Docu85873 - NetWorker 9.2.x VMware Integration Guide
Docu85873 - NetWorker 9.2.x VMware Integration Guide
Version 9.2.x
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Dell EMC
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www.DellEMC.com
Figures 9
Tables 13
Preface 15
Glossary 347
1 Revision history...........................................................................................................15
2 Style conventions........................................................................................................18
3 NetWorker VMware Protection with vProxy appliance requirements......................... 24
4 Incoming port requirements........................................................................................25
5 Outgoing port requirements....................................................................................... 26
6 Performance and scalability factors........................................................................... 30
7 Minimum required vCenter user account privileges ................................................... 52
8 Supported and unsupported VMware Backup appliance operations in a NetWorker 9.1
and later environment.................................................................................................62
9 Schedule icons........................................................................................................... 83
10 Schedule icons........................................................................................................... 89
11 Backup log files......................................................................................................... 107
12 FLR privilege requirements........................................................................................134
13 Recovery log files......................................................................................................162
14 NetWorker VMware Data Protection tasks............................................................... 166
15 NetWorker VMware Protection requirements........................................................... 167
16 Incoming port requirements...................................................................................... 169
17 Outgoing port requirements — with external proxies................................................170
18 Recommended memory and swap space based on storage space utilization............. 175
19 Minimum required vCenter user account privileges .................................................. 188
20 Description of services running on the VMware Backup Appliance............................198
21 Schedule icons..........................................................................................................222
22 Schedule icons......................................................................................................... 225
23 Backup tab column descriptions .............................................................................. 238
24 Task Failure column descriptions...............................................................................241
25 Job Details column descriptions................................................................................ 241
26 Unprotected Clients column descriptions................................................................. 242
27 Backup appliance detail descriptions........................................................................ 242
28 Email configuration field descriptions....................................................................... 245
29 EMC Backup and Recovery alarms .......................................................................... 264
30 Scalability Factors.....................................................................................................277
31 Maximum concurrent sessions per VMware Backup Appliance................................. 279
32 Concurrency/parallelism recommendations ............................................................. 279
33 Application information values ................................................................................. 305
34 Recovery options that are available based on the virtual client configuration........... 309
35 VADP backup privileges ............................................................................................312
36 VADP recovery privileges ......................................................................................... 313
Note
This document was accurate at publication time. To ensure that you are using the
latest version of this document, go to the Support website at https://
support.emc.com.
Purpose
This document describes how to configure the NetWorker software to protect a
VMware environment.
Audience
This document is part of the NetWorker documentation set and is intended for use by
system administrators during the configuration of the NetWorker software.
Revision history
The following table presents the revision history of this document.
04 August 30, 2017 Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client images
updated for SQL application-consistent database/
instance restore.
01 Jul 28, 2017 First release of this document for NetWorker 9.2.
Related documentation
The NetWorker documentation set includes the following publications, available on the
Support website:
l NetWorker Online Software Compatibility Matrix
Provides compatibility information, including specific software and hardware
configurations that NetWorker supports. To access the matrix, go to http://
compatibilityguide.emc.com:8080/CompGuideApp/.
l NetWorker Administration Guide
Describes how to configure and maintain the NetWorker software.
l NetWorker Network Data Management Protocol (NDMP) User Guide
Describes how to use the NetWorker software to provide data protection for
NDMP filers.
l NetWorker Cluster Integration Guide
NOTICE
Note
Typographical conventions
The following type style conventions are used in this document:
Bold Used for interface elements that a user specifically selects or clicks,
for example, names of buttons, fields, tab names, and menu paths.
Also used for the name of a dialog box, page, pane, screen area with
title, table label, and window.
Italic Used for full titles of publications that are referenced in text.
Monospace Used for:
l System code
l System output, such as an error message or script
l Pathnames, file names, file name extensions, prompts, and
syntax
l Commands and options
You can use the following resources to find more information about this product,
obtain support, and provide feedback.
Note
To create a service request, you must have a valid support agreement. Contact a sales
representative for details about obtaining a valid support agreement or with questions
about an account.
Note
If upgrading to NetWorker 9.1 and later, you can continue to use the previous
NetWorker VMware Protection Solution with the VMware Backup appliance to run
existing VMware Backup appliance protection policies. However, you will not be able
to create any new policies using the VMware Backup Appliance, and you cannot
recover backups performed with the VMware Backup appliance by using the vProxy
appliance.
l SQL full database restore, transaction log restore, and SQL instance restore from
the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client.
The NetWorker vProxy solution in NetWorker 9.2 also introduces support for Data
Domain Retention Lock for vProxy protection policies in NMC.
System requirements
The following table lists the required components for NetWorker VMware Protection
with the vProxy appliance.
When you install or upgrade NetWorker and deploy the vProxy appliance, ensure that
the NetWorker server and storage node are at the same version, and that you use the
latest version of the vProxy appliance.
Component Requirements
NetWorker NetWorker 9.2 server software with NMC.
Note
vCenter server l Version 5.5, 5.5 U2, 5.5 U3a, 5.5 U3b, 5.5
U3d, 6.0, 6.0 U1b, 6.0 U2, 6.5, 6.50b.
Note
ESX/ESXi server l Version 5.5, 5.5 U2, 5.5 U3a, 5.5 Ub, 6.0
U1, 6.0 U1b, 6.0 U2, 6.5, 6.50b.
Component Requirements
Note
Note
Note
Port requirements
The NetWorker VMware Protection solution requires the ports outlined in the
following tables.
Port requirements 25
Introduction to NetWorker VMware Protection with the vProxy appliance
vProxy Appliance Data Domain 7, 22, 111, 131, 163, Data Domain
2049, 2052 management
Figure 2 Port requirements for NetWorker VMware Protection with the vProxy appliance
Note
vProxy appliance configured with dual stack or IPv6 only is not supported
The vProxy appliance does not support dual stack (IPv4 and IPv6) or IPv6 only
addressing. If you want to run backups and restores using the vProxy appliance,
use IPv4 addressing for the vProxy and disable IPv6.
Data Domain system requires REPLICATION license when clone of VMware backup
performed to same system as the backup
When cloning VMware backups using NetWorker VMware Protection with the
vProxy appliance, if the clone is performed to the same Data Domain system as
the backup, a REPLICATION license is required on the Data Domain system.
vProxy cannot perform recoveries from policies run with VMware Backup appliance
After upgrading to a NetWorker release with the vProxy appliance, any policies
run with the VMware Backup appliance cannot be recovered with the vProxy
appliance. If you want to recover these backups you must continue to use the
VMware Backup appliance.
Virtual machine alert "VM MAC conflict" may appear after successful recovery of
virtual machine
After performing a successful recovery of a virtual machine through vCenter
version 6, an alert may appear indicating a "VM MAC conflict" for the recovered
virtual machine, even though the new virtual machine will have a different and
unique MAC address. You must manually acknowledge the alert or clear the alert
after resolving the MAC address conflict. Note that this alert can be triggered
even when the MAC address conflict is resolved.
The VMware release notes at http://pubs.vmware.com/Release_Notes/en/
vsphere/60/vsphere-vcenter-server-60u2-release-notes.html provide more
information.
Backups fail for resource pools recreated with the same name as deleted pool
When you delete a resource pool in vCenter and then recreate a resource pool
with the same name, backups fail. Re-configure the protection group with the
newly created resource pool.
Specify NBD for datastores if proxies should use NBD mode only
For proxies that only use NBD transport mode (proxies where you specify a value
greater than 0 for the NBD maximum sessions limit), you must also specify the
datastores for which you want the proxy to perform only NBD backups to ensure
that any backups of virtual machines running on these datastores are always
performed using NBD mode. This also ensures that the same NBD-only proxies
are never used for backups of virtual machines residing on any other datastores.
VMware View in the NetWorker Administration map view does not display when
configuration for Virtual Machines within the vCenter is incomplete
When you use VMware View, the map view does not appear when the
configuration for one or more Virtual Machines in the vCenter is incomplete. To
avoid this issue, remove the incomplete Virtual Machine configurations from
vCenter.
Cannot select a vProxy or the cloned vProxy when you create a VMware group
When you create a new protection group, you cannot select vProxy or clones of
the vProxy from the hosts list. To use the clone vProxy as a normal virtual
machine, clear the annotation string This is EMC Backup and Recovery
vProxy Appliance in the Notes section of the cloned vProxy virtual machine.
Compatibility information
The NetWorker Online Compatibility matrix provides software compatibility
information for the NetWorker 9.2 release, which includes NetWorker VMware
Protection with the vProxy appliance.
The guide is available at http://compatibilityguide.emc.com:8080/CompGuideApp/.
Note
For compatibility information related to the Microsoft VM App Agent for SQL Server
application-consistent protection, refer to the NMM support matrix.
Compatibility information 29
Introduction to NetWorker VMware Protection with the vProxy appliance
Number of concurrent NBD 50 (10G VMware uses Network File Copy (NFC) protocol to
backups per vCenter server network) read VMDK using NBD transport mode. You need one
NFC connection for each VMDK file being backed up.
The VMware Documentation provides more
information on vCenter NFC session connection limits.
Virtual machines concurrent 100 100 Bound by VMware vCenter limits. Can be achieved
backups per vCenter server with a combination of the number of proxies multiplied
by the number of configured hotadd sessions per
vProxy.
Number of proxies per 8 8 proxies with 12-13 hotadd sessions on each proxy can
vCenter protect 100 virtual machines concurrently. If more than
8 proxies are required per vCenter, configure the
hotadd limits on the proxies to ensure that no more
than 100 proxy streams run concurrently against any
given vCenter.
Number of vCenter servers 5 3 Per policy you can use 5 vCenter servers in the
per policy respective workflows and trigger concurrent backups.
Total number of virtual 1000 800 Virtual machines must be spread across multiple
machines in a single workflows. The recommended count for the number of
NetWorker policy workflows is 8. Multiple vProxy policies may be run
concurrently as long as the total number of concurrent
backup streams does not exceed the vCenter limits
indicated above. If using a single vCenter, stagger the
schedules for policies to ensure that all the backups for
a policy complete before the backups for the next
policy start.
Backup Optimization modes During creation of a VMware type group in NMC, you
can select a backup optimization mode of either
Capacity or Performance. Performance mode
results in additional space use on the Data Domain
device (around 20%) but significantly improves instant
access restore performance when the virtual machine
environment is I/O intensive and uses random I/O.
Note
Hotadd mode requires VMware hardware version 7 or later. Ensure all Virtual
Machines that you want to back up are using Virtual Machine hardware version 7
or later.
For sites that contain a large number of virtual machines that do not support
hotadd requirements, NBD transport mode will be used. This can cause congestion
on the ESXi host management network. Plan your backup network carefully for
large scale NBD installs. You may consider configuring one of the following
options:
n Set up Management network redundancy.
n Set up backup network to ESXi for NBD.
n Set up storage heartbeats. http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/techpaper/
vmw-vsphere-high-availability.pdf provides more information.
l If you only want to use one transport mode, ensure that you set the maximum
sessions value for the other transport mode to 0. For example, if you want to use
hotadd mode only set hotadd = 25 and nbd = 0. If you want to use NBD mode only,
set hotadd = 0 and nbd = 10.
l Avoid deploying VMs with IDE virtual disks; using IDE virtual disks degrades
backup performance. Use SCSI virtual disks instead whenever possible.
