This is more helpful hints than an actual question, but I thought I would impart this information for anyone attempting my setup.
We're ultimately trying to set up the
AppFabric beta1 using SQL Server 2008 in a cluster. So, we set up a development environment with Window 2008 Server R2 using Clustering. We also want to cluster SQL Server 2008. So, I go out to MSDN and get the necessary disks. Here's where the problems begin.
Setting up Clustering
First step is to get clustering set up. I needed iSCSI for failover disk targets to get clustering set up. You can't setup clustering otherwise. For this setup, I needed 3 different target physical disks:
- One as the cluster quorum disk
- One for MSDTC
- One for SQL Server 2008
MSDTC won't share a disk with any other process. SQL Server 2008 will also not share a disk. Why these apps can't share disks, I don't know. Who comes up with these arbitrary decisions anyway? Hence the need for 3 disks. The disks have to be mountable on all nodes in the cluster and have to be capable of failover, hence iSCSI. To set this up, I used FreeNAS using iSCSITargets. Obviously for heavy disk production use, you'd want something a bit more robust than FreeNAS running in Virtualbox. I digress.
After the disks are setup and imported into the cluster, you need to create the MSDTC application and attach it to one of the disks. It's easy to set up the MSDTC application, so I won't go into this setup. The harder part has yet to come.
After disks, clustering and MSDTC are ready, we move to installing SQL Server 2008 on the node with the active disks drives. Note that if all of the drives aren't active on the node where you plan to install SQL Server, you will need to fail all other nodes to force the disks onto that node where you plan to install.
Installing SQL Server 2008
Here's where the problems begin. The MSDN SQL Server 2008 downloads are in bad shape. First, SQL Server 2008 sans SP1 will not install on Windows 2008 Server R2 period. If you try installing, it gives a warning that this software is incompatible. It suggests that you install SP1 after you finish the install. I'm here to tell you, don't try it. It's a waste of time... lots of time. If you attempt to install SQL Server 2008 sans SP1 on Windows 2008 Server R2, it will fail badly and you will be forced to manually clean that SQL Server installation off of your machine (or you'll be reinstalling Windows 2008 Server R2 over again). By manually, I mean going into the registry and deleting registry keys associated with SQL Server 2008 along with cleaning all of the Program Files software, using sc to delete the SQL services installed and removing the applications set up in the cluster. Basically, an unmitigated disaster!
To answer this burning question... No, the SQL Server 2008 uninstaller will not remove the garbage left on the machine after the failed SQL Server 2008 install. The uninstaller explicitly tells you that you need to resolve the failures before it will uninstall. This leaves a load of garbage on the machine and prevents a clean reinstall. In fact, trying to install SP1 also gives you this same message about resolving failures and also won't install. Good luck with resolving those failures. Hence, manual cleanup.
The way to solve this problem is to first
slipstream the SP1 package into the SQL Server 2008 package. Ok, you would think this should be easy. No, the SP1 disk that's on MSDN is old (4/2009) and doesn't work for slipstreaming. In fact, you have to go to the downloads area of Microsoft and
download SP1 (updated 8/2009) from that site. Only
this SP1 package works to slipstream. The older (4/2009) SP1 setup package on MSDN doesn't even have the /PCUSOURCE flag necessary for the slipstream to work. So, don't bother downloading the SP1 package from MSDN. I wasted time here.
If you are using MSDN to get your SQL Server 2008 install disk, download that disk from MSDN and then go to the main MS downloads site and get the
SQL Server 2008 SP1 installer separately.
Slipstreaming SP1 into the original SQL Server 2008 software is not that hard. Since slipstreaming is already covered in this
MSDN Blog article and in article
KB955392, I won't go over that process here.
After you get SP1 integrated into SQL Server 2008, only then can you run a SQL Server 2008 cluster install and be certain that this software will install properly on Windows 2008 Server R2. Of course, that's as of this writing.
Once SQL Server 2008 is finally installed, you can finally go get
AppFabric (formerly Velocity) and install that. Of course, you'll still need to create your database and set up the connection string for AppFabric, but that's an entirely different issue.
Commentary
If there's anyone here who knows someone managing MSDN, please remove that old SP1 disk from SQL Server 2008 area and put up the latest SP1 that will actually slipstream properly. Even better, why not put up an already slipstreamed installer?
If there's anyone here who works on the SQL Server 2008 design team, PLEASE create a cleanup and removal tool for SQL Server 2008. Better, fix the uninstaller to actually clean the software off regardless of failures. There is no design reason why this software can't uninstall itself fully and completely regardless of failures. If I can manually remove the software by hand, an uninstaller can also do this. I spent the better part of an hour manually cleaning the machine from registry to filesystem to get the failed software off. There is no excuse for this poor level of installer design. If software can be installed, it can be uninstalled period. There is no excuse or reason why any software cannot be fully and completely removed from the OS.
MSDN Downloads + SQL Server 2008 + Windows 2008 Server R2 - SQL Server 2008 SP1 = Failure
