I have a bit of a throw-back question. I swear I've read all the docs availalbe (HA 7-mode config guide, system admin guide, network mangement guide, ethernet storage design TR) but I am still confused on how to properly configure a 7mode HA VIF failover in a situation where you only have one VIF that needs to float to a standby controller. Support tells me this is "not a common configuration" and that the solution is to have a data IP on both controllers, even if both controllers are not being used in active/active. I realize that I can do an ifconfig on each controller, with the partner option specifying the other node's IP/interface. However, this particular filer is just a large aggregate, single volume, single NFS access IP. So I don't see a point to having a data IP on the other controller...

According to the ifconfig man page (https://library.netapp.com/ecmdocs/ECMP1196979/html/man1/na_ifconfig.1.html), this is possible:


"On a node in an HA pair, a network interface performs one of these roles:
...

A standby network interface for the partner. That is, if the partner fails, the network interface works on behalf of the partner. When the node is not in takeover mode, the network interface is idle. A network interface performs this role if it does not have a local IP address but a partner IP address, which you assign by the partner option of the ifconfig command.

The node maps a partner IP address to a shared or standby interface when the node initiates a takeover operation. In takeover mode, all requests destined for the partner IP address are serviced by the shared or standby interface. Also, in partner mode, if a command takes a network interface name as an argument, enter the network interface name of the failed node. The command is executed on the shared or standby interface on the live node. Similarly, in partner mode, a command for displaying network interface information displays the network interface name of the failed node, even though the command is serviced by the shared or standby interface on the live node."

Help me think this through. This means if I want filer1 to be active and filer2 to be standby with a sinlge VIF, filer1 would have something like 'ifconfig e0a 10.10.10.10', while filer2 would have something like 'ifconfig e0a partner 10.10.10.10'?