System and method for providing hot spare redundancy and recovery for a very large database management system

For use with a primary database residing on a primary computer, said primary computer being couplable to a secondary computer having a secondary database, a method of allowing said secondary computer to operate as a hot spare for said primary computer, comprising the steps of:

• maintaining log records of transactions involving persistent data in said primary database;
• transmitting a portion of said log records to said secondary computer to allow said secondary computer to commit said portion of said log records to said secondary database;
• designating a state of said primary and secondary computers with a first parameter associated with said primary and secondary databases;
• automatically redesignating said secondary database to function in a primary database mode upon failure of said primary database;
• and
• automatically redesignating said primary database to function in a secondary database mode upon resolution of said failure.

A database management system (DBMS), comprising:

• a primary database residing on a primary computer;
• a secondary database residing on a secondary computer coupled to said primary computer;
• and
• a system that allows said secondary database to mirror said primary database, including:
• a transaction logger, associated with said primary database, that maintains log records of transactions involving persistent data in said primary database, and
• a transaction processor, associated with said primary database, that transmits a portion of said log records to said secondary computer to allow said secondary computer to commit said portion of said log records to said secondary database, said secondary database thereby mirroring said primary database, said secondary database being able to, upon failure of said primary database, automatically redesignate to function in a primary database mode, said primary database being able to, upon resolution of said failure, automatically redesignate to function in a secondary database mode.