CumuLogic DBaaS Platform, MongoDB Edition

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Features

Below are the features supported by the CumuLogic DBaaS Platform, MongoDB Edition:

• Provisioning – Single-click or single-API call to provision the desired database instance: size with configuration and performance parameters, single or multi-node replica set, backup settings, size of storage volumes and rules for auto update and patches.
• Monitoring and Self-Healing – Each MongoDB instance is fully monitored and provides visibility into performance of the database via real time charts on the User Dashboard. No additional monitoring tools are required to monitor the instances. In case of failure, the system will try to restore the replica set nodes or sharded cluster. Alert notifications are sent to the user’s email address regarding any performance degradation, failures and recovery process.
• Optional Integration with MongoDB Management Service (MMS) – Users can opt-in to our integration with MMS, easily deploying MMS agents into target clouds to add additional monitoring and backup capabilities to their environment.
• Backup and Restore – The CumuLogic DBaaS Platform, MongoDB Edition uses persistent storage for datastore and initiates full database snapshots once every 24 hours. CumuLogic also backups the opslog (transaction log file) file periodically and hence it is possible to do a point-in-time restore. In case of a single node database instance, the database backup will impact the performance of the database, therefore, it is recommended to customize the time of the day suitable for backup operations. In case of replica sets, a secondary node is used for backup purposes to minimize the performance impact on the primary node. The backup retention period can be changed from the one day default.
• Database Snapshots – Users can initiate database snapshots at any time on a running database instance – as well as restore a database snapshot, or launch a new database instance with an existing snapshot. User initiated snapshots are retained permanently until deleted by the user. It is also possible to recover/restore snapshots in other availability zones, enabling users to migrate a database from one availability zone to another.
• Scaling – It is possible to launch a single node of MongoDB and add additional nodes to convert the single node to a replica set as you scale your application. You can also remove nodes and scale down the replica set.
• Replication – MongoDB is a highly scalable databases and has built-in high availability and data redundancy. A MongoDB single instance can be used for small experimental projects or can be used as multi-node replica set for data durability. For smaller applications or development experimentation, it is sufficient to use a single database instance.
• Optimization – MongoDB instances are optimized for the underlying infrastructure (IaaS cloud, virtualized environment or bare metal), which means out-of-the-box performance of each instance will be optimized to deliver the highest possible IOPS and lowest latency based on the size of the database instance. MongoDB internal processes perform disk I/O and are configured for better performance. Most of these parameters can be changed to suit a particular workload by creating Parameter Groups. Parameter Groups are a set of configuration parameters that impact the performance of the database and must be tweaked for optimal operations.
• Security and Access Control – Database instances are secured and protected by applying Security Groups or iptable configuration on the VM nodes. To access the database instance, you must first allow ingress from your application server’s IP address on a defined port. To enable access, you can create an Access Group and apply that Access Group to the running instance of MongoDB. Access groups work like firewall settings to open ports for ingress IP address range.

Benefits

The CumuLogic DBaaS Platform, MongoDB Edition eliminates over 75% of the database management tasks for developers and administrators while providing the flexibility to control the scalability and performance of the database instances.

• Instant Provisioning– Easy to spin up new database instances whether for development, QA/Testing or production purposes. Database instances can be provisioned using CumuLogic Console or with an API call. The deployment and lifecycle control of the database instances can be easily automated by using command line tools.
• Low Cost of Operation – The database instances are fully managed and monitored, eliminating the need for manual installation, configuration, backups, patching, scaling and replication. The built-in monitoring of database metrics allows users to analyze performance and availability.
• On-Demand Scalability – The CumuLogic DBaaS Platform, MongoDB Edition can scale from a single instance for smaller applications all the way to production quality via replica sets and sharded cluster architectures.
• Reliable – Reliability is achieved by providing options to deploy multi-node replica sets. Multi-node database instances are replica sets or nodes of a sharded cluster and not only provide reliability, but also enhance the scalability of applications. Reliability of database instances can also be improved by using multiple replicas of the master database instance. In the event of a failure of the master database, replicas can be promoted as primary database servers.
• Secure – Database instances are secured using the firewall settings and security groups of IaaS clouds that allow users to control remote access to the database instances.
• Cost Effective – The CumuLogic DBaaS Platform, MongoDB Edition is scalable on-demand so you can start using the size of instances which can handle a minimal workload and only scale the database out when needed. This eliminates costly over provisioning of resources and management cost of database service.
• Supported on Multiple IaaS Clouds – CumuLogic’s platform abstracts the underlying APIs of the various IaaS clouds such as Apache CloudStack, Citrix CloudPlatform, OpenStack, VMware vCloud, XenServer, KVM, Eucalyptus and many others. This enables users to deploy CumuLogic’s DBaaS platform on any of the supported private and public clouds.

Detailed Description

The CumuLogic DBaaS Platform, MongoDB Edition provides a quick way for developers and system administrators to provision fully managed instances of MongoDB on any cloud or private infrastructure (i.e. VM pools and bare metal).

When provisioning the database engine, users can tweak the performance parameters to optimize the database service for their applications and workload types.

