Steps to add second Citrix Storefront server to server group for HA


This article explains the steps to add second Citrix Storefront server for the high availability and load balancing (Called Storefront Server Group). Steps are straightforward. In this example, I am working on two storefront servers called Citrix1 and Citrix2. These two servers are already installed with Storefront 2.1 component.

-          Login to the Citrix1 ( Storefront #1 server) and open Citrix Storefront MMC from Start – Programs
-          After opening, navigate to the Server Group and Click on “Add Server”, then it will generate an Authorization code
Citrix Storefront authorisation code

-          Then login to Citrix2 ( Storefront #2 server) and open the Citrix Storefront MMC from Start – Programs
-          After opening, navigate to the Server Group and select “ Join existing Server Group” and enter the first Storefront Server name ( Citrix1) and Authorization code generated on above steps then click on join

     
-          As soon as you click on join, it starts adding to the first Storefront server. When finished, you get message with confirmation
Citrix Storefront Join group

Citrix Storefront Join group

-          To verify the Storefront servers status, on Citrix1 server- Storefront console, you can see both Storefront server details as per below screenshot
My recommendation is to do any changes to the Storefront configuration, always perform changes on one server i.e. Citrix1 and propagate changes to the secondary server by clicking on “Propagate Changes” tab
Citrix Storefront replication status

These steps are captured on Storefront 2.1 and help to achieve Citrix Storefront HA.  To load balance traffic between two storefront servers, there are multiple solutions available like Netscaler, KEMP load balancers, F5 etc..

Refer to this article of you want to load balance Storefront servers using DNS round robin. It's free and easy solution for lab, development and test environments or if your cant afford to buy a paid solution for load balancing.
You can download Storefront software from here.
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5 comments:

  1. Good article short but straight to the point

    Regards,

    Curran Mohan Padake

    ReplyDelete
  2. yes, its correct way for adding store front server...........

    ReplyDelete
  3. its work for me, thanks

    Rgds
    Praveen

    ReplyDelete
  4. Thank you for the article. I have a question regarding adding server2 to a server group after it has been removed from a server group. I had server1 and server2 in a server group. I removed the store from server1 and server2 and recreated the store on server1. Now, on server2 I do not have the Join Existing Server Group option. I only have options to View or Change Stores, and Create Another Store. How do I join server2 to server1?

    ReplyDelete