Hello good Moodlers,
I'm setting up a bunch of Moodle servers (all Ubuntu 12.04) such that a bunch of schools each have their own, local moodle server.
The purpose of giving each school their own moodle server is speed. The servers will be used to implement hardcore tests, and the tests have to load quickly and equally.
Simultaneously, it's important that the Slave Moodles all feed back the test results to the Mother Moodle.
My original plan had been to have each local Moodle have a copy of the test, the enrolled users, etc, and then for the databases of enrolled users to backup to local files, which I could then rsync to the Mother Moodle, and (ultimately) merge on the Mother Moodle. Lot of work!
I now believe, however, that the collection of the data could be accomplished as well by just having the local servers (running Slave Moodle) use an external database (on the Mother Moodle). So, the tests are localhosted on the local network, but the moodle DB is far-hosted on the distant internet server.
So, my first question: is this solution even optimal, or am I missing something obvious?
Second question, if the external database hosting isn't crazy: I'm trying to follow the documentation:
http://docs.moodle.org/23/en/External_database_enrolment
But, when I try to connect my Slave Moodles to my Master Moodle, they say:
"Error: Database connection failed
It is possible that the database is overloaded or otherwise not running properly.
The site administrator should also check that the database details have been correctly specified in config.php"
I've setup port forwarding on my router, but I get the above even when I point to the Master Moodle on the local network, without the need for port forwarding. Any idea of why?