How to handle a DR situation in eMAM

How to handle a DR situation in eMAM

This article describes how to activate the eMAM Disaster Recovery (DR) environment when the primary site becomes unavailable. The process varies depending on whether a SQL Always-On Availability Group (AG) replica exists in the DR network and how the SQL AG is configured.

A DR SQL update script is always required. This script is environment-specific, must be provided by the eMAM Implementation Team, and must be collected before support handoff. It is not a generic script.

DR Scenario 1: SQL AG Replica Available in the DR Site

When a SQL Availability Group secondary replica is hosted in the DR network, failover to the DR site can occur in two ways, depending on AG configuration.

Automatic Failover

If the AG is configured with synchronous commit mode and the DR replica is defined as an automatic failover partner, SQL Server can promote the DR replica automatically when the primary node goes down (provided quorum is maintained).
In this case, no administrator action is required to initiate failover.

Manual Failover

If the AG is configured in asynchronous commit mode, or if the DR replica is not designated as an automatic failover partner, SQL Server will not fail over automatically.

Once the primary site is confirmed down, administrators must manually promote the DR replica to primary using SQL Server Management Studio or equivalent management tools.

Please follow the steps below to achieve this.

1. Log on to the Web/DB server at the DR site. Open SQL Server Management Studio using Windows Authentication (Administrator) or  SQL Server Authentication.
2. Navigate to Always On High Availability and expand all the way to “eMAMDB”.



3. We will need to make “eMAMDB” on this node as Primary. For that, right-click on “eMAMDB” and click on failover.



4.  It will open a wizard. Click on Next.




5.  Click next on the pages and click on the Finish button on the summary page.


6.  Make sure the wizard ended up without any errors.

7. Now, open the DR script folder received from eMAM Implementation Team, here, “DR Plan”.


8. Open the script file for primary down (here, “Execute when the primary is down.sql”) using SQL Server Management Studio.



9. Log in to SQL Server Management Studio using Windows Authentication (Administrator) or using SQL Server authentication.



10. Make sure you are logging into the DR SQL instance.

11. Once you have successfully logged in to SQL Server Management Studio, execute the script in the eMAM Database (emamdb). Make sure it is not in the Master Database.



eMAM will now update all the required information to the eMAM database for the servers from the DR site to start functioning.

12. Once this script is successfully executed, go to the Application server on the DR site and start eMAM Services.

Your eMAM instance from the DR site is now fully functional.


Note: This is applicable if the secondary node of the SQL AG is in the DR location.

DR Scenario 2: No SQL AG Replica in the DR Site

If the DR site does not contain a SQL AG secondary replica, failover cannot occur through SQL Always-On. Instead, the DR environment is activated using a database backup-and-restore workflow.

Recommended Backup Strategy at Primary Site
A reliable backup policy is critical in non-AG DR environments. The following backup intervals are recommended based on business criticality:
•    Hourly backups for high-criticality environments.
•    Daily backups for standard workloads.
Backups must be copied or replicated to the DR site automatically.

DR Activation Using Backup and Restore
When a DR event occurs:
•    Restore the latest available eMAM database backup to the DR SQL Server.
•    Execute the environment-specific DR SQL script against the restored eMAM database.
Follow the steps below to achieve this.

1. Open the DR script folder received from eMAM Implementation Team, here, “DR Plan”.


2. Open the script file for primary down (here, “Execute when the primary is down.sql”) using SQL Server Management Studio.



3. Log in to SQL Server Management Studio using Windows Authentication (Administrator) or using SQL Server authentication.



4. Make sure you are logging into the DR SQL instance.

5. Once you have successfully logged in to SQL Server Management Studio, execute the script in the eMAM Database (emamdb). Make sure it is not in the Master Database.



eMAM will now update all the required information to the eMAM database for the servers from the DR site to start functioning.

6. Once this script is successfully executed, go to the Application server on the DR site and start eMAM Services.

Your eMAM instance from the DR site is now fully functional.

Note: This is applicable if the secondary node of the SQL AG is in the DR location.
________________________________________
Important Notes
•    The DR SQL script is deployment-specific and must be prepared by the Implementation Team before transitioning the project to support. It cannot be recreated or assumed to be generic.
•    If the DR site does not include storage-level synchronization or replication, required media assets must be mirrored manually or via customer-defined workflows to support playback and processing.
•    Organizations should perform periodic DR drills to confirm readiness, validate scripts, ensure backup integrity, and verify that both application and SQL failover workflows function as designed.

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