Current setup:
RDCB, RDWB and RDLC roles on same server. x 2 servers. These are load balanced using MS NLB. Lets call these CF01 and CF02. External cert deployed to all servers, DNS Round robin name: remoteapp.mydomain.com which points to the NLB of both these servers.
1. Are Active Remote Desktop management server and Active Collection Broker the same? Or are these different entities? I think the same? https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/jj215479.aspx
I note in RDS Server Manager > Overview > Deployment Overview the drop down to change the active Connection Broker. However this displays the machine names either CF01 or CF02.
During HA testing (set Active Broker to CF01) disable NIC on CF01, new and previous clients can still access apps via RDWB fine with no interruption :-) So CF02 must be being accesed via the NLB at remoteapp.mydomain.com
The RDS Server Manager can't find the alternative Collection Broker for around 3 minutes, Get-RDLicenseConfiguration will also show a change in ActiveManagementServer and returns the second broker after this approx 3 minutes. Update - not true, after checking fail-over from CF01 to CF02 this appeared true but CF02 to CF01 not - weird! Get-RDConnectionBrokerHighAvailability : The active Remote Desktop management server is not reachable.
Clients appear completely unaffected by this outage and RDS Server Manager facilities are available too (after 3 minutes), on the surface all good.
Get-RDConnectionBrokerHighAvailability returns:
ActiveManagementServer : CF02.mydomain.com
ConnectionBroker : {CF01, CF02}
ClientAccessName : REMOTEAPP.mydomain.com
DatabaseConnectionString : DRIVER=SQL Server Native Client
11.0;SERVER=DB01;Trusted_Connection=Yes;APP=Remote Desktop Services Connection
Broker;Database=RemoteApp
DatabaseFilePath : E:\Program Files\Microsoft SQL Server\MSSQL11.MSSQLSERVER\MSSQL\DATA\RAPP\RemoteApp.mdf
2. But for this HA environment, should the Broker HA settings be set as follows?
Set-RDConnectionBrokerHighAvailability -ConnectionBroker "remoteapp.mydomain.com"
Confused as to why HA works without 2. being set above!
Any pointers welcomed
Lea