using vMotion on a running D3 VM

vMotion is used to migrate a VM? I don't understand it that well, but my gut tells me that D3 should be shut down while the VM is "in motion". If you have a D3 test system somewhere, log on a user, run a test program that loops and does something, like update the SQLDEMO,CUSTOMERS, file, then use vMotion to move it, see if it survives.

On a properly setup machine in a virtual environment VMotion is totally safe and will keep all connections and systems running on transfer to a new host.    We have never had any issues with VMotion on running machines.

We use VMWare as well and although I wasn't 'told' that it should not be done, I inherited the idea that for what D3 keeps in RAM - is the issue in a vMotion process.  We definitely use vMotion if we shutdown D3 and move it to another host, but we have vMotion turned off for automatic failure moves.

I am also interested in what a real-time test would show.

--Tom

Hey, Craig, do you ever move the D3 server while it's running?

to answer Brian's question, Yes.  We have moved d3 in running state in order to balance the hosts or if a host needs upgrades we move.   On the other note, I do not trust VMware to care for all the DRS and HR.  We have it set in partially automation in that it will suggest but not actually move machines.   With DRS you could lose memory if you lost the host.  If the host failed then DRS would pick up and restart the system on another host.  While this is a form VMotion it would lose the memory since the machine is on a down host.  In all my testing you will lose maybe one packet while the network reroutes the traffic.  As far as memory, the magic moves everything in some magic way to the new host.  I have moved both d3 and sql servers without any issues.