Note
You cannot use hotadd mode with IDE Virtual disks and therefore backup of these
disks will be performed using NBD mode.
l In order for backup and recovery operations to use hotadd mode on a VMware
Virtual Volume (VVol) datastore, the vProxy should reside on the same VVol as the
virtual machine.
l For best practices related to SQL Server application-consistent protection, review
the software and security requirements in the section Enable the Microsoft VM
App Agent for SQL Server application-consistent protection.
l During policy configuration, assign virtual machines to a protection group based on
logical grouping to allow for better scheduling of backups that will help you avoid
resource contention and create more organized logs for review.
l When you plan the backups, ensure that NetWorker VMware Protection supports
the disk types that you use in the environment. Currently, NetWorker VMware
Protection does not support the following disk types:
n Independent (persistent and non-persistent)
n RDM Independent - Virtual Compatibility Mode
n RDM Physical Compatibility Mode
l The vProxy Appliance leverages Changed Block Tracking (CBT) by default. If CBT
is disabled on the virtual machine, then it will enable CBT automatically. If you add
a disk to the virtual machine after the first full backup, for the next policy run a full
backup will be performed automatically for the newly added disk, and an
incremental backup will be performed for the existing disk. For information on
disabling CBT, refer to the section Enabling or disabling Changed Block Tracking.
l When backing up thin-provisioned Virtual Machines or disks for Virtual Machines
on NFS datastores, an NFS datastore recovery does not preserve thin
provisioning. VMware knowledge base article 2137818 at http://
kb.vmware.com/kb/2137818 provides more information.
l Use the vSphere Web Client to install VMware Tools on each Virtual Machine.
VMware Tools adds additional backup capability that quiesces certain processes
on the guest OS prior to backup. File Level Restore also require VMware Tools.
l EMC recommends that you set an appropriate NetWorker server/storage
parallelism value, according to the available resources, to reduce queuing. For
example, 5 vProxy appliances with backup and clone operations will require more
than 125 parallel sessions. Therefore, setting the parallelism for the NetWorker
server to 128 or higher (while also setting the server with 32+ GB memory and 8+
CPUs) will suit such an environment. The NetWorker Performance Optimization
Planning Guide provides more details.
If you require a larger number of parallel image backups, also consider setting the
maximum number of vCenter SOAP sessions to larger value. Note that this
requires careful planning and additional resources on the vCenter Server You can
configure this by modifying the following line in the vCenter vpxd.cfg file:
<vmacore><soap><maxSessionCount> N </maxSessionCount></soap></
vmacore>
This applies specifically to SDK sessions as opposed to VI client sessions:
l Each Virtual Machine backup to a Data Domain system consumes more than one
session on the Data Domain device. The default device configuration is target
sessions=20 and max session=60, however it is recommended that you
configure additional devices for more than 10 parallel backups.
l Virtual Machines with extremely high IO may face hangs during consolidation due
to the ESXi forced operation called synchronous consolidate. Plan your backups of
such Virtual Machines according to the amount of workload on the Virtual
Machine.
l When you work with the vCenter database either directly or by using scripts, do
not change the name attribute for the vmfolder object. VMware knowledge base
article at https://support.emc.com/kb/190755 provides more information.
l Resource contention can occur at various points during the backup cycle. When
NetWorker runs larger policies, issues due to contention of resources can occur,
which impact all running operations. Adjust your resources and times for other
larger policies to avoid overlaps, and avoid resource contention.
For example, you configure one pool named Bronze, with one device. If you set up
a policy where every day at 10 pm two policies called 'Bronze1' and 'Bronze2' with
NetWorker VMware Protection Solution best practices with the vProxy Appliance 33
Introduction to NetWorker VMware Protection with the vProxy appliance
400 virtual machines each start writing to the device in the 'Bronze' pool, then the
long wait for device availability may cause unexpected delays or timeouts. To fix
this, set the policy start times 4 hours apart and add more devices, to allow for
stable backups.
Configuration checklist
The following configuration checklist provides best practices and troubleshooting tips
that might help resolve some common issues.
Basic configuration
l Synchronize system time between vCenter, ESX/ESXi/vSphere, and the vProxy
appliance
l Assign IPs carefully — do not reuse any IP address
l Use FQDNs (Fully Qualified Domain Names) everywhere
l For any network related issue, confirm that forward and reverse DNS lookups
work for each host in the datazone.
NetWorker configuration
l Ensure that the relevant devices are mounted.
l Ensure that vProxy IP addresses are populated in DNS, and that the NetWorker
server has name resolution for the vProxy host names.
l Wait until you successfully configure a policy before you run the policy.
l A message appears after successful vProxy registration in NMC.
section of the topic Enable the Microsoft VM App Agent for SQL Server
application-consistent protection.
Note
9. On the Storage window, select the destination datastore on which to store the
virtual appliance files, and then click Next.
10. On the Disk Format window, select the disk format.
EMC recommends that you select Thick Provision Lazy Zeroed to ensure that
amount of storage space allocated to the virtual appliance is available.
11. On the Network Mapping window, select the Source and Destination networks
to use with the appliance, and then click Next.
12. On the Ready to Complete window, review the deployment configuration
details. If you will immediately configure the appliance, select Power on after
deployment, and then click Finish.
The Deploying window appears and provides status information about the
deployment.
Note
Procedure
1. Log in to the vSphere client with an administrator account.
2. In the Main menu, expand vCenter and then expand Hosts.
3. Right-click the ESXi host on which you will deploy the OVA and select Deploy
OVF template.
4. On the Source window, type a URL path to the OVA package or click Browse
and navigate to the OVA package location, and then click Next.
5. On the Review details window, review the product details such as the product
name, version, vendor, publisher, and download size, and then click Next.
6. On the Accept License Agreements window, the EULA appears. Review the
EULA and then click Accept.
7. On the Select name and folder window, specify a name for the virtual
appliance, and optionally the inventory location, for example a datacenter or VM
folder. Click Next.
8. On the Select storage window, select disk format and the destination
datastore on which to store the virtual appliance files and then click Next.
EMC recommends that you select Thick Provision Lazy Zeroed to ensure that
amount of storage space allocated to the virtual appliance is available.
9. (Optional) On the Select resource window, select the host, vApp, or resource
pool in which to deploy the OVA, and then click Next.
10. On the Setup networks window, select the Source and Destination networks to
use with the appliance, and then click Next.
11. On the Customize template window, specify the following attributes, and then
click Next.
a. Expand Networking properties, and then perform the following tasks:
l In the Network IP address field, specify the IP address for the vProxy
appliance.
l In the Default gateway field, specify the IP address of the gateway host.
l In the Network Netmask/Prefix field, specify the netmask for an IPv4
Network IP address. vProxy backups do not support the use of IPv6
Network IP addresses.
c. Expand Timezone settings and in the Timezone setting field, select the
timezone.
Note
To set a timezone outside of the list supported by the vProxy appliance, you
need to change the timezone manually. SSH into the vProxy appliance using
root credentials and run the following command: /usr/bin/timedatectl
set-timezone new-timezone
Procedure
1. In the left panel of the Enterprise window, select the appropriate server.
2. Right-click the server, and select Launch Application.
The Administration window opens.
Many of the options for the VMware Protection solution are accessed by using
the Protection window, as shown in the following figure.
Note
When you select Deployed in Cloud, a parameter displays in the backup action
logs that indicates HypervisorMode: VMC. When the checkbox is not
selected, the parameter indicates HypervisorMode: vSphere.
7. Click OK.
Note
release or installing a cumulative hot fix. If you need to remove the VM Backup and
Recovery plug-in from the vSphere Web Client, perform the following steps.
Procedure
1. Stop the vSphere Web Client services.
2. Log into vCenter Server's MOB at http://vcenter-server/mob.
3. Click the content link.
4. Click the ExtensionManager link.
5. Click on the UnregisterExtension link.
6. Enter the value com.emc.networker and click the Invoke Method link.
7. Enter the value com.emc.networker.backup and click the Invoke Method link.
8. Enter the value com.emc.networker.recover and click the Invoke Method
link.
9. On the vCenter server, manually remove the plug-in from the /vsphere-
client-serenity folder. On vCenter 5.5, the path is /var/lib/vmware/
vsphere-client/vc-packages/vsphere-client-serenity. On
vCenter 6.0 and 6.5, the path is /etc/vmware/vsphere-client/vc-
packages/vsphere-client-serenity on Linux, and C:\ProgramData
\VMware\vCenterServer\cfg\vsphere-client\vc-packages
\vsphere-client-serenity on Windows.
10. Restart the vSphere Web Client services.
11. Perform the steps in the section Installing VM Backup and Recovery plug-in for
vSphere Web Client to re-install the VM Backup and Recovery plug-in and
verify the plug-in has been added to the vSphere Web Client.
c. In the Password field, specify the password for the admin user account on
the vProxy appliance. The default password is a3dp@m8n.
d. Specify a value in the Maximum NBD sessions or Maximum hotadd
sessions attribute, using the guidelines in the section "Performance and
Scalability."
l Maximum NBD sessions—Defines the maximum virtual machine
sessions that the vProxy appliance supports when you use the NBD
transport. Datastores should be defined in the vProxy properties when
using this setting to restrict NBD to these datastores only.
l Maximum hotadd sessions—Defines the maximum number of virtual
disks that NetWorker can concurrently hotadd to the vProxy appliance.
The default value is 13. The maximum value for this attribute is 25.
When specifying the maximum sessions value for the transport modes,
ensure that at least one transport mode is set to a value greater than 0. If
you want to enable only one of the transport modes, set the maximum
sessions for the transport mode you do not want to use to 0.
8. Click OK.
Enable the Microsoft VM App Agent for SQL Server application-consistent protection 45
Deploy the vProxy appliance and configure the NetWorker datazone
Note
A restore of the SQL Server instance or individual SQL Server databases in the
Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client will overwrite the existing database,
and there is no option to restore to a database copy.
During advanced application-consistent backup for both SQL Server FULL backup and
transaction log backup, vProxy installs or upgrades the vProxy Agent and
MSVMAPPAGENT software packages. On a new virtual machine without these
software packages installed, the vProxy Agent uses the VM Administrator Credentials
from the backup action to install the vProxy Agent, using the vCenter VIX API to copy
packages into the guest virtual machine and run the install. Once the vProxy Agent is
installed in the virtual machine, vProxy communicates with the vProxy Agent to install
the MSVMAPPAGENT package.
On a system with vProxy and MSVMAPPAGENT already installed, vProxy performs a
version check of the MSVMAPPAGENT by running the
Msvmagent_discovery.exe program to report the installed program version and, if
necessary, perform an upgrade if the vProxy software repository contains a later
version.
The following table provides a list of the MSVMAPPAGENT binaries that are called by
the vProxy, and the operations these binaries perform.
Binary Purpose When called
Msvmagent_discovery.exe Provides functions for listing program Called by vProxy to report agent version
version and for validating that SQL is and determine if an upgrade is required.
installed. Also called by vProxy to validate that
SQL Server services are running in the
virtual machine.
Note
If Msvmagent_discovery.exe does
not find running SQL Server services,
the program returns a failure to the
vProxy and the overall NetWorker
Application Consistent backup workflow
cannot proceed. To resolve the issue,
remove virtual machines that do not
have SQL from the NetWorker
Application Consistent workflow. You
can also use the action logs to diagnose
the failure, and contact Dell EMC
support if required.
Msvmagentcatsnap.exe Catalogs the SQL VSS Full backup that Called by vProxy once the virtual
was performed by VMware Tools as an machine image snapshot has completed.
App Agent VSS Full backup of SQL
Server instances. Catalog is written to
Data Domain.
Msvmagent_snapshotrestore.exe Performs restore of SQL VSS Full Called by vProxy during restore of SQL
backup. Database FULL backup.
Prior to the restore, the virtual machine
image backup is mounted on the target
virtual machine. The
Msvmagent_snapshotrestore.exe
copies the VSS manifest documents
from the backup, and uses those
documents to perform a VSS-aware
restore of the SQL database. The SQL
database files are copied from the
mounted backup VMDK to the original
location of the database, and during the
VSS post restore, the SQL VSS Writer
completes recovery of the backup. If
transaction logs are to be restored, or if
the NORECOVERY option has been
specified, the database will be left in a
NORECOVERY state.
Msvmagent_apprestore.exe Performs restore of individual SQL Called by vProxy during restore of the
transaction log backup. transaction log backup.
