During one of my consulting engagements about Always On availability group configuration, I encountered an issue where the listener network name was not coming online. In such cases, it is always a good practice to generate a cluster log to investigate any errors related to the cluster.
To generate a Windows cluster log, you can follow these steps:
- Open a command prompt with administrative privileges.
- Run the following command:
cluster log /g
The cluster log provides valuable information for troubleshooting cluster-related issues. In this particular case, the cluster log revealed the following error:
ERR [RES] Network Name: [NNLIB] Unable to add server name SQLAUTH-LISTENER to transport \Device\NetBt_If4, status 2
The error message indicates that the system cannot find the specified file. Further investigation led me to the “NetBIOS over TCPIP” setting, which was causing the issue.
To resolve this issue, follow these steps:
- Open the properties of the Network Name resource.
- Check the NetBIOS status, which may show “The system cannot find the file specified.”
- Uncheck the NetBIOS related setting.
If you want to change this setting at the NIC level, you can refer to my earlier blog post on how to do so.
After applying the workaround mentioned above, we were able to bring the listener online successfully.
If you have encountered a similar error with the Windows cluster log, I would love to hear about your experience and any workarounds you may have used. Sharing knowledge and experiences is essential in the SQL Server community.
Remember, sharing is caring!