Once provisioned, MongoDB instances are fully monitored and managed by CumuLogic’s platform, including:

• Monitoring and reporting any instance failures
• Self-healing from some possible failures like process crash
• Periodically backing up the database to an alternate storage, most commonly object storage if available
• Configuring security and access controls by using firewall settings, security groups on IaaS clouds and using master user names and encrypted passwords

Users can override the default time intervals of the scheduled automated backups, define the backup data retention policies, change the maintenance time windows, configure security and access credentials and override any configuration policies of the running instances.

Working with the CumuLogic DBaaS Platform, Mongo Edition

The CumuLogic DBaaS Platform, MongoDB Edition can be used to launch MongoDB instances using the User Console or a simple set of API. Users can launch MongoDB instances, scale replica sets, take snapshots, create and apply parameter groups.

Requirements – To run CumuLogic’s platform inside your datacenter, you can download CumuLogic’s MongoDBaaS Installer. The controller software only requires a single VM (or you can install it on bare metal as well) with at least 16GB RAM and 50GB disk space. The CumuLogic platform integrates with Citrix CloudPlatform, Apache CloudStack, OpenStack, Eucalyptus, and VMware vCloud environments, as well as supporting numerous public cloud platforms. MongoDB performance depends on the environment type and block storage available.

Launching a Database Instance – Select the size of the instance, and launch your database. Optionally, you can configure the database parameters and customize the preferences for backup and update maintenance time windows. Once you have launched the database instance you can get credentials and access point so you can use them to configure the datasource for your application to connect to the database instance.

Creating and Applying a New Database Parameter Group – Database parameter groups allow users to optimize the performance of the database for specific workloads. You can easily create a new parameter group from a parameter family group of the engine, modify the selected parameters, and apply that parameter group to your database instance. You can apply a database parameter group to running instances with requiring a restart of the instance or start a new database instance with new parameter group.

Scaling out the Database Instance – For smaller applications or development experimentation, it is sufficient to use a single MongoDB instance. However, for production purposes, there are two possible architectures: replica sets and sharded cluster (with or without replica set), both supported by CumuLogic’s platform. Please refer to our “On-Prem MongoDB-as-a-Service” white paper for more details.

Taking a Snapshot – We recommend taking full database snapshots at regular intervals or at critical points where you are making major database or application code changes. In the event of a recovery, you may easily restore the database from a backup copy.

Monitoring and Optimizing – You can use monitoring metrics and charts to identify any potential issues with your database instance. As needed, you can edit the desired performance parameters by using database parameters and/or by using the in-memory caching service to scale out your database performance.

Use Cases

The database tier is a key architecture component for any application, and MongoDB is an excellent choice for many types of applications. With the CumuLogic DBaaS Platform, MongoDB Edition, developers, DevOps and Ops teams can quickly launch the desired type MongoDB environment, picking both the appropriate scale and availability attributes for their use case with a single API call or a single click on the UI. This eliminates the need for installing or provisioning, configuring and managing the databases completely.

Development / Testing Systems
For application development and testing organizations, the speed at which they can create, change and destroy backend services like MongoDB environments is a critical concern. Developers and testers are constantly re-creating environments, as their application undergoes each phase of the application development and deployment process. The CumuLogic DBaaS Platform makes it easy for them to get their work done, by enabling self service access to fully automated and fully managed MongoDB systems on nearly any target infrastructure. With CumuLogic’s DBaaS Platform, the enterprise gets the benefit of significantly reducing the time needed to deploy these development and testing systems.

Production Web and Mobile Applications
NoSQL databases like MongoDB are increasingly popular options for both web and mobile application developers. The CumuLogic DBaaS platform takes the guess-work out of database deployment, regardless of the person responsible for getting an application into production. Developers, DevOps and DBAs all benefit from the use of repeatable configurations, self service deployment and fully managed instances. Using the CumuLogic DBaaS Platform, MongoDB Edition ensures that your MongoDB environment can be deployed across nearly any infrastructure (public or private), giving your choice in where your data resides.

Big Data Analysis
In modern applications, the data tends to be unstructured and in high volume. Such data can be generated by social applications or machines such as log files from web servers or debug data from large number of applications. Such data is usually required to be analyzed for further action by the applications. For example, analyzing web server log files to identify the demographics of the site visitors. Because of the unstructured nature of the data and its volume, developers prefer to use NoSQL databases such as MongoDB. Unlike relational databases such as MySQL, MongoDB can store unstructured data in form of collections of JSON files. These files can then be analyzed by commonly available tools.

Disaster Recovery
The CumuLogic DBaaS Platform makes it easy and cost effective to architect a Disaster Recovery (DR) architecture and a plan for mission critical applications. Typically, enterprises are required to maintain one standby deployment environment to failover to in case of any downtime. With the CumuLogic DBaaS Platform, MongoDB Edition, it is possible to launch a full functioning database server on the cloud or on different clouds within minutes, and a replica of a database server on an alternate cloud or alternate availability zone on the same cloud. The replicas are fully synchronized and in case of downtime, applications can quickly use the replica database servers nodes. A DBaaS solution eliminates the need of highly expensive standby environments and lowers the overall cost of maintaing and implementing a DR plan.