20.5.4.2 Cloning for Distributed Recovery

If you want to use remote cloning operations for distributed recovery in a group, you must set up existing members and joining members beforehand to support this function. If you do not want to use this function in a group, do not set it up, in which case Group Replication only uses state transfer from the binary log.

To use cloning, at least one existing group member and the joining member must be set up beforehand to support remote cloning operations. As a minimum, you must install the clone plugin on the donor and joining member, grant the BACKUP_ADMIN permission to the replication user for distributed recovery, and set the group_replication_clone_threshold system variable to an appropriate level. To ensure the maximum availability of donors, it is advisable to set up all current and future group members to support remote cloning operations.

Be aware that a remote cloning operation removes user-created tablespaces and data from the joining member before transferring the data from the donor. If the operation is stopped while in progress, the joining member might be left with partial data or no data. This can be repaired by retrying the remote cloning operation, which Group Replication does automatically.

20.5.4.2.1 Prerequisites for Cloning

For full instructions to set up and configure the clone plugin, see Section 7.6.7, “The Clone Plugin” . Detailed prerequisites for a remote cloning operation are covered in Section 7.6.7.3, “Cloning Remote Data” . For Group Replication, note the following key points and differences:

• The donor (an existing group member) and the recipient (the joining member) must have the clone plugin installed and active. For instructions to do this, see Section 7.6.7.1, “Installing the Clone Plugin” .

• The donor and the recipient must run on the same operating system, and must use the same MySQL Server release series. Cloning is therefore not suitable for groups where members run different minor MySQL Server versions, such as MySQL 8.0 and 8.4.

• The donor and the recipient must have the Group Replication plugin installed and active, and any other plugins that are active on the donor (such as a keyring plugin) must also be active on the recipient.

• If distributed recovery is configured to use SSL (group_replication_recovery_use_ssl=ON), Group Replication applies this setting for remote cloning operations. Group Replication automatically configures the settings for the clone SSL options (clone_ssl_ca, clone_ssl_cert, and clone_ssl_key) to match your settings for the corresponding Group Replication distributed recovery options (group_replication_recovery_ssl_ca, group_replication_recovery_ssl_cert, and group_replication_recovery_ssl_key).

• You do not need to set up a list of valid donors in the clone_valid_donor_list system variable for the purpose of joining a replication group. Group Replication configures this setting automatically for you after it selects a donor from the existing group members. Note that remote cloning operations use the server's SQL protocol hostname and port.

• The clone plugin has a number of system variables to manage the network load and performance impact of the remote cloning operation. Group Replication does not configure these settings, so you can review them and set them if you want to, or allow them to default. Note that when a remote cloning operation is used for distributed recovery, the clone plugin's clone_enable_compression setting applies to the operation, rather than the Group Replication compression setting.

• To invoke the remote cloning operation on the recipient, Group Replication uses the internal mysql.session user, which already has the CLONE_ADMIN privilege, so you do not need to set this up.

• As the clone user on the donor for the remote cloning operation, Group Replication uses the replication user that you set up for distributed recovery (which is covered in Section 20.2.1.3, “User Credentials For Distributed Recovery”). You must therefore give the BACKUP_ADMIN privilege to this replication user on all group members that support cloning. Also give the privilege to the replication user on joining members when you are configuring them for Group Replication, because they can act as donors after they join the group. The same replication user is used for distributed recovery on every group member. To give this privilege to the replication user on existing members, you can issue this statement on each group member individually with binary logging disabled, or on one group member with binary logging enabled:

  GRANT BACKUP_ADMIN ON *.* TO rpl_user@'%';

• If you use START GROUP_REPLICATION to specify the replication user credentials on a server that previously supplied the user credentials using CHANGE REPLICATION SOURCE TO, ensure that you remove the user credentials from the replication metadata repositories before any remote cloning operations take place. Also ensure that group_replication_start_on_boot=OFF is set on the joining member. For instructions, see Section 20.6.3, “Securing Distributed Recovery Connections”. If you do not unset the user credentials, they are transferred to the joining member during remote cloning operations. The group_replication_recovery channel could then be inadvertently started with the stored credentials, on either the original member or members that were cloned from it. An automatic start of Group Replication on server boot (including after a remote cloning operation) would use the stored user credentials, and they would also be used if an operator did not specify the distributed recovery credentials on a START GROUP_REPLICATION statement.

