How to recover a Directory System Agent (DSA) after an extended outage - Symantec Directory

Products

• CA Directory
• CA Identity Manager
• CA Identity Governance
• CA Identity Portal
• CA Identity Suite
• SITEMINDER

Issue/Introduction

A DSA may fail to start following an extended outage, preventing successful replication. This article outlines the steps to perform a manual recovery of a DSA that has fallen out of sync due to multi-write queue exhaustion or prolonged downtime.

Environment

Symantec Directory 14.1

Cause

This issue occurs when a DSA configured with Multi-Write DISP (Dispatch) is offline for an extended period (typically >7 days), or when the multi-write queue has been purged. The Directory logs will indicate this with the message: "DSA is attempting to start after a long outage, perform a recovery procedure before starting."

Resolution

1. Check Sync Status: On all DSA hosts (Source and Target), run the following command to check the dispatch status: dxdisp <DSAName>
2. Perform Backup: On a healthy DSA host, back up the data to ensure integrity: dxserver onlinebackup <DSA_Name> Monitor the _warn_<date>.log file for the message: WARN : Dump completed, X fragments.
3. Stop Failed DSA: Ensure the DSA that failed to start is stopped: dxserver stop <Failed_DSA_Name>
4. Remove Old Files: On the host where the DSA failed, delete, move, or rename the existing data files (.db, .tx, .dp, .dx) located in the data/ directory (e.g., /CA/Directory/dxserver/data/).
5. Copy Data: Copy the .zdb file from the healthy DSA host to the data directory of the failed DSA host. Note: Do not copy .TX, .DP, or .DX files. Copy the .zdb file only.
6. Rename File: Rename the copied .zdb file to match the name of the failed DSA, giving it a .db extension. Example: HealthyDSA.zdb → FailedDSA.db
7. Start DSA: Start the DSA: dxserver start <Failed_DSA_Name>
8. Verify Synchronization: Once started, verify the DSA has reconnected and begun Multi-Write (MW) replication by monitoring the logs.

Additional Information

For further information about backup and replication, see documentation Symantec Directory: Backing Up Data and Symantec Directory : Data Replication and Recovery Best Practice

To run the command on Windows: Execute as Administrator, on Linux: Execute commands as "dsa" user.

In case of vApp (Identity Suite Virtual Appliance) open ssh session as "config" user and change to "dsa" user using

su - dsa

 

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