Connecting to a Parallels RAS Farm

When you run the Parallels RAS installer and install core Parallels RAS components, you are creating a Parallels RAS farm. If later you install Parallels RAS on another server, you create one more farm. The Parallels RAS Console, which is used to administer a farm, is capable of connecting to any farm that you have in your organization and allow you to administer the farm it is connected to.

When you run the Parallels RAS Console for the first time, you specify the Parallels RAS farm you wish to connect to. We've already talked about this in the Log In and Activate Parallels RAS section. If you need to connect to a different farm while in the RAS Console, do the following:

1. Click on the arrow icon next to your user name in the upper right-hand corner of the RAS Console window and then choose Log Off in the context menu.
2. After you are logged off, you will see the dialog where you can select a farm you wish to connect to.
3. Enter the FQDN or IP address of the server where you have the RAS Publishing Agent installed or click the [...] button for more options. Read below for details.
4. Enter the user account name and password to connect to the farm and click Connect. Once the connection is established, the Parallels RAS Console will re-appear and will be connected to the specified farm.

Customizing how the Parallels RAS Console connects to a farm

When connecting to a farm (step 3 in the instructions above), you can click the [...] button next to the Farm field to define how the Parallels RAS Console connects to a farm. The button opens a dialog, which is described below.

The left pane of the dialog lists known Parallels RAS farms. Select a farm you wish to connect to. If a farm is no longer relevant, you can remove it from the list by clicking the [-] icon above the list.

The right pane of the dialog has the following elements:

Site: Displays the name of the Licensing Site in the selected farm.

Master Publishing Agent: Displays the name of the master RAS Publishing Agent to which the RAS Console connects by default.

Check Connection (button). Click the button to verify that the RAS Console can connect to the specified RAS Publishing Agent.

Alternative Publishing Agents: Lists one or more alternative RAS Publishing Agents. If the master RAS Publishing Agent is not available (for any reason), the RAS Console will try to connect to an alternative Publishing Agent. You can add an alternative Publishing Agent to the list by clicking the [+] icon and then entering its hostname or IP address. The columns in the list are as follows:

• Publishing Agent. RAS Publishing Agent hostname or IP address.
• Status. Indicates whether the RAS Publishing Agent is functioning properly.
• Site. Site name to which the RAS Publishing Agent belongs.
• Priority. Indicates whether it's a master or secondary RAS Publishing Agent. For more information, see the RAS Publishing Agents chapter.

Renaming a farm

To change a farm name, select the Farm category in the Parallels RAS Console, right-click the farm name and choose Rename Farm.