Scaling the Output Generator
The IXIASOFT CCMS Output Generator can be scaled up and scaled out.
- requested by the CCMS users
- for the web collaborative reviews
- for scheduled documentation builds.
The resources required by the CCMS Output Generator server depend on the output generation operations and the kind of performance that an organization requires. For example, the resource requirements for a small documentation team that generates documentation twice a year will be very different from that of a worldwide company that regularly generates large documentation sets in multiple output types in a short amount of time.
Scale up
The CCMS Output Generator can be scaled up by adding more resources (CPU, RAM, etc.) to the server on which it is running.
Scaling up the CCMS Output Generator ensures that it can handle a large number of jobs without requiring an additional license of the rendering engine. It can also handle more complex jobs, such as generating maps in multiple output types (CHM, PDF, HTML, etc.) or generating multiple PDF files for different audiences.
Scale out
When scaled out, the CCMS Output Generator server component is installed on two or more servers. For example, two CCMS Output Generators can be installed: one that is used in production and one that is used to tweak the output before putting it in production. The servers are not load balanced; the connection is done manually, through configuration.
The following diagram shows a typical scale out scenario:
In this example, an CCMS Output Generator handles the outputs requested by users, while another CCMS Output Generator is dedicated to generating the documentation builds (based on scripts that run at scheduled intervals).
When scaling out the CCMS Output Generator, additional licenses for the rendering engine may be required. A way to avoid additional licenses could be to handle all the PDF generation on one machine and to do the HTML generation (which doesn't require a license) on another machine.