A few weeks ago I started experimenting with MySQL InnoDB cluster. As part of the testing, I tried to kill a node to see what happens to the cluster.

The good news is that the cluster is resilient. When the primary node goes missing, the cluster replaces it immediately, and operations continue. This is one of the features of an High Availability system, but this feature alone does not define the usefulness or the robustness of the system. In one of my previous jobs, I worked at testing a commercial HA system and I've learned a few things about what makes a reliable system.

Armed with this knowledge, I did some more experiments with InnoDB Cluster. The attempt from my previous article had no other expectation than seeing operations continue with ease (primary node …

January 27, 2015 By Severalnines

Unlike standard MySQL server and MySQL Cluster, the way to start a MySQL/MariaDB Galera Cluster is a bit different. Galera requires you to start a node in a cluster as a reference point, before the remaining nodes are able to join and form the cluster. This process is known as cluster bootstrap. Bootstrapping is an initial step to introduce a database node as primary component, before others see it as a reference point to sync up data.

How does it work?

When Galera starts with the bootstrap command on a node, that particular node will reach Primary state (check the value of wsrep_cluster_status). The remaining nodes will just require a normal start command and they will automatically look for existing Primary Component (PC) in the cluster and join to form a cluster. Data synchronization then happens through either incremental state transfer (IST) or …