For each transaction log restore,
Msvmagent_apprestore.exe
receives the Data Domain path for the
backup and performs a SQL VDI restore
of the transaction log backup. For
intermediate transaction logs, the
database is left in the NORECOVERY
state. For the final transaction log
restore, the database is either recovered
or left in the NORECOVERY state if you
specify this option. The STOPAT feature
may also be used for the final
transaction log restore if you specify this
option.
Enable the Microsoft VM App Agent for SQL Server application-consistent protection 47
Deploy the vProxy appliance and configure the NetWorker datazone
l The NetWorker 9.2 MSVMAPPAGENT runs under the SYSTEM account for data
protection operations. Configure all SQL Server instances in the virtual machine to
grant NT AUTHORITY\SYSTEM account rights to perform SQL database backup
and recovery operations:
Add SYSTEM account to SQL logins.
Grant SYSTEM account the sysadmin role.
l Network connectivity, host name resolution, and firewall ports between the Data
Domain device and the virtual machines that are part of the SQL Server
application-consistent protection policy is required to allow MSVMAPPAGENT to
perform client direct operations to Data Domain.
l VMware vCenter server version 6.5 and later.
l VMware ESXi server version 6.5 and later.
l VMware Tools version 10.1 and later.
l Data Domain client direct access from the virtual machine.
l Enable the UUID attribute (disk.EnableUUID=TRUE) in the vSphere Client.
l The virtual machine must use SCSI disks only, and the number of available SCSI
slots must at least match the number of disks.
Note
The following table provides a list of special characters known to be supported in SQL
database names for English and non-English locales.
Special character FULL and transaction log FULL and transaction log
backup restore
~ Tilde Supported Supported
Special character FULL and transaction log FULL and transaction log
backup restore
: Colon Supported Supported
backed up. Some virtual machines, however, do not support CBT and you may be
required to disable CBT for those virtual machines.
A vCenter administrator can control the application of CBT by using the custom field
EMC vProxy Disable CBT. You can set this custom field to true to disable CBT, or
false to enable CBT. If you do not set this field for a virtual machine, or the field is not
present, CBT is enabled by default for that virtual machine.
To set CBT for virtual machines, perform the following:
1. Log into the vSphere Client as an administrator.
2. Click on a virtual machine in the vCenter tree, and then click the Summary tab.
3. Click Edit in the Annotation box.
4. Locate the EMC vProxy Disable CBT field, or create a string for EMC vProxy
Disable CBT. The string must match the field name exactly and is case-sensitive.
5. Set the value to true to disable CBT on the virtual machine, or to false (or leave
the field blank) to enable CBT on the virtual machine. Setting or resetting the field
for one virtual machine does not affect the other virtual machines in the vCenter.
Fixing CBT if corrupted on virtual machine
If CBT becomes corrupted on the virtual machine, warnings similar to the following
appear in the backup logs:
If these messages appear, you can use PowerCLI commands to disable and then
enable CBT without powering off the virtual machines as described in the VMware
knowledgebase article at https://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/search.do?
cmd=displayKC&docType=kc&docTypeID=DT_KB_1_1&externalId=1031873, or
perform the following steps to clean up CBT:
1. Power down the virtual machine.
2. Remove CBT flags.
3. Delete CTK files from the datastore.
4. Power ON the virtual machine.
Note
vApp l Export
l Import
l vApp application configuration
Virtual Machine
Note
In high-security environments, you can restrict the vCenter user account permissions
required to configure and administer the vProxy or VMware Backup Appliance. Table
7 on page 52 provides the account permission categories.
The following steps allow you to configure an EMC Backup and Recovery user or SSO
admin user by using the vSphere Web Client.
Procedure
1. From a web browser, access the vSphere Web Client using the following URL:
https://<Ip_address_vCenter_server>:9443/vsphere-client/
Note
When assigning permissions, the vSphere Web Client places the curser in the
location last used. Depending on what level was selected the last time you used
this window, permissions might not get applied to the root level of the vCenter.
For example, if the last item you selected in this window was Cluster Name,
permissions will be assigned at the Cluster level. Review carefully to ensure that
permissions get assigned at the root level of the vCenter.
9. Click OK.
10. From the Assigned Role drop-down list, select the role you created.
11. Confirm that the Propagate to children box is checked.
12. Click OK.
e. In the NetWork Type page, change the value in the Adapter Type field to
VMXNET 3, and assign this vNIC to the appropriate virtual machine port
group. Select the Connect at power on checkbox if it is not selected.
Figure 8 Change Adapter Type
f. Select the appropriate virtual machine port group for the production
network/VLAN, and then click Next.
g. In the Ready to Complete page, verify the information and then click
Finish.
4. Right click the vProxy appliance and select Power > Power On.
5. Configure the second NIC on the vProxy appliance:
a. After you power on the vProxy appliance, log in as root to the vProxy
appliance Console by using the vSphere Client.
b. Type yast2 to invoke the YaST configuration tool.
c. Select Network Devices and press Enter.
The Network Devices dialog appears.
d. Select Network Settings and press Enter.
The Network Settings dialog appears.
e. In the Overview tab, select the Second Ethernet Adapter labeled eth1.
f. Use the tab key to select Edit and press Enter.
g. From the Network Card Setup, use the tab key to access Statically
assigned IP Address and select using the spacebar. Use the tab key to
select IP Address and enter the IP Address, the Subnet Mask, and the host
name of the vProxy appliance. Ensure that these settings come from the
production network/VLAN.
h. Use the tab key to select Edit, and then press Enter.
i. (Optional when setting up second NIC) From Network Settings, use the tab
key to select Overview. Use the right-arrow key to select Hostname/DNS.
Use the tab key to select and then specify the following fields:
l Host name
l Domain name for the production network
l Policy for DNS configuration
l Name Server 1 for production network
l Name Server 2 for backup network
l Domain Search for both production and backup network.
j. From Network Settings, use the tab key to select Hostname/DNS.Use the
right-arrow key to select Routing, and update the routing table by setting
the Default Gateway to the gateway/address for the backup network, if not
already set.
Figure 9 Routing table with backup network gateway
m. Use the tab key to select OK, and then press Enter.
n. Use the tab key to select Quit, and then press Enter.
6. Restart the vProxy appliance.
7. Login to the vProxy appliance and confirm that you can ping the vCenter
production network IP.
You can now proceed with registering the vProxy appliance with the NetWorker
server on the backup subnet/VLAN. This will require selecting the vCenter
server running on the production network in the drop-down.
Note
You can use a non-routable private address space for the subnet used for the backup
traffic/data, providing that:
l All devices/vNICs using a private IP address exist on the same physical switch, and
l There is a DNS server on the non-routed private network so that the proxies can
perform a reverse lookup for its host name.
Note
curl -O ftp://avamar_ftp:[email protected]/software/scripts/
proxycp.jar
For sites where direct download using curl is unavailable, use WinSCP to transfer
the script to the VMware Backup appliance or external proxy.
5. Change the permissions on proxycp.jar:
Note
NetWorker does not support the migration of workflows and policies from a VMware
Backup appliance deployed in a NetWorker release previous to NetWorker 9.0 that
uses GSAN internal storage.
appliance. For example, if you want to recover from a backup performed with the
VMware Backup appliance that has not expired, you must keep the VMware Backup
appliance and at least one of the VMware Backup appliance's external proxies.
If you plan to continue using the VMware Backup appliance, make note of the
following information:
l NetWorker 9.1 and later releases require the same version of the VMware Backup
appliance as NetWorker 9.0.1, which is 1.5.1.7. If you are upgrading from
NetWorker 9.0.1, you do not need to upgrade the VMware Backup appliance
version. If you are upgrading from an earlier release, for example, from NetWorker
8.2.3 with version 1.1.3.7, you will need to upgrade the VMware Backup appliance
version to 1.5.1.7 after upgrading the NetWorker server to 9.1 and later.
l Backups run with VMware Backup appliance policies cannot be recovered using
the vProxy appliance. These backups must be recovered with the VMware Backup
appliance.
l You cannot create new policies with the VMware Backup appliance. You can only
run or edit existing policies.
l You cannot run policies with VMware Backup appliance GSAN internal storage.
l Different plug-ins are available in the vSphere Web Client for VMware Backup
appliance policies and vProxy appliance policies. For the VMware Backup
appliance, this is the EMC Backup and Recovery plug-in. For the vProxy
appliance, this is the VM Backup and Recovery plug-in. The two plug-ins can co-
exist on the same vCenter.
It is recommended to migrate all VMware Backup appliance policies to the vProxy
appliance. Note that you can still use the EMC Backup and Recovery plug-in within
the vSphere Web Client for operations that are related to the backup of still-to-be
migrated VMware Backup appliance policies, or for image-level recovery of any
backups performed with the VMware Backup appliance. However, after a policy has
been migrated to the vProxy appliance, it is no longer accessible from the VMware
Backup appliance. You must manage all such migrated policies as native NetWorker
vProxy policies from NMC, or by using the VM Backup and Recovery plug-in within
the vSphere Web Client for NetWorker 9.1 and later vProxy-based policies.
Additionally, for file-level recovery in the EMC Data Protection Restore Client, you
must use vProxy appliance backups after migrating. Recovery from older backups that
were created using the VMware Backup appliance can still be performed using the
EMC Backup and Recovery plug-in, but you must retain at least one external proxy
node.
The following table provides a list of supported and unsupported VMware Backup
appliance operations in an upgraded NetWorker 9.1 and later environment.
Table 8 Supported and unsupported VMware Backup appliance operations in a NetWorker 9.1
and later environment
l Scheduled backups of VMware Backup appliance policies l Create new VMware Backup appliance protection policies
that were created before upgrading to NetWorker 9.1 or l Image-level recovery of VMware Backup appliance
9.2
backups by using the VM Backup and Recovery plug-
l On demand (adhoc) backups of virtual machines in in the vSphere Web Client
protected by a VMware Backup appliance from NMC's
l Image-level recovery of VMware Backup appliance
Protection window
backups by using the NMC Recovery wizard
Table 8 Supported and unsupported VMware Backup appliance operations in a NetWorker 9.1
and later environment
l On demand (adhoc) backups of virtual machines l File-level recovery from VMware Backup appliance
protected by a VMware Backup appliance from the EMC backups by using the NMC Recovery wizard
Backup and Recovery plug-in in the vSphere Web l File-level recovery from VMware Backup appliance
Client backups by using the Dell EMC Data Protection
l Edit existing VMware Backup appliance protection Restore Client (vProxy)
policies (for example, to modify an existing action to point l Manage VMware Backup appliance policies by using the
to a different VMware Backup appliance)
VM Backup and Recovery plug-in in the vSphere
l Modify the VMware Backup appliance protection group to Web Client
add virtual machines to an existing group or remove
virtual machines from an existing group
l Manage vProxy policies by using the VM Backup and
Recovery plug-in in the vSphere Web Client
l Image-level recovery (to a new virtual machine, revert,
VMDK-level and instant access) from VMware Backup
appliance backups run before or after the upgrade by
using the EMC Backup and Recovery plug-in in the
vSphere Web Client
l File-level recovery from VMware Backup appliance
backups run before or after the upgrade by using the Dell
EMC Data Protection Restore Client (VBA)
l Emergency restore from VMware Backup appliance
backups run before or after the upgrade
l Create checkpoints after the upgrade by running an
integrity check using the EMC Backup and Recovery
plug-in in the vSphere Web Client
l Rollback to a desired checkpoint (to checkpoints taken
after the upgrade)
l Deploy and manage VMware Backup appliance external
proxies after the upgrade by selecting a desired VMware
Backup appliance
l Resurrect VMware Backup appliance backups run before
or after the upgrade by using the EMC Backup and
Recovery plug-in in the vSphere Web Client
l Disaster recovery of VMware Backup appliance in case of
a VMware Backup appliance failure
l Restore to the same vCenter with a newly deployed
VMware Backup appliance by using the EMC Backup
and Recovery plug-in in the vSphere Web Client
l Recovery of VMware Backup appliance backups from a
secondary site (restore to a different vCenter) with a
newly deployed VMware Backup appliance by using the
EMC Backup and Recovery plug-in in the vSphere
Web Client
Migration pre-requisites
When you migrate a VMware Backup appliance policy to a vProxy policy, a pre-check
occurs automatically to determine that compatibility requirements are met.
