failover
A switch to a backup computer system when the main one stops working.
The automatic or planned transfer of operations from a failed or unavailable computer system, server, network, or service to a backup one.
Used as a backup when the main system stops working.
Designed, configured, or kept available for use when operations switch from a primary system to a backup system after a failure.
- Base: failover
- Comparative: failoverer
- Superlative: failoverest
- Base: failover
- Plural: failovers
automatic failover
1Backup switch without human action
A backup switch that happens by itself when the main system fails.
- Automatic failover reduced downtime to less than a minute.
- The cloud service includes automatic failover across multiple availability zones.
- Automatic failover did not start because the monitoring agent was offline.
- Automatic failover starts without a person.
- The app has automatic failover.
fail over
1Switch to backup operation
For a computer system to start using a backup system when the main one stops working.
- If the primary server goes down, the application fails over to a server in another region.
- The database failed over successfully after the hardware problem was detected.
- Engineers expected the service to fail over automatically, but the backup was not ready.
- The system failed over to the backup server.
- If one server stops, the service can fail over.
failover cluster
1Group of backup-linked servers
A group of computers that keeps a service running if one computer fails.
- The hospital runs its records system on a failover cluster.
- Adding a third node made the failover cluster more resilient.
- The administrator patched one server in the failover cluster while the others kept the service online.
- A failover cluster helps keep the app online.
- The company uses a failover cluster for its database.
manual failover
1Backup switch started by people
A backup switch that a person starts or controls.
- The team performed a manual failover during the maintenance window.
- Manual failover is slower, but it gives administrators more control.
- Before upgrading the primary database, they initiated a manual failover to the standby server.
- An engineer started the manual failover.
- Manual failover needs a person.