How to use standby sharepoint farm to access logshipped secondary database

Jephe Wu - http://linuxtechres.blogspot.com

Environment:  sharepoint 2010 farm(2 nodes plus a SQL 2008 database) at primary site, a logshipped database with sharepoint farm(1 node) at DR site.
Objective: If primary site database is down, how to use DR site sharepoint webfarm (or primary site sharepoint ) to connect to logshipped content database.


Steps:

1.  configure logshipping to prepare for DR purpose
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd890507%28office.12%29.aspx#Fail_over

2. use standby mode when configuring logshiping rather than norecovery mode, also choose 'disconnect user when logshipping'

3. only wss content database need to be logshipped according to SharePoing 2010 Disaster Recovery Guid.

4. when DR is happening, stop sql restoration job, backup logshiping database from primary database.

5. rename secondary database  for wss content database, so standby sharepoint farm will use logshipped database for contenet database, please refer to this article
http://www.raregrooverider.com/post/2008/02/04/Renaming-a-SharePoint-Central-Administration-Database-with-a-GUID-Appended-to-the-Database-Name.aspx

  1. Change the directory to the 12-hive bin where you can run the STSADM commands from:
    C:\Program Files\Common Files\Microsoft Shared\web server extensions\12\BIN\
  2. Delete the original content database with the following STSADM command using the database with the GUID you looked up previously (be sure to change UrlOfYourCentralAdministration and NamedInstanceOfYourSqlServer to your names):
    stsadm -o deletecontentdb -url http://UrlOfYourCentralAdministration -databasename SharePoint_AdminContent_<GUID> -databaseserver NamedInstanceOfYourSqlServer
  3. Re-Associate the backed up database with your Central Administration with the following STSADM command (be sure to change UrlOfCentralYourAdministration and NamedInstanceOfYourSqlServer to your names):
    stsadm -o addcontentdb -url http:// UrlOfYourCentralAdministration -databasename SharePoint_AdminContent -databaseserver NamedInstanceOfYourSqlServer
 5. References:
 Sharepoint 2010 disaster recovery guide pdf book (this book talks about only logship wss content database)