These requirements include verification of the following items:
l The Data Domain OS (DD-OS) is DDOS version 5.7, 6.0.0.30, 6.0.1-10, or 6.1. Note
that use of the DD Retention Lock feature on vProxy backup and clone actions
requires DDOS 6.1.
l The NetWorker server and storage node version is NetWorker 9.2.
l The vProxy is available on the vCenter server and is version 2.1.0.17 for NetWorker
9.2.
l The vCenter server is a minimum of version 5.5.
If this check discovers any compatibility issues that can cause problems migrating all
policies, the issues are reported and migration is cancelled. If using the command line
to migrate policies, you can specify a force flag (-f) to ignore these errors and
proceed with the migration to correct any issues afterwards, however it is
recommended that the pre-check requirements be met prior to proceeding with the
migration. Issues discovered during the pre-check will be logged and displayed even
when using the force flag.
Additionally, if you used IPv6 only or dual stack (IPv4 and IPv6) for the VMware
Backup appliance and are migrating to use the vProxy appliance, ensure that you
switch to IPv4 only. The vProxy appliance does not support either IPv6 or dual stack
(IPv4 and IPv6), and so the migration from the VMware Backup appliance to the
vProxy appliance will not work with these configurations. If you previously used IPv4
only, no configuration change is necessary.
Note
Results
A Migrate Operation Results dialog box opens which provides a real-time report of
the analyzation and the migration until the process completes. You can then choose to
export a log of the analyzation or migration as a report by clicking Export Log File.
Figure 12 Migrate Operation Results dialog
perform a pre-migration check before migrating. The command line supports multiple
policies for each run.
Before you begin
To perform a pre-check only before migrating, run nsrvbaupgrade -c. It is
recommended that you resolve any pre-check errors, including unsupported software
versions, before completing the migration in order for backups to complete
successfully.
Procedure
1. Open a command prompt.
2. Specify the nsrvbaupgrade command in the following format:
nsrvbaupgrade –p policy [-c] [-f] [-v] where:
l -p policy specifies one or more policies to migrate
l -c runs the pre-check only
l -f forces the migration to ignore a pre-check failure
l -v specifies verbose mode
Redeploying a vProxy
The procedure to redeploy a vProxy appliance requires you to perform the same steps
that you performed when you deployed the original vProxy host.
After you deploy the vProxy appliance, perform the following steps:
Procedure
1. Delete the vProxy by performing the steps in the section "Deleting the vProxy
host".
2. Deploy the vProxy by performing the procedures in the section "Deploy the
vProxy appliance".
3. Configure the vProxy using the steps in the section "Configuring the vProxy in
NetWorker".
passwd admin
The pam_tally2 man page provides more information about the pam_tally2
command and how to configure the maximum number of login attempts for a user
account.
Note
c. If it does not exist, add the DD Boost user to the Users with DD Boost
Access table:
a. Click the + (Add) button that is located above the table and to the right.
b. In the User list, select an existing local user, or select Create a new
Local User and then create a user account.
c. Click Add, and then click Close.
4. For FLR and IA only, on Protocols, select NFS, ensure that NFS status is
enabled, and then click OK.
The vProxy dynamically creates and deletes the NFS shares, as required.
Note
You cannot create a new policy for VMware Backup Appliance in NetWorker 9.2. You
can only modify existing VMware Backup Appliance policies. For the creation of new
policies, use the vProxy appliance.
VMware environment or for snapshot backups on a NAS device. Review the following
information about protection groups:
l Create one protection group for each workflow. Each group can be assigned to
only one workflow.
l You can add the same Client resources and save sets to more than one group at a
time.
l You can create the group before you create the workflow, or you can create the
group after you create the workflow and then assign the group to the workflow
later.
Actions
Actions are the key resources in a workflow for a data protection policy and define a
specific task, for example, a backup, clone, or snapshot. NetWorker uses a work list to
define the task. A work list is composed of one or several work items. Work items
include client resources, virtual machines, save sets, or tags. You can chain multiple
actions together to occur sequentially or concurrently in a workflow. All chained
actions use the same work list.
When you configure an action, you define the days on which to perform the action, as
well as other settings specific to the action. For example, you can specify a destination
pool, a retention period, and a target storage node for the backup action, which can
differ from the subsequent action that clones the data.
You can create multiple actions for a single workflow. However, each action applies to
a single workflow and policy.
The following figure provides a high level overview of the components that make up a
data protection policy in a datazone.
Figure 13 Data Protection Policy
Note
Each preconfigured data protection policy provides the following best practices that
you should follow when you design the data protection solution:
l Separate the file system backups from application database backups, to provide
ease of access at recovery time.
l Stagger the start times for the file system backups and the application database
backups, to prevent disk contention on the target hosts.
Each default data protection policy mimics the requirements of a service provider, and
are designed to provide protection that is based on service-level agreements.
Platinum policy
The Platinum policy provides an example of a data protection policy for an
environment that contains supported storage arrays or storage appliances and
requires backup data redundancy. The policy contains one workflow with two actions,
a snapshot backup action, followed by a clone action.
Figure 14 Platinum policy configuration
Gold policy
The Gold policy provides an example of a data protection policy for an environment
that contains virtual machines and requires backup data redundancy. The policy
contains two workflows, one to protect Hyper-V hosts and one to protect VMware
hosts. Each workflow contains a backup action followed by a clone action.
Figure 15 Gold policy configuration
Silver policy
The Silver policy provides an example of a data protection policy for an environment
that contains non-virtualized machines and requires backup data redundancy. The
policy contains two workflows, one to protect hosts file systems and one to protect
database applications. Each workflow contains a backup action followed by a clone
action.
Bronze policy
The Bronze policy provides an example of a data protection policy for an environment
that contains non-virtualized machines. The policy contains two workflows, one to
protect hosts file systems and one to protect database applications. Each workflow
contains a backup action.
Figure 17 Bronze policy configuration
Note
nsrlog -f policy_notifications.log
l On Linux, to send an email notification, type the following command:
where:
n -s subject—Includes a standard email header with the message and
specifies the subject text for that header. Without this option, the
smtpmail program assumes that the message contains a correctly
formatted email header and nothing is added.
n -h mailserver—Specifies the hostname of the mail server to use to
relay the SMTP email message.
n recipient1@mailserver—Is the email address of the recipient of the
notification. Multiple email recipients are separated by a space.
7. In the Restricted Data Zones tab, leave the Restricted Data Zone field blank.
NetWorker VMware Protection with the vProxy appliance does not currently
support the protection of virtual machines within a Restricted Data Zone.
8. Click OK.
After you finish
Create the workflows and actions for the policy.
Creating a workflow
The policy workflow defines a list of actions to perform sequentially or concurrently, a
schedule window during which the workflow can run, and the client resource or save
Creating a workflow 75
Protecting virtual machines
set group to which the workflow applies. You can create a workflow when you create a
new policy, or you can create a workflow for an existing policy.
nsrlog -f policy_notifications.log
l On Linux, to send an email notification, type the following command:
where:
n -s subject—Includes a standard email header with the message and
specifies the subject text for that header. Without this option, the
smtpmail program assumes that the message contains a correctly
formatted email header and nothing is added.
n -h mailserver—Specifies the hostname of the mail server to use to
relay the SMTP email message.
n recipient1@mailserver—Is the email address of the recipient of the
notification. Multiple email recipients are separated by a space.
8. In the Running section, perform the following steps to specify when and how
often the workflow runs:
a. To ensure that the actions that are contained in the workflow run when the
policy or workflow starts, in the Enabled box, leave the option selected. To
prevent the actions in the workflow from running when the policy or
workflow that contains the action starts, clear this option.
b. To start the workflow at the time that is specified in the Start time
attribute, on the days that are defined in the action resource, in the
AutoStart Enabled box, leave the option selected. To prevent the workflow
from starting at the time that is specified in the Start time attribute, clear
this option.
c. To specify the time to start the actions in the workflow, in the Start Time
attribute, use the spin boxes.
The default value is 9:00 PM.
d. To specify how frequently to run the actions that are defined in the
workflow over a 24-hour period, use the Interval attribute spin boxes. If you
are performing transaction log backup as part of application-consistent
protection, you must specify a value for this attribute in order for
incremental transaction log backup of SQL databases to occur.
The default Interval attribute value is 24 hours, or once a day. When you
select a value that is less than 24 hours, the Interval End attribute appears.
To specify the last start time in a defined interval period, use the spin boxes.
Creating a workflow 77
Protecting virtual machines
nsrlog -f policy_notifications.log
l On Linux, to send an email notification, type the following command:
10. In the Running section, perform the following steps to specify when and how
often the workflow runs:
a. To ensure that the actions that are contained in the workflow run when the
policy or workflow starts, in the Enabled box, leave the option selected. To
prevent the actions in the workflow from running when the policy or
workflow that contains the action starts, clear this option.
b. To start the workflow at the time that is specified in the Start time
attribute, on the days that are defined in the action resource, in the
AutoStart Enabled box, leave the option selected. To prevent the workflow
from starting at the time that is specified in the Start time attribute, clear
this option.
c. To specify the time to start the actions in the workflow, in the Start Time
attribute, use the spin boxes.
The default value is 9:00 PM.
d. To specify how frequently to run the actions that are defined in the
workflow over a 24-hour period, use the Interval attribute spin boxes. If you
are performing transaction log backup as part of application-consistent
protection, you must specify a value for this attribute in order for
incremental transaction log backup of SQL databases to occur.
The default Interval attribute value is 24 hours, or once a day. When you
select a value that is less than 24 hours, the Interval End attribute appears.
To specify the last start time in a defined interval period, use the spin boxes.
e. To specify the duration of time in which NetWorker can manually or
automatically restart a failed or canceled workflow, in the Restart Window
attribute, use the spin boxes.
If the restart window has elapsed, NetWorker considers the restart as a new
run of the workflow. NetWorker calculates the restart window from the start
of the last incomplete workflow. The default value is 24 hours.
For example, if the Start Time is 7:00 PM, the Interval is 1 hour, and the
Interval End is 11:00 PM., then the workflow automatically starts every hour
beginning at 7:00 PM. and the last start time is 11:00 PM.
11. In the Groups group box, specify the protection group to which the workflow
applies.
Creating a workflow 79
Protecting virtual machines
To use a group, select a protection group from the Groups list. To create a
protection group, click the + button that is located to the right of the Groups
list.
12. The Actions table displays a list of actions in the workflow. To edit or delete an
action in the workflow, select the action and click Edit or Delete. To create one
or more actions for the workflow, click Add.
The Actions table organizes the information in sortable columns. Right-click in
the table to customize the attributes that appear.
13. To create the workflow, click OK.
Note
Note
You can also assign the group to a workflow when you create or edit a
workflow.
9. From the vCenter list, select the vCenter with the virtual machines or VMDKs,
or click + to add the vCenter by using the group properties, and then select the
objects to protect.
For example, you can select a Data Center, ESX host, virtual machine, resource
pool, vApp, or disk.
Note
If the vCenter list is empty, cancel the task and using the NMC Protection
window, right-click VMware View in the left pane, and select Refresh.
VMware actions
Actions are the key resources in a workflow for a data protection policy. An action is
the task that occurs on the client resources in the group assigned to the workflow.
You can chain multiple actions together to occur sequentially or concurrently in a
workflow.
When you create an action for a policy that is associated with the virtual machine
backup, you can select one of the following data protection action types:
l Backup (Backup Subtype—VMware (vProxy))—Performs a backup of virtual
machines in vCenter to a Data Domain system. You can only perform one VMware
backup action per workflow. The VMware backup action must occur before clone
actions.
l Clone—Performs a clone of the VMware backup on a Data Domain system to any
clone device that NetWorker supports (including Data Domain system or tape
targets). You can specify multiple clone actions. Clone actions must occur after
the Backup action.
