SmartGraphs and SatelliteGraphs on a Single Server

Simulate SmartGraphs and SatelliteGraphs on a single server to make it easier to port them to an ArangoDB cluster later

General idea

You can create SmartGraphs and SatelliteGraphs in a single server instance and test them there. Internally, the graphs are General Graphs, supplemented by formal properties such as isSmart, which play no role in the behavior of the graphs, however. The same is true for vertex and edge collections: they have the corresponding properties, but they are non-functional.

After a test phase, you can dump such graphs and then restore them in a cluster instance. The graphs themselves and the vertex and edge collections obtain true SmartGraph or SatelliteGraph sharding properties as if they were created in the cluster.

The Procedure

On a single server, create SmartGraphs or SatelliteGraphs graphs by using arangosh as usual. Then you can set all the cluster-relevant properties of graphs and collections:

• numberOfShards
• isSmart
• isSatellite
• replicationFactor
• smartGraphAttribute
• satellites
• shardingStrategy

After that, you can dump the graphs with arangodump as usual.

Restore the dumped data into a running ArangoDB cluster. As a result, all cluster relevant properties are restored correctly and affect the sharding and the performance as expected.