RM Fail Safe Redundancy Guide

Release 4

9/28/2015

Copyright 1998-2016 Action Systems, Incorporated

All Rights Reserved

RESTAURANT MANAGER is a registered trademark of Action Systems, Inc.

1734 Elton Road, # 219, Silver Spring, MD 20903

Email: support@actionsystems.com

Website: www.rmpos.com

This document contains recommended naming conventions for Windows user accounts and shared-folder names. For support purposes it is recommended these conventions be used, though if necessary you may substitute these names to suit an existing deployment routine already established in your specific operation.

Overview

What Happens During Normal Operation and Failover:

1. When each POS station boots, RmNetMon will automatically begin to look for the server. After the server is located, RmNetMon will attach, login, and launch RMStart. RMStart will in turn launch RMPOS, RMSpool, and any other programs you may have defined for RMStart.
2. After RMPOS is launched, RmNetMon will minimize and continue to check the server availability at regular intervals.
3. While RMPOS is operating, the data mirroring will keep the RMPOS files synchronized in real time so that if the primary server becomes unavailable, all of the POS data will be accessible by the alternate server, current as of the last activity or transaction prior to the server becoming unavailable.
4. In the event the server becomes unavailable. RmNetMon will terminate all POS applications and will display an option to show the ‘troubleshooting screen’. To access the ‘troubleshooting screen’ simply touch the middle of the RmNetMon display window where indicated by “Touch here to show troubleshooting”.
5. While RmNetMon is running, it will continue to attempt to locate the server. If the server was only rebooted or disconnected briefly, and there is no malfunction, RmNetMon will automatically reconnect again when the server is available and all stations will reload RmStart automatically launching all necessary applications and RMPOS.
6. If the server is unavailable due to a serious problem that cannot be quickly remedied, the user may engage the ‘Alternate Server’ my using the Make Server function located on the ‘troubleshooting’ screen on the machine that has been designated as the ‘Alternate Server’ earlier in the setup process.
7. When the Make Server option is selected, the user will enter the password: Default = ‘password’, and the system will engage the Alternate Server settings and will take over as the server on the network.
8. The Make Server process should take less than 1 minute.
9. Each station will then see the Alternate Server and they will connect exactly the same as if the primary server was online and normal operations may proceed.

After the Primary Server or other malfunction has been remedied:

1. DO NOT Reconnect the Primary Server to the network until instructed. Power it on, but do not connect to the network.
2. Disable Mirroring on the Primary Server: Right Click the Syncovery icon in the systray and select the option to ‘Stop Profile and Scheduler Immediately’
3. Unload RMPOS on all POS stations, and power off each station except the Alternate Server
4. On the Alternate Server, maximize RmNetMon, touch the middle of the screen, and select UnMake Server.
5. RmNetMon will display the steps to be performed by the UnMake Server Wizard.
6. Simply touch ‘Next’ or ‘Continue’ when prompted. The wizard will perform most functions and you will be instructed when to reconnect the Primary Server to the network.
7. After the UnMake Server Wizard is complete, re-enable mirroring, reboot the server, and reboot each POS station.

Note: Step by step instructions for navigating the UnMake Wizard are covered in the section Testing RM FailSafe

Requirements

The following a the requirements need to use fingerprint readers on systems with a 64 bit machine on the network.

• Restaurant Manager Build- the version used should be the same on the rmserver and alternate server computer.
• Syncovery Mirroring Software:http://www.superflexible.com/download.htm. Make sure you download the latest build and correct build for operating system (i.e. 64 bit vs 32 bit)

NOTE: You may install the software in 30 Day trail mode with no key required. To purchase a license for Syncovery please see Appendix B for special RM pricing.

• RmMirror.ini file: RMMirror.zip. This will be used to configure Syncovery Mirror software. Unzip and save the ini file to Windows Documents folder.

• RmNetMon- This program comes included with the RM installation package. This can be found in the rmwin directory under the redundancy sub-folder.
• IP Printers for remote prep printers
• Static IP Network Scheme

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