Note
When you clear the Enabled option, actions that occurs after a disabled action
do not start, even if the subsequent options are enabled.
Note
Any backup level that displays in the wizard but is not identified in this table is
not supported for VMware.
VMware actions 83
Protecting virtual machines
Note
To perform the same type of backup on each day, select the backup type from
the list and click Make All.
Note
12. From the Destination Storage Node box, select the storage node that contains
the devices where you want to store the backup data.
Note
When you deploy the vCenter server in the Cloud, a parameter displays in the
backup action logs that indicates HypervisorMode: VMC. When not deployed
in the Cloud, the parameter indicates HypervisorMode: vSphere.
13. From the Retention spin boxes, specify the amount of time to retain the
backup data.
After the retention period expires, the save set is removed from the client file
index and marked as recyclable in the media database during an expiration
server maintenance task.
14. Select the Apply DD Retention Lock checkbox to enable retention lock for the
virtual machines included in this backup action. Note that the device used for
backing up these virtual machines must also have DD Retention lock enabled in
the NMC Device Properties window, or DD Retention Lock must be enabled
during device creation.
15. In the DD Retention Lock Time box, specify the duration the virtual machines
will remain on the Data Domain device before the retention lock expires. During
this time, these virtual machine backups cannot be overwritten, modified, or
deleted for the duration of the retention period, although the backups can be
mounted and unmounted. The retention time period set here must fall within the
minimum and maximum values set for the Data Domain Mtree, and should be
lower than or equal to the NetWorker Retention Period.
VMware actions 85
Protecting virtual machines
Note
Note
Note
25. From the Send Notifications list box, select whether to send notifications for
the action:
l To use the notification configuration that is defined in the Policy resource to
send the notification, select Set at policy level.
l To send a notification on completion of the action, select On Completion.
l To send a notification only if the action fails to complete, select On Failure.
26. In the Send notification attribute, when you select the On Completion option
or On failure option, the Command box appears. Use this box to configure how
NetWorker sends the notifications. You can use the nsrlog command to send
the notifications to a log file or you can send an email notification.
The default notification action is to send the information to the
policy_notifications.log file. By default, the
policy_notifications.log file is located in the /nsr/logs directory on
Linux and in the C:\Program Files\EMC NetWorker\nsr\logs folder on
Windows.
Use the default mailer program on Linux to send email messages or the
smtpmail application on Windows:
VMware actions 87
Protecting virtual machines
nsrlog -f policy_notifications.log
l On Linux, to send an email notification, type the following command:
Note
When you clear the Enabled option, actions that occurs after a disabled action
do not start, even if the subsequent options are enabled.
VMware actions 89
Protecting virtual machines
d. From the Retention list, specify the amount of time to retain the cloned
save sets. After the retention period expires, the save sets are marked as
recyclable during an expiration server maintenance task.
12. Click Next.
The Specify the Advanced Options page appears.
13. Configure advanced options, including notifications and schedule overrides.
Note
Although the Retries, Retry Delay, or the Inactivity Timeout options appear,
the clone action does not support these options and ignores the values.
14. In the Parallelism field, specify the maximum number of concurrent operations
for the action. This value should not exceed 25.
15. From the Failure Impact list, specify what to do when a job fails:
l To continue the workflow when there are job failures, select Continue.
l To abort the entire workflow if there is a failure with one of the jobs in the
action, select Abort workflow.
Note
If any of the actions fail in the workflow, the workflow status does not appear
as interrupted or cancelled. NetWorker reports the workflow status as failed.
16. From the Send Notifications list box, select whether to send notifications for
the action:
l To use the notification configuration that is defined in the Policy resource to
send the notification, select Set at policy level.
l To send a notification on completion of the action, select On Completion.
l To send a notification only if the action fails to complete, select On Failure.
17. In the Send notification attribute, when you select the On Completion option
or On failure option, the Command box appears. Use this box to configure how
NetWorker sends the notifications. You can use the nsrlog command to send
the notifications to a log file or you can send an email notification.
The default notification action is to send the information to the
policy_notifications.log file. By default, the
policy_notifications.log file is located in the /nsr/logs directory on
Linux and in the C:\Program Files\EMC NetWorker\nsr\logs folder on
Windows.
Use the default mailer program on Linux to send email messages or the
smtpmail application on Windows:
l To send notifications to a file, type the following command, where
policy_notifications.log is the name of the file:
nsrlog -f policy_notifications.log
l On Linux, to send an email notification, type the following command:
where:
n -s subject—Includes a standard email header with the message and
specifies the subject text for that header. Without this option, the
smtpmail program assumes that the message contains a correctly
formatted email header and nothing is added.
n -h mailserver—Specifies the hostname of the mail server to use to
relay the SMTP email message.
n recipient1@mailserver—Is the email address of the recipient of the
notification. Multiple email recipients are separated by a space.
18. From the Soft Limit list, select the amount of time after the action starts to
stop the initiation of new activities. The default value of 0 (zero) indicates no
amount of time.
19. From the Hard Limit list, select the amount of time after the action starts to
begin terminating activities. The default value of 0 (zero) indicates no amount
of time.
20. Optional, in Start Time specify the time to start the action.
Use the spin boxes to set the hour and minute values, and select one of the
following options from the drop-down list:
l Disabled—Do not enforce an action start time. The action will start at the
time defined by the workflow.
l Absolute—Start the action at the time specified by the values in the spin
boxes.
l Relative—Start the action after the period of time defined in the spin boxes
has elapsed after the start of the workflow.
21. (Optional) Configure overrides for the task that is scheduled on a specific day.
To specify the month, use the navigation buttons and the month list box. To
specify the year, use the spin boxes. You can set an override in the following
ways:
l Select the day in the calendar, which changes the action task for the
specific day.
l Use the action task list to select the task, and then perform one of the
following steps:
n To define an override that occurs on a specific day of the week, every
week, select Specified day, and then use the lists. Click Add Rules
based override.
n To define an override that occurs on the last day of the calendar month,
select Last day of the month. Click Add Rules based override.
n In the Override field, type an override.
Note
VMware actions 91
Protecting virtual machines
transaction log backup in the Policy Action wizard, the transaction log backup will
occur as part of incremental backups after the initial full backup, at the interval set in
the workflow properties.
The Media window displays the save sets contained within the policy. If the save sets
are additionally part of an application-consistent policy, a green check mark appears in
the VM App Consistent column.
Figure 21 VMware protection policy save sets in Media window
In the Host Name field, type the IP address of the host, and provide the vCenter
Server username and password credentials. Additionally, in NetWorker 9.2.1 and later,
if the vCenter server is deployed in the Cloud, select the Deployed in Cloud
checkbox, and then click OK.
Note
When you select Deployed in Cloud, a parameter displays in the backup action logs
that indicates HypervisorMode: VMC. When the checkbox is not selected, the
parameter indicates HypervisorMode: vSphere.
When you add the vCenter server to VMware View, the following actions occur:
l A visual or tabular representation of the vCenter environment appears in the
VMware View window.
l A client resource is created for the vCenter server with the vProxy backup type.
Using VMware View, you can also assign the policies you created in "VMware data
protection policies in NMC."
The following sections describe the options that are available in VMware View.
To refine items displayed in the right details pane, select containers in the
Virtualization node hierarchy in the left pane. For example, if an individual Cluster is
selected in the Virtualization node, only child elements associated with that Cluster
display.
To filter the visible items to show only protected VMs, unprotected VMs, or
overprotected VMs, click the links located above the right pane, as shown in the
following figure.
Figure 25 Filtering results in VMware View
Note
Table view only displays information for virtual machines. It does not show any details
about VMDKs. You must use Map view to display those details.
The filtering function works the same in Table view as in Map view. Links provided
above the details pane allow you to display only overprotected virtual machines,
unprotected virtual machines, or all virtual machines in the environment. The
NetWorker Administration Guide provides general information on using tables in the
Administration window.
Note
In Table view, the Host field contains an undefined value for virtual machines or
containers that are part of a cluster. The Map view provides a link to the cluster.
Note
Disconnecting an ESX server from a vCenter server only temporarily disconnects the
server and does not remove the server. To permanently remove the ESX server from
the vCenter inventory, use the Remove command from vCenter.
Note
Backup and recovery operations in the vSphere Web Client VM Backup and
Recovery interface are not supported for SQL Server advanced application-
consistent protection policies. Perform these operations from the NMC NetWorker
Administration window or the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client.
Results
The Active Directory user that you create using these steps will only have access to
the vSphere Web Client VM Backup and Recovery interface, and cannot be used to
log in to NetWorker Management Console. If you also need to provide access to NMC,
then add those required privileges accordingly.
3. Highlight the policy and workflow you want to run and click Backup now in the
top-right corner.
Results
You can monitor the progress of the backup in the Running tab of the Recent Tasks
pane.
4. Select any virtual machines or VMDKs in the inventory you want to protect with
this workflow and click Finish.
Results
Any virtual machines or VMDKs added to the workflow appear under Sources in the
bottom of the Backup pane.
SQL Server application-consistent backups fail with error "Unable to find VSS metadata files in
directory"
SQL Server application-consistent virtual machine backups might fail with the
following error when the disk.enableUUDI variable for the virtual machine is set to
False.
Unable to find VSS metadata files in directory C:\Program Files
\DPSAPPS\MSVMAPPAGENT\tmp\VSSMetadata.xxxx.
To resolve this issue, ensure that the disk.enableUUDI variable for the virtual machines
included in an SQL Server application-consistent backup is set to True.
Failed to lock Virtual Machine for backup: Another EMC vProxy operation 'Backup' is active on
VM
This error message appears when a backup fails for a virtual machine, when previous
backups of the virtual machine was abruptly ended and the VM annotation string was
not cleared.
To resolve this issue, clear the annotation string value for the virtual machine.
1. Connect to the vCenter server and navigate Home > Inventory > Hosts and
Clusters.
2. Select the virtual machine, and then select the Summary tab.
3. Clear the value that appears in the EMC Proxy Session field.
“The following items could not be located and were not selected {client name}.”
This error can occur when the backed up VM(s) cannot be located during Edit of a
backup job. This is a known issue.
Windows 2008 R2 VMs may fail to backup with “disk.EnableUUID” configured to “true.”
Windows 2008 R2 backups may fail if the VM is configured with the disk.EnableUUID
parameter set to true. To correct this problem, manually update the vmx configuration
parameter disk.EnableUUID to false by using the vSphere Web Client:
1. Shut down the VM by right clicking the VM and selecting Shut Down Guest OS.
2. Right click the VM and select Edit Settings.
3. Click VM Options.
4. Expand the Advanced section and click Edit Configuration.
5. Locate the name disk.EnableUUId and set the value to false.
6. Click OK on the next two pages.
7. Right click the VM and select Power On.
After you update the configuration parameter, the backups of the Windows 2008 R2
VM should succeed.
When VMs are moved in or out of different cluster groups, associated backup sources may be
lost
When you move hosts into clusters with the option to retain the resource pools and
vApps, the containers get recreated, not copied. As a result, the container is no longer
the same container even though the name is the same. To resolve this issue, validate
or recreate any backup jobs that protect containers after moving hosts in or out of a
cluster.
Backups fail if certain characters are used in the virtual machine name, datastore, folder, or
datacenter names
When you use spaces or special characters in the virtual machine name, datastore,
folder, or datacenter names, the .vmx file is not included in the backup. The vProxy
appliance and VMware Backup appliance do not back up objects that include the
following special characters, in the format of character/escape sequence:
l & %26
l + %2B
l / %2F
l = %3D
l ? %3F
l % %25
l \ %5C
l ~ %7E
l ] %5D
To resolve this issue, increase the values in the max target sessions and target
sessions attributes for the clone device. The NetWorker Administration Guide describes
how to modify the properties of a device.
Backups failing for virtual machines containing both hotadd disks and disks that do not support
hotadd mode such as IDE and SATA
If a virtual machine includes a mix of disks with hotadd mode and disks that do not
support hotadd mode (such as IDE and SATA disks), and at least one vProxy appliance
has non-zero limits for both hotadd and NBD modes, backups fail with the following
error:
VM failed configuration checks. Virtual Disk "Hard disk 1" does
not support HotAdd mode.
Workaround
Create a separate group for the virtual machines that require NBD mode, and deploy a
separate vProxy appliance for handling NBD backups. For this separate vProxy, set
the properties within NMC for the hotadd limit to zero and the NBD limit to the
required non-zero value. Ensure that you manually associate the NBD proxy with the
backup action of the policy workflow.
Lock placed on virtual machine during backup and recovery operations continues for 24 hours if
vProxy appliance fails
During vProxy backup and recovery operations, a lock is placed on the virtual machine.
If a vProxy appliance failure occurs during one of these sessions, the lock gets
extended to a period of 24 hours, during which full backups and transaction log
backups will fail with the following error until the lock is manually released:
Cannot lock VM 'W2K8R2-SQL-2014' (vm-522): Another EMC vProxy
operation 'Backup' is active on VM vm-522.
Workaround
To manually release the lock on the virtual machine:
1. Open the vSphere Web Client.
2. Click on the virtual machine and select Summary.
3. Select Custom attribute and click Edit.
4. Remove the attribute EMC vProxy Session.
System System databases are automatically skipped for transaction log backup.
Database
Database State Database is not in a state that allows backup. For example, the database is in
the NORECOVERY state.
Recovery Database is in SIMPLE recovery model, which does not support transaction
Model log backup
Other Backup Most recent backup for the database was performed by a different backup
Product product.
New Database Database was created after most recent full backup.
Backup Failure Database was in state to allow backup, backup was attempted, but backup
failed.
All skipped databases will be backed up as part of the next full backup. Also, a skipped
database will not result in msvmagent_appbackup.exe failure. The only instance in
which msvmagent_appbackup.exe would potentially fail is if all databases failed to
back up.
On the NetWorker server, the location of log files for individual backups differ on
Windows and LINUX:
l Linux—/nsr/logs/policy/policy_name
l Windows—C:\Program Files\EMC NetWorker\logs\policy
\policy_name
where policy_name is the name of the policy resource associated with the backup
action.
Additional logging with the VMBackup broker
Debug logging of the vmbackup broker of nsrd is disabled by default. To turn on
additional logging, you can touch an empty file at <nsr>/tmp/vmbackup_logging.
Enabling of additional logging can be performed while other operations are in progress,
and a NetWorker restart is not required. To turn off additional logging, you can
remove the same file.
Note
If you are accessing NMC from a remote machine that cannot communicate with
vProxy, NMC fails to collect the log bundle.
Note
The NetWorker Data Domain Boost Integration Guide provides information about
the Cloud unit field and use of the Cloud tier device.
Entering management credentials for the Data Domain resource (instant recovery and User mode file-level restore only) 111
Recover virtual machines and data
Domain user setup for file level recovery in the NMC Recovery wizard
In order to perform file level recovery as a domain user in the NMC Recovery wizard,
you need to add and register this user by performing the following steps.
Procedure
1. Create a tenant user on NetWorker by running the authc_config command.
For example, open a command prompt and cd to C:\Users\Administrator,
and then type authc_config -u administrator -e add-tenant -D
tenant-name=FLR -D tenant-alias FLR -p Emclegato@123
2. Obtain the tenant ID by running the following command:
cn=flruser01,ou=users,ou=vproxy,dc=v12nblr,dc=com
9. Repeat step 8 for the Console Security Administrator and Console User. For
example:
10. Navigate to the NMC Enterprise window, right-click the server and select
Launch Application... to open the NMC Administration window.
11. Click Server to open the Server window.
12. In the left navigation pane, select User Groups to display the users in the right
pane.
13. Provide the following user details in the External Roles field for the following
users:
l Application Administrators:
cn=flruser01,ou=users,ou=vproxy,dc=v12nblr,dc=com
l Users: cn=flruser01,ou=users,ou=vproxy,dc=v12nblr,dc=com
l VMware FLR Users:
cn=flruser01,ou=users,ou=vproxy,dc=v12nblr,dc=com
14. After registering the user as external domain, log in to the virtual machine as a
domain user.
15. Re-launch the NetWorker Management Console's Administration window and
log in as the domain user. For example, FLR\v12nblr\flruser02.
Results
You can now perform file level recovery in the NMC Recovery wizard as a domain
user.
After selecting a virtual machine recovery, you can perform recovery of individual
virtual machines, or recover from multiple virtual machines (Revert and Virtual
Machine recovery methods only).
Procedure
1. In the Select the Recovery Type page, select Virtual Machine Recovery, and
then select a vCenter server to recover from using the Source vCenter server
drop-down. Click Next.
2. In the Select the Virtual Machine to Recover page, enter the name of the
source virtual machine(s) to recover from, or perform a search for the virtual
machine. Additionally, you can use the tabs on this page to choose a single
virtual machine or multiple virtual machines from a selected backup, or browse
the source vCenter to determine the required virtual machine source. When you
locate and choose the desired virtual machine(s), click Next.
3. In the Select the Target Backups page, select the virtual machine backup(s)
you want to restore from the Available Backups pane. This pane lists both
primary backups and, if available, clone copies. If you selected recovery from
multiple virtual machines, you can switch between virtual machines to browse
each machine's available backups by using the Virtual Machine Name drop-
down. Click Next.
4. In the Select the Virtual Machine Recovery method page, select from one of
the available recovery methods:
l Revert (or rollback) a virtual machine
l Instant Recovery of a virtual machine (direct restore from a Data Domain
device)
l Virtual Machine recovery (recovery to a new virtual machine)
l Virtual Disk recovery (recover VMDKs to an existing virtual machine)
l Emergency recovery (recovery to an ESX host)
l File Level recovery
Figure 36 Select the Virtual Machine Recovery method
Results
Subsequent wizard options change based on the recovery method selected, as
described in the following sections.
Note
You cannot use the Revert a Virtual Machine recovery method when the ESXi has
been removed from the vCenter and then added back to the vCenter. In this case, use
the Virtual Machine recovery method instead.
To complete the Recovery wizard with the reverting a virtual machine method,
perform the following.
Procedure
1. In the Select the Virtual Machine Recovery Method page:
a. Select Revert a Virtual Machine.
b. Click Next.
The Select Options to Revert a Virtual Machine page displays
2. In the Revert Type pane of the Select Options to Revert a Virtual Machine
page:
a. Select Revert both VM configuration and data to revert both the
configuration information (such as operating system, virtual machine size)
and data for a virtual machine. When you select this revert type, the Delete
existing disk on disk configuration mismatch option appears in the Revert
Options pane to allow you to overwrite an existing disk if a configuration
mismatch occurs.
b. Select Revert VM Data Only to revert only the virtual machine data without
changing the virtual machine configuration.
3. In the Revert Options pane of the Select Options to Revert a Virtual
Machine page, choose from the following options
a. Select Revert all disks on this virtual machine to rollback all VMDKs, or
select Revert one or more disks only and then select a specific disk drive to
rollback only that disk.
b. Select the Power on virtual machine checkbox to power on the virtual
machine after the restore.
c. Select Delete existing disk on disk configuration mismatch if you want to
be presented with the option of deleting the existing disk if a disk
configuration mismatch is detected. Note that this option only appears when
you select the Revert both VM configuration and data revert type in step
two.
d. Click Next.
Note
Note
The entire VMDK will be rolled back unless you have CBT enabled, in which case
only the changed blocks will be moved.
Procedure
1. In the Select the Virtual Machine Recovery Method page:
a. Select Instant Recovery.
b. Click Next.
2. In the Configure the Instant Recovery Options page:
a. Select the location where you want to restore the virtual machine in the
vCenter environment.
This does not have to be the original location, and can also be on a different
vCenter server.
b. Ensure that you select the Power on virtual machine and Reconnect to
network options.
c. Click Next.
Figure 39 Configure the Instant Recovery
Note
Note
Recoveries of virtual machines backed up with the VMware Backup Appliance should
still be performed with the EMC Backup and Recovery user interface in the vSphere
Web Client.
To complete the Recovery wizard with the virtual machine recovery method, perform
the following.
Procedure
1. In the Select the Virtual Machine Recovery Method page:
a. Select Virtual Machine Recovery.
b. Click Next.
2. In the Configure the Virtual Machine Recovery page, select the location
where you want to restore the virtual machine in the vCenter environment
a. In the Destination pane, select the option to recover the new virtual
machine to the original location, or browse to select a new location on the
same vCenter server or a different vCenter server.
b. In the Recovery Options pane, specify the name of the new virtual machine,
and then optionally select the virtual machine file datastore and the folder
where you want to recover the files. You can recover the virtual machine to
a Blue folder by using the VM Folder drop-down, as shown in the following
figure. The folder can be the default folder, or a new folder.
If you have a single disks, or multiple disks with multiple datastores, you can
perform the following:
l Choose to recover a collection of all the available hard drives.
l Select a different datastore than the original datastore.
l Select a different datatore for each disk you want to recover.
l Specify the datastore where the virtual machine configuration files reside.
Optionally, select the Power on virtual machine and Reconnect to network
options to power on and reconnect after the recovery, and then click Next.
Note
Results
The Check the Recovery Results page will display the duration of the recovery, and a
log file entry when the virtual machine recovery is complete.
c. Click Next.
4. In the Perform the Recovery page:
a. Specify a name for the recovery.
b. Check the summary at the bottom of the page to ensure all the details are
correct.
c. Click Run Recovery.
Results
The Check the Recovery Results page will display the duration of the recovery, and a
log file entry when the disk recovery is complete.
Note
When you start a VMDK recovery, the virtual machine will be powered off
automatically without issuing a warning message.
Emergency Recovery
The next virtual machine recovery option available in the NMC Recovery wizard is an
Emergency Recovery. An Emergency Recovery is required when you need to restore
the virtual machine to an ESXi host.
Before you begin
Emergency Recovery requires a vProxy set up on the ESXi host prior to running the
recovery.
Additionally, ensure that you disconnect the ESXi host from the vCenter server.
Note
During an Emergency Recovery, the vProxy gets associated with the ESXi host and is
unavailable for other operations on the vCenter server. Wait until the recovery
completes before initiating any other operations on the vProxy.
To complete the Recovery wizard with the Emergency Recovery method, perform the
following:
Procedure
1. In the Select the Virtual Machine Recovery Method page:
a. Select Emergency Recovery.
b. Click Next.
2. In the Configure the Emergency Recovery page:
a. Specify the target ESXi server in the vCenter environment.
b. Click Connect.
The Proxy Selection and Recovery Data panes get populated with the ESXi
server details.
3. In the Proxy Selection pane, if a proxy is not discovered, add a new proxy
which is deployed in vCenter but not added to NetWorker.
4. For the disks in the Recovery Data pane:
a. Select a datastore.
b. Optionally, select the Power on virtual machine and Reconnect to
network options.
c. Click Next.
5. In the Select Alternate Recovery Sources page:
a. Select the original disk backup, or a clone copy if one is available.
b. If recovering from a clone that is not on a Data Domain device, or recovering
from a Data Domain Cloud Tier device, specify the staging pool.
6. In the Perform the Recovery page:
a. Specify a name for the recovery and check the summary at the bottom of
the page to ensure all the details are correct.
b. Click Run Recovery.
Results
The Check the Recovery Results page will display a progress bar with the duration of
the recovery, and a log file entry when the Emergency Recovery is complete.
Note
The progress bar may not update correctly when you perform an Emergency Recovery
directly to the ESXi host.
Note
File level recovery in the NMC Recovery wizard can only be performed by an
administrator.
