Hardware Requirements

Your application server, cache server, Activity Engine, and database machines have different suggested hardware specifications.

Jive is compatible with a number of hardware configurations as well as network topologies. The following tables provide suggested hardware specifications.

Network Technology and Topology

Required: One box for each application, database, Activity Engine, and cache server.
Recommended: At least two app nodes with a cache server for redundancy and load balancing. If you have Document Conversion enabled, you need to store that on a separate server.
Gigabit Ethernet hardware gear (NICs, switches).
One local network for any multi-box deployments.

Application Machine

Component	Recommendations
CPUs	Multicore - 2 chips with multicore optimal 2 GHz Minimum x86 architecture
Memory	3-4 GB physical RAM 2 GB memory heap (configured by default)
Storage	Use a RAID configuration for best performance and reliability. For the database server machine, be sure you have enough available disk space to allow for your community's growth. For example, a new community might start out with 10 GB of free space, which you should monitor and increase as the community grows.

Activity Engine Machine

Component	Recommendations
CPUs	Multicore - 2 chips with multicore optimal 2 GHz Minimum x86 architecture
Memory	2 GB physical RAM; 4 recommended 1 GB memory heap (configured by default). 2+ GB recommended for sites with large amounts of content.
Topology	Activity Engine on a single machine separate from clustered application servers.

Cache Server Machine

Component	Recommendations
CPUs	Multicore - 2 chips with multicore optimal 2 GHz Minimum x86 architecture
Memory	2 GB physical RAM; 4 recommended 1 GB memory heap (configured by default). 2+ GB recommended for sites with large amounts of content.
Topology	Cache server on a single machine separate from clustered application servers. If you're setting up more than one cache server machine, you should use three or more. Using only two cache servers can be less efficient than using one.

Database Machine -- for configurations where the application and Activity Engine share a database.

Component	Recommendations
CPUs	Multicore - 4 chips with multicore optimal 2 GHz Minimum x86 architecture
Memory	6-8 GB physical RAM 4 GB memory heap (configured by default)
Storage	Use a RAID configuration for best performance and reliability. For the database server machine, be sure you have enough available disk space to allow for your community's growth. For example, a new community might start out with 20 GB of free space, which you should monitor and increase as the community grows.

Separate Application and Activity Engine Database Machines -- for configurations where the application and Activity Engine will each have their own database machine.

Component	Recommendations
CPUs	Multicore - 2 chips with multicore optimal 2 GHz Minimum x86 architecture
Memory	3-4 GB physical RAM
Storage	Use a RAID configuration for best performance and reliability. For the database server machine, be sure you have enough available disk space to allow for your community's growth. For example, a new community might start out with 10 GB of free space, which you should monitor and increase as the community grows.

Binary Storage Considerations

If your community will include a large amount of binary data, you should consider configuring a binary storage provider that is outside the application database (the default).

For example, consider the load you need to account for if you have document conversion enabled. The stored footprint for each version of each converted document is about 130 percent of the size of the uploaded document. So, for example, a 5MB document uploaded by the user will mean about 6.5MB of storage needed for each version of the document in your binary storage provider. That's because for each document for which the application generates a preview -- for each version of that document -- the application generates a preview, thumbnail images, and PDFs.

Additional System Recommendations

When you run a server-side application, you should also have a daily backup solution. At a minimum you should back up your database on a regular basis as well as the configuration files for Jive (note that those are stored in one directory).