Managing a Liberty server cluster configuration

There are two possible strategies for managing a Liberty server cluster configuration - shared and nonshared.

About this task

Each Liberty instance comprising a Liberty server cluster has its own configuration documents, such as an server.xml file. Although each Liberty instance in a server cluster has unique information in its configuration, such as host name, other information is typically the same across the Liberty instances that comprise the server cluster - deployed applications for example. There are two strategies for managing the configuration for a Liberty server cluster.

• Shared configuration strategy

  In this approach, the configuration specification that is common across all cluster members is stored in a common location and included in each cluster member's server.xml file using the <include> element. See Using include elements in configuration files for more information. Changes made to the cluster are made to the shared include.

• Nonshared configuration strategy

  In this approach, each cluster member has its own complete server.xml file. When you use this strategy, take care when making updates to the cluster members to ensure that each cluster member is updated so that the server cluster remains consistent.