To complete the Recovery wizard with the file level recovery method, perform the
following:
Procedure
1. In the Select the Virtual Machine Recovery Method page:
a. Select File Level recovery.
b. Click Next.
2. In the Select Alternate Recovery Sources page:
a. Select the primary backup to recover from, or select the Recover the
Virtual machine from a clone on a Data Domain device option.
b. Select the clone copy that you want to recover files from.
c. Click Next.
Note
Note
When the Mount Results pane shows that the mount has succeeded, click
Next.
Note
This user should have privileges to install the FLR Agent, which is required to
perform file level recovery. For Linux virtual machines, this requires the root
user account.
Note
NetWorker does not currently support creating folders with spaces in the folder
name.
Results
The Check the Recovery Results page displays the duration of the recovery, and a
log file entry when the file level recovery is complete.
Procedure
1. In the Select Alternative Recovery Sources page, select the clone you want to
recover from, either a clone on a Data Domain device or non-Data Domain
device.
Additionally, make note of the name indicated in the Volume column for all of
the volumes you do not want to recover from, as you will require this
information in steps 5 and 6.
2. Click Close to display the Save Progress dialog, and then specify a name for
the recover and click Save to save your progress.
3. In the NMC Administration window, click Devices to display the Devices
window.
4. In the left navigation pane, select Devices. The list of devices displays in the
right pane.
5. For each volume you do not want to recover from that you made note of in step
1, locate the corresponding device, and make note of that device name.
6. For each device you identify as corresponding with those volumes, right-click
the device and select Unmount from the drop-down, and then also select
Disable from the drop-down.
Note
Note
10. In the Perform the Recovery page, specify a name for the recovery and check
the summary at the bottom of the page to ensure all the details are correct.
Click Run Recovery.
The Check the Recovery Results page will display the duration of the
recovery, and a log file entry when the recovery is complete.
11. In the NMC Administration window, click Devices to return to the Devices
window, and in the left navigation pane, select Devices to display the list of
devices in the right pane.
12. For each device that you unmounted and disabled in step 6, right-click the
device and select Enable from the drop-down, and then select Mount from the
drop-down.
NOTICE
NetWorker removes the recover log file and the job information from the job
database based on value of the Jobsdb retention in hours attribute in the
properties of the NetWorker server resource. The default jobsdb retention is 72
hours.
Note
Before you start a file-level restore, review the prerequisites in the section File-level
restore prerequisites, as well as FLR limitations to ensure that you can perform file-
level restores in your configuration.
vProxy recovery in the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client 131
Recover virtual machines and data
File-level restore and SQL database/instance level restore only supported from primary or clone
backup on a Data Domain device
NetWorker only supports file-level restore and SQL database/instance level restore
operations from a primary or cloned backup when the save set is on a Data Domain
device.
If a cloned backup does not exist on the Data Domain device, you must manually clone
a save set from the tape device to Data Domain before launching the Dell EMC Data
Protection Restore Client.
If backups reside on a non-Data Domain Device such as Cloud Boost, tape, Cloud Tier,
or AFTD, the backups do not display in the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore
Client.
If the FLR Agent was not installed and you initiate a file-level restore, the following
message appears.
Figure 46 Deploy FLR Agent if not found
This message provides an option to deploy the FLR Agent by providing the appropriate
credentials.
On Linux, to perform a file-level restore using a non-root user, ensure that the FLR
Agent has already been installed on the target virtual machine using the root user
account. Otherwise, ensure that you are using a supported platform and the root user
is specified, and click OK.
On Windows, to perform a file-level restore using a non-administrator user, ensure
that the FLR Agent is already installed on the target machine using administrative
privileges. Otherwise, ensure that an administrative user is specified, and click OK.
FLR Agent installation on Windows virtual machines with User Account Control
(UAC) enabled
Performing the FLR Agent installation on UAC-enabled Windows virtual machine
requires you to either provide the credentials of the administrator user, or to disable
UAC during the FLR Agent installation, and then re-enable on completion.
On Windows versions 7, 8, and 10, the administrator account is disabled by default. To
enable the account, complete the following steps:
1. To activate the account, open a command prompt in administrative mode, and
then type net user administrator /active: yes.
2. To set a password for the administrator account, go to Control Panel > User
Accounts and select the Advanced tab. Initially, the account password is blank.
3. In the User Accounts pane, right-click the user and select Properties, and then
clear the Account is disabled option.
To disable UAC during the FLR Agent installation and then re-enable on completion of
the installation, complete the following steps:
1. In the FLR Agent installation window, select the Keep vProxy FLR on target
virtual machine option.
2. Open regedit and change the EnableLUA registry key value at HKLM\SOFTWARE
\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Policies\System to
0x00000000. By default, this is set to 1.
3. Proceed with the FLR Agent installation.
4. Open regedit and reset the EnableLUA registry key to the previous value to re-
enable UAC.
NetWorker privileges required by File-level restore and SQL database/instance level restore
users
A new user group, VMware FLR Users, requires NetWorker privileges for User and
Admin logins to perform file-level restore and SQL database/instance level restore
operations in the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client.
Specify the following privileges for the VMware FLR Users group by using the NMC
NetWorker Administration window or nsradmin.
User Admin
Remote Access All Clients Remote Access All Clients
Note
On Linux LVM, LVM2 rpm version 2.02.117 or later is required. Also, additional binaries
required on Linux LVM include dmsetup, lvm, and vgimportclone.
Entering management credentials for the Data Domain resource (instant recovery and User
mode file-level restore only)
When you perform an instant recovery of a virtual machine, or file-level restore (User
mode), ensure that you provide the management credentials for the Data Domain
resource before you initiate the recovery. For instant recovery, these credentials are
required when performing the recovery using the NMC Recover wizard or the VM
Backup and Recovery plug-in in the vSphere Web Client.
Procedure
1. In the NMC Administration window, click Devices.
The Devices window displays.
2. In the expanded left navigation pane, select Data Domain Systems.
3. In the right details pane, right-click the Data Domain system, and then select
Properties.
The NSR Data Domain Properties window displays.
Figure 47 NSR Data Domain Properties
d. In the Management port field, specify the management port. By default, the
port is 3009.
Note
The NetWorker Data Domain Boost Integration Guide provides information about
the Cloud unit field and use of the Cloud tier device.
Domain user setup for file level recovery in the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client
In order to perform file level recovery as a domain user in the Dell EMC Data
Protection Restore Client, you need to add and register this user by performing the
following steps.
Procedure
1. Create a tenant user on NetWorker by running the authc_config command.
For example, open a command prompt and cd to C:\Users\Administrator,
and then type authc_config -u administrator -e add-tenant -D
tenant-name=FLR -D tenant-alias FLR -p Emclegato@123
2. Obtain the tenant ID by running the following command:
6. Under Users and Roles in the left navigation pane, select NMC Roles. The
roles display in the right pane.
7. From the right pane, right-click Console Application Administrator and select
Properties.
8. In the Edit NMC Role dialog, add the new user in the External roles field by
specifying the following, and then click OK.
cn=flruser01,ou=users,ou=vproxy,dc=v12nblr,dc=com
9. Repeat step 8 for the Console Security Administrator and Console User. For
example:
10. Navigate to the NMC Enterprise window, right-click the server and select
Launch Application... to open the NMC Administration window.
11. Click Server to open the Server window.
12. In the left navigation pane, select User Groups to display the users in the right
pane.
13. Provide the following user details in the External Roles field for the following
users:
l Application Administrators:
cn=flruser01,ou=users,ou=vproxy,dc=v12nblr,dc=com
l Users: cn=flruser01,ou=users,ou=vproxy,dc=v12nblr,dc=com
l VMware FLR Users:
cn=flruser01,ou=users,ou=vproxy,dc=v12nblr,dc=com
14. After registering the user as external domain, log in to the virtual machine as a
domain user.
15. Launch the EMC Data Protection Restore Client and log in with Tentantname
\domain\user. For example, FLR\v12nblr\flruser01.
Results
You can now perform file level recovery in as a domain user in the Dell EMC Data
Protection Restore Client by selecting User mode.
Create a user in the NetWorker authentication service (User mode file-level restore only)
When performing file-level restore in User Mode, you must create a user in the
Networker Management Console (NMC) using the Manage Authentication Service
Users option, and make note of the password as you will require this information when
logging in to the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client.
Before you begin
For file-level restores on Linux virtual machines, the root account credentials are
required for the target virtual machine in order to install the FLR Agent. During the
file-level restore session, if non-root credentials are provided for the target virtual
machine, the FLR Agent installation fails, even if this user has privileges similar to a
root user. To perform a file-level restore using a non-root user, ensure that the FLR
Agent has already been installed on the target virtual machine using the root user
account.
For file-level restores on Windows virtual machines, if the provided credentials for the
target virtual machine do not have administrative privileges, theFLR Agent installation
fails. To perform a file-level restore using a non-administrator user, ensure that the
FLR Agent is already installed on the target machine using administrative privileges.
Procedure
1. In the NMC NetWorker Administration window, click Server to open the
Server window.
2. In the left navigation pane, highlight User Groups, and then right-click and
select Manage Authentication Service Users.
Figure 48 Manage Authentication service users
6. Right click VMware FLR Users and select Properties. In the User field, create
an entry for the user created in step 4 (for example, user1), in the format
user=user1,host=NW server FQDN.
Results
You can now use this new user to log into the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore
Client.
Note
Before performing a file-level restore, make sure that your browser is updated to the
latest version.
l File-level restore and SQL instance restore in the Dell EMC Data Protection
Restore Client is only supported on the platforms and versions identified in the
section Supported platform versions. The online compatibility guide, available at
https://compatibilityguide.emc.com:8080/CompGuideApp/, provides more
software compatibility information.
l When a file-level restore operation is in progress on a virtual machine, no other
backup or recovery operation can be performed on this virtual machine. Wait until
the file-level restore session completes before starting any other operation on the
virtual machine.
l A restore of individual SQL Server databases or instances in the Dell EMC Data
Protection Restore Client will overwrite the existing database, even if your
NetWorker version provides an option where you can unselect Overwrite the
existing DB. Note also there is no option to restore to a database copy.
l For SQL application-consistent restore operations, when you configure a restore
operation of a long backup chain containing many transaction log backups and only
one full backup, the restore fails during the mount process. Ensure that you
schedule a daily application-consistent virtual machine image backup and avoid
scheduling a large number of transaction log backups during a 24 hour period.
