this scenario much to be honest with you, typically a full recovery model for the database suffices in most scenarios (for point in time recovery). More on that here.
For others reading this thread, as the documentation article you mention states, we expressly do not support SQL replication and haven’t tested log shipping or database mirroring features of SQL server.
I don’t have any reason to believe that transaction log shipping would be a problem at this stage but I do advise trialing & piloting the solution to ensure it works as intended before committing to it across the board. It may be worth reaching out to others on our community slack channel too, in case others have tried this.
Sensitive variable values are encrypted to the database with the master key, so one thing to keep in mind would be to ensure the fail over database is setup with the same master key as the original.
Otherwise, any sensitive variables would be rendered impossible to decrypt at the DR site. The transfer of the master key across a network boundary in a secure fashion is its own risk to be managed too.
I don’t have personal experience with VMWare SRM but I’m assuming that it would take care of synchronizing virtual machine images and their file systems? There are several folders that are important to Octopus (apart from the installation directory itself) - if you need to manage or move these folders prior to setting up your DR solution - this documentation could also be of use.
I sincerely hope this helps you determine your best course of action - please reach out with further questions and I’ll do my best to answer them.