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Question

Which Forms Server Does What?

Forms
Updated November 13, 2020
asked on January 29, 2020

We have a primary Forms server setup and a Forms server in a DMZ, both using the same Forms database. The Forms server in the DMZ is currently running its own routing service. We noticed that email service tasks fail because the DMZ server is unable to communicate with the email server that is setup even though the primary Forms server can communicate with it.

That lead to the following questions:

  1. When this setup exists and the DMZ server is using its own routing service, which server performs which functions? Does the DMZ server perform the email tasks, save to repository tasks, etc.?
  2. What about when the DMZ server is setup to use the internal Forms routing service?
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Answer

SELECTED ANSWER
replied on January 29, 2020

Hey Blake,

I strongly recommend pointing both at the internal Forms server's Routing Service. Running multiple Routing Services with the same database is not, to my knowledge, a supported configuration. While it mostly works most of the time, you can end up with some fun collisions where both Routing Services think they're responsible for firing off the same event at the same time, among a myriad of other such cases the service isn't designed to handle.

Is there a particular problem you're trying to solve by running the DMZ instance with its own Routing Service?

To answer your two questions directly, the Routing Service processing the Email and Save to Repository actions communicates with the configured SMTP endpoint and LFS repo(s) respectively. The Routing Service doing these things should always be the one running on the internal server.

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Replies

replied on January 29, 2020

Hi Blake

 

   When we set up our DMZ server we turned off routing on the DMZ server and let the internal server handle that as per the instructions in the attached pdf.

 

Thanks,

Michael

Hosting Laserfiche Forms 10 In A Perimeter Network (DMZ).pdf (637.03 KB)
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View 6 previous replies
replied on January 29, 2020

Micahel, Thank you. I understand that is the recommended way of doing things, but I'm more looking for clarification of what Forms server performs what functions based on the situations in my post.

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replied on January 29, 2020

It's my understanding, and I could be wrong, but you'll need the internal Forms server to handle all of the routing if you want forms sent from the DMZ to be able to save in the repository, send emails, etc.. This was the only way that we were able to get it to work.

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replied on January 29, 2020

That is apparently not correct, because it has been working for quite some time the way I describe in the initial post.

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SELECTED ANSWER
replied on January 29, 2020

Hey Blake,

I strongly recommend pointing both at the internal Forms server's Routing Service. Running multiple Routing Services with the same database is not, to my knowledge, a supported configuration. While it mostly works most of the time, you can end up with some fun collisions where both Routing Services think they're responsible for firing off the same event at the same time, among a myriad of other such cases the service isn't designed to handle.

Is there a particular problem you're trying to solve by running the DMZ instance with its own Routing Service?

To answer your two questions directly, the Routing Service processing the Email and Save to Repository actions communicates with the configured SMTP endpoint and LFS repo(s) respectively. The Routing Service doing these things should always be the one running on the internal server.

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replied on January 30, 2020

Samuel,

The system was setup this way previously and we have inherited the setup. We are trying to troubleshoot an issue where SSL was selected in the FormsConfig for the connection with the repository and wanted to make sure how the communication works in that instance to narrow down a few  things. Thank you for clarifying for us.

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replied on November 13, 2020

Hi

My question in this regard.

If running 2 Forms Servers internally in a NLB Configuration how would this be properly supported if you can only run 1 Routing Engine?

If one Forms Server goes down, and it is the Server with the routing Engine, the Fail Over will not work properly without manually starting the Routing Engine on the 2nd Forms Server.

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replied on November 13, 2020

Correct, it is a load balanced, but not failover clustered configuration. If the instance with the Forms Routing Engine is down, some form submissions will still go through on the other instance and be written to disk in a Forms "RoutingError" folder there. Sometime after the Routing Engine comes back up, it will process them.

We're actively looking into ways to make the Forms Routing Service more horizontally scalable and resilient to failure, so I recommend waiting for architectural enhancements on our end there.

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replied on November 13, 2020

What we ended up doing for a client was install the Primary Forms outside the NLB and then installed Forms in the NLB. The end users only are given the address to the NLB cluster and never hit the Primary Forms server directly. It doesn't help with the situation if the Primary Server goes down, but still helps separate things.

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replied on November 13, 2020

Thanks again.

 

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