20.5.4.2.2 Threshold for Cloning

When group members have been set up to support cloning, the group_replication_clone_threshold system variable specifies a threshold, expressed as a number of transactions, for the use of a remote cloning operation in distributed recovery. If the gap between the transactions on the donor and the transactions on the joining member is larger than this number, a remote cloning operation is used for state transfer to the joining member when this is technically possible. Group Replication calculates whether the threshold has been exceeded based on the gtid_executed sets of the existing group members. Using a remote cloning operation in the event of a large transaction gap lets you add new members to the group without transferring the group's data to the server manually beforehand, and also enables a member that is very out of date to catch up more efficiently.

The default setting for the group_replication_clone_threshold Group Replication system variable is extremely high (the maximum permitted sequence number for a transaction in a GTID), so it effectively deactivates cloning wherever state transfer from the binary log is possible. To enable Group Replication to select a remote cloning operation for state transfer where this is more appropriate, set the system variable to specify a number of transactions as the transaction gap above which you want cloning to take place.

Warning

Do not use a low setting for group_replication_clone_threshold in an active group. If a number of transactions above the threshold takes place in the group while the remote cloning operation is in progress, the joining member triggers a remote cloning operation again after restarting, and could continue this indefinitely. To avoid this situation, ensure that you set the threshold to a number higher than the number of transactions that you would expect to occur in the group during the time taken for the remote cloning operation.

Group Replication attempts to execute a remote cloning operation regardless of your threshold when state transfer from a donor's binary log is impossible, for example because the transactions needed by the joining member are not available in the binary log on any existing group member. Group Replication identifies this based on the gtid_purged sets of the existing group members. You cannot use the group_replication_clone_threshold system variable to deactivate cloning when the required transactions are not available in any member's binary log files, because in that situation cloning is the only alternative to transferring data to the joining member manually.

20.5.4.2.3 Cloning Operations

When group members and joining members are set up for cloning, Group Replication manages remote cloning operations for you. A remote cloning operation might take some time to complete, depending on the size of the data. See Section 7.6.7.10, “Monitoring Cloning Operations” for information on monitoring the process.

Note

When state transfer is complete, Group Replication restarts the joining member to complete the process. If group_replication_start_on_boot=OFF is set on the joining member, for example because you specify the replication user credentials on the START GROUP_REPLICATION statement, you must issue START GROUP_REPLICATION manually again following this restart. If group_replication_start_on_boot=ON and other settings required to start Group Replication were set in a configuration file or using a SET PERSIST statement, you do not need to intervene and the process continues automatically to bring the joining member online.

A remote cloning operation clones settings that are persisted in tables from the donor to the recipient, as well as the data. Group Replication manages the settings that relate specifically to Group Replication channels. Group Replication member settings that are persisted in configuration files, such as the group replication local address, are not cloned and are not changed on the joining member. Group Replication also preserves the channel settings that relate to the use of SSL, so these are unique to the individual member.

If the replication user credentials used by the donor for the group_replication_recovery replication channel have been stored in the replication metadata repositories using a CHANGE REPLICATION SOURCE TO statement, they are transferred to and used by the joining member after cloning, and they must be valid there. With stored credentials, all group members that received state transfer by a remote cloning operation therefore automatically receive the replication user and password for distributed recovery. If you specify the replication user credentials on the START GROUP_REPLICATION statement, these are used to start the remote cloning operation, but they are not transferred to and used by the joining member after cloning. If you do not want the credentials transferred to new joiners and recorded there, ensure that you unset them before remote cloning operations take place, as described in Section 20.6.3, “Securing Distributed Recovery Connections”, and use START GROUP_REPLICATION to supply them instead.

If a PRIVILEGE_CHECKS_USER account has been used to help secure the replication appliers (see Section 19.3.3.2, “Privilege Checks For Group Replication Channels”), the PRIVILEGE_CHECKS_USER account and related settings from the donor are cloned to the joining member. If the joining member is set to start Group Replication on boot, it automatically uses the account for privilege checks on the appropriate replication channels.

20.5.4.2.4 Cloning for Other Purposes

Group Replication initiates and manages cloning operations for distributed recovery. Group members that have been set up to support cloning may also participate in cloning operations that a user initiates manually. For example, you might want to create a new server instance by cloning from a group member as the donor, but you do not want the new server instance to join the group immediately, or maybe not ever.

In all releases that support cloning, you can initiate a cloning operation manually involving a group member on which Group Replication is stopped. Note that because cloning requires that the active plugins on a donor and recipient must match, the Group Replication plugin must be installed and active on the other server instance, even if you do not intend that server instance to join a group. You can install the plugin by issuing this statement:

INSTALL PLUGIN group_replication SONAME 'group_replication.so';

You can initiate a cloning operation manually if the operation involves a group member on which Group Replication is running, provided that the cloning operation does not remove and replace the data on the recipient. The statement to initiate the cloning operation must therefore include the DATA DIRECTORY clause if Group Replication is running.