Also, ensure that there is a successful full backup available before starting the
restore operation.
l You cannot restore files to a /tmp directory.
l When you enable Admin Approval Mode (AAM) on the operating system for a
virtual machine (for example, by setting Registry/
FilterAdministratorToken to 1), the administrator user cannot perform a
file-level restore to the end user's profile, and an error displays indicating "Unable
to browse destination." For any user account control (UAC) interactions, the
administrator must wait for the mount operation to complete, and then access the
backup folders located at C:\Program Files (x86)\EMC\vProxy FLR
Agent\flr\mountpoints by logging into the guest virtual machine using
Windows Explorer or a command prompt.
l The Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client incorrectly allows you to select a
VMware Backup appliance as a destination client for file-level restore.
l After migrating from the VMware Backup appliance to the vProxy appliance, the
Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client may continue to display VMware
Backup appliance backups along with the new vProxy backups for virtual
machines. Note, however, that you will only be able to perform file-level restore
from the new vProxy backups.
l After migrating from the VMware Backup appliance to the vProxy appliance, new
vProxy backups of virtual machines that were previously backed up with the
VMware Backup appliance will not be visible in the Dell EMC Data Protection
Restore Client in Admin mode. You must log in using User mode to view and
recover from these backups.
l When you perform file-level restore on Windows 2012 R2 virtual machines, the
volumes listed under the virtual machine display as "unknown." File-restore
operations are not impacted by this issue.
l When you perform file-level restore on Ubuntu/Debian platforms, you must enable
the root account in the operating system. By default, the root account will be in
locked state.
l You cannot use clone volumes for file-level restore when the primary backup
volume is unmounted or unavailable. The restore will fail looking for backup
volumes. If this occurs, dynamic staging allows you to use the secondary copy by
staging the requested virtual machine backups from the clone to an available
backup volume and then recovering the virtual machine.
l When running the NetWorker 9.2 server on Windows platforms, file-level restore
session logs are not kept.
l Performing a file-level restore from a Data Domain Cloud Tier device is not
supported. To perform file-level restores of data that resides only on this device,
first clone the data to a Data Domain device, and then recover the data from the
Data Domain device.
l Browsing a large number of files at once may cause Internet Explorer to become
slow or unresponsive. The Chrome and Mozilla browsers issue a warning when
encountering a difficulty handling many files, but Internet Explorer does not. EMC
recommends using the Chrome or Mozilla browser for file level restore.
l In a large environment where many virtual machines appear in the Dell EMC Data
Protection Restore Client, the navigation buttons (Back, Next, Finish) may
appear very small, requiring you to zoom in to see the options. If this occurs, EMC
recommends that you use the latest versions of the Chrome or Firefox browsers to
avoid the issue.
l You can only restore files and/or folders from a Windows backup to a Windows
machine, or from a Linux backup to a Linux machine.
l You must install VMware Tools to use file-level restore. For best results, ensure
that all virtual machines run the latest available version of VMware Tools. Older
versions are known to cause failures when you perform browse actions during the
file-level restore operation.
l You can perform file-level restore across vCenters as long as the vCenters are
configured in the same NetWorker server, and the source and target virtual
machine have the same guest operating system. For example, Linux to Linux, or
Windows to Windows.
l File-level restore does not support the following virtual disk configurations:
n LVM thin provisioning
n Unformatted disks
n FAT16 file systems
n FAT32 file systems
n Extended partitions (Types: 05h, 0Fh, 85h, C5h, D5h)
n Two or more virtual disks mapped to single partition
n Encrypted partitions
n Compressed partitions
Using the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client for file-level restore
The Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client, which you access through a web
browser, allows you to select specific virtual machine backups as file systems, and
then browse the file system to locate the directories and files you want to restore. You
can also select individual SQL instances to restore from SQL Server application-
consistent backups.
The Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client features two tabs—an FLR tab for
virtual machine file and folder restore, and an App tab for SQL database and instance
restore.
Additionally, the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client operates in one of two
modes:
l User—A user account that can restore folders or files to the original virtual
machine, or restore individual SQL databases and instances to the original machine
from the virtual machine you are logged into. This user can be an Authentication
Service user. The sections Restoring specific folders or files to the original virtual
machine (User mode) and Restore of SQL Server application-consistent backups
provide more information.
l Admin—A NetWorker administrator account that can restore folders or files from
a different virtual machine to any available destination client, or restore individual
SQL databases and instances to the original machine from any virtual machine you
have access to that contains an SQL Server application-consistent backup. This
user can also be an Authentication Service user. The sections Restoring specific
folders or files from a different virtual machine (Admin mode) and Restore of SQL
Server application-consistent backups provide more information.
Note
Restoring specific folders or files to the original virtual machine in User mode
To restore specific folders and files to the original virtual machine on Windows and
Linux virtual machines, select the User tab in the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore
Client login page. In this mode, you connect to the Dell EMC Data Protection
Restore Client from a virtual machine that has been backed up by the vProxy
Appliance.
Before you begin
For the Data Domain resource, ensure that you provide the management credentials
and, if required, enter the export path appropriately. The section Entering
management credentials for the Data Domain resource (instant recovery and User
mode file-level restore only)provides detailed steps.
Additionally, you must create a user in the NetWorker Authentication Service by using
the NetWorker Management Console (NMC), as described in the section Create a
user in the NetWorker authentication service (User mode file-level restore only).
Procedure
1. Open a browser from the virtual machine that the restored files will be
recovered to, and enter a URL that points to the NetWorker server host and
indicates file-level restore. For example:
https://NetWorker server:9090/flr
Note
For User recoveries, you must connect to the NetWorker server from a web
browser on the virtual machine that will receive file-level restore data.
Using the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client for file-level restore 143
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2. Select the User tab, and then log in to the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore
Client with the user credentials of the virtual machine to which you are logged
in. This user account should also belong to the NetWorker user group "VMware
FLR Users" in order to be authorized to perform file-level restore. The section
NetWorker privileges required by File-level restore users provides more
information.
When you log in, the Select the backup(s) to restore from page displays with
a list of backups for the local virtual machine.
3. Use the drop-down list to view the available backups. You can view all backups,
or only backups on a specific date or within a specific range. Highlight a backup
and double-click or drag and drop to move the backup to the Selected Items
pane. Click Next. The following figure provides an example of the Select the
backups to restore from page.
Figure 52 Select backups to restore from
Note
When you click Next, if a folder hierarchy does not appear, the EMC Data
Protection Restore Client may not support the file system in use on the virtual
machine. The section File-level restore limitations provides more information.
4. On the Restore Options page, select the folder to which you want to restore
the items, and then click Next. The following figure provides an example of the
Restore Options page.
5. In the Select items to restore page, browse and select the files and folders
available for recovery. To mark an item for recovery, double-click the item, or
drag and drop the item into the Selected Items pane. You can sort items by
Name, File size, or Date, and you can also search for a specific file or folder
name. Items marked for recovery will appear in the Selected Items pane.
Figure 54 Select items to restore
When you select the arrow button, the Restore Monitor panel slides up. The
following figure provides an example of the Restore Monitor panel.
Using the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client for file-level restore 145
Recover virtual machines and data
Click the Refresh button on the right-hand side of the panel to refresh the
contents as the restore occurs.
Restoring specific folders or files from different virtual machines in Admin mode
To restore specific folders or files from a different virtual machine, select the Admin
tab in the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client login page. Once connected, you
can browse, select, and restore files and folders from any virtual machine that you
backed up with the vProxy Appliance. You can then restore items to the virtual
machine on which you are currently logged in, or to any available destination virtual
machine.
Procedure
1. Open a browser and specify a URL that points to the NetWorker server and
indicates FLR, as in the following example:
https://NetWorker server:9090/flr
2. Click Admin, and then log in to the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client
with the vCenter administrative credentials that you used to register the vProxy
appliance to the vCenter Server. The following figure provides an example of
the Admin login window.
Figure 57 Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client Admin Login
Note
When you use Admin mode, ensure that the user you specify for the NetWorker
server login has the correct privileges to use this option.
3. When you log in, the Select Backups page appears with a list of all the virtual
machines that were backed up by using the vProxy Appliance. The available
backups appear under each virtual machine.
Figure 58 Select the backup(s) to restore from
Note
After migrating from the VMware Backup appliance to the vProxy appliance,
new vProxy backups of virtual machines that were previously backed up with
the VMware Backup appliance will not be visible in the Dell EMC Data
Protection Restore Client in Admin mode. You must log in using User mode to
view and recover these backups.
4. Use the arrows to the right of the entry to view the available backups. You can
view all backups, or only backups on a specific date or within a specific range.
Highlight a backup and double-click or drag and drop to move the backup to the
Selected Items pane. Click Next.
5. In the Restore Options page, select a destination virtual machine.
A login dialog box similar to the following figure appears for the restore
destination.
Using the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client for file-level restore 147
Recover virtual machines and data
6. Log in to the destination virtual machine to initiate the mounting of the backup.
7. After you successfully log in, select the restore location. If desired, specify a
new folder name in this location, as shown in the following.
Figure 60 New folder for restore location
8. In the Select items to restore page, browse and select the files and folders
available for recovery. To mark an item for recovery, double-click the item, or
drag and drop the item into the Selected Items pane. You can sort items by
Name, File size, or Date, and you can also search for a specific file or folder
name. Items marked for recovery will appear in the Selected Items pane.
Within this window, you can also discover and select the total number of items
available for recovery by scrolling to the far right of the directory structure and
right-clicking the icon located on the vertical scroll bar, as shown in the
following figure.
Figure 62 Total items available for recovery
When you select the arrow button, the Restore Monitor panel slides up. The
following figure provides an example of the Restore Monitor panel.
Using the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client for file-level restore 149
Recover virtual machines and data
Click the Refresh button on the right-hand side of the panel to refresh the
contents as the restore occurs.
Note
A restore of individual SQL Server databases or instances in the Dell EMC Data
Protection Restore Client will overwrite the existing database, even if your
NetWorker version provides an option where you can unselect Overwrite the existing
DB. Note also there is no option to restore to a database copy.
NetWorker automates the complete restore of SQL databases based on the above
selection, and restores the database FULL and transaction log backups as a single
restore operation according to the following sequence:
l The primary FULL database backup is identified, mounted on the original virtual
machine, and the SQL database files from the FULL backup are restored to the
original database.
l If a transaction log backup was selected, the series of transaction logs that
occurred after the FULL backup to the selected transaction log are restored in
sequence.
NetWorker automates the complete restore of SQL instances according to the
following sequence:
l The master database is restored first. During this restore, the SQL instance
restarts in single-user mode as required by the Microsoft SQL Server to restore
the master database. When the restore completes, the SQL services restart in
multi-user mode.
l Each remaining database is restored individually, and includes the backup versions
present in the currently selected backup.
The Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client provides the ability to monitor the
restore operations while in progress from the Restore Monitor pane. Green status
indicates a successful restore, while red status indicates a failed restore. A row is
created in the Restore Monitor pane for each database being restored, and the
Target Name field provides the name of the SQL instance and database associated
with the progress line.
Note
Both User and Admin modes in the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client only
allow you to restore individual SQL databases and instances to the original machine. In
User mode, you can only perform this restore from the virtual machine you are logged
into. In Admin mode, you can select from any virtual machine you have access to.
Using the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client for file-level restore 151
Recover virtual machines and data
The following figures provides an example of App restore mode in the login
window.
Figure 65 Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client App mode
2. Select User or Admin mode, and then select the App restore mode button.
Note
For User mode recoveries, you must connect to the NetWorker server from a
web browser on the virtual machine that the SQL database or instance will be
restored to.
l For Admin mode, type the NetWorker credentials. When using this mode,
ensure that the user you specify for the NetWorker server login has the
correct privileges to use this option.
When you log in, the Select App Backups page displays with a list of virtual
machines that were backed up by an application-consistent protection policy.
The available backups (primary backups) appear under each virtual machine,
and include the virtual machine FULL and transaction log backups, depending
on the application-consistent policy settings. For User mode, this will be limited
to a list of backups for the local virtual machine.
4. On the Select App Backups page, use the arrows to the right of the entry to
browse and select from the available SQL Server application-consistent
backups, including all SQL instances, databases, and backup versions.
To select a backup version, expand the SQL instance and database to display
the backup versions pane, and then click the backup version item once or drag
and drop the item to move the backup to the Selected Items pane. You may be
required to scroll right to view the backup versions.
To select a SQL database or instance, drag and drop the entry to move to the
Selected Items pane. Note that you cannot drag and drop the SQL database or
instance when the entry has been expanded to view its children. If you
expanded the entry, reselect the virtual machine, and then select the SQL
database or instance to enable drag-and-drop.
The following figure provides an example of the Select App Backups page.
Note
The backup filter is not currently supported. Ensure that you leave the filter set
to All Backups.
Using the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client for file-level restore 153
Recover virtual machines and data
Agent are installed on the virtual machine. The following figure provides an
example of the Restore Target page.
Figure 67 Restore Target page
When the mount completes, click Next. The Restore Options page displays.
Note
If the vProxy FLR Agent and Microsoft VM App Agent are not already installed
on the virtual machine, a dialog displays requiring you to provide system
administrative credentials for the virtual machine.
6. On the Restore Options page, set the Diagnostic logging level if required. The
default level is 0.
7. Select from the available SQL Restore to Original Location options:
a. Leave the DB in recovery state—Select this option to activate the SQL
Server NORECOVERY database restore option, which places the database in
a recovering state upon completion of the restore and is useful for special
situations such as restoring transaction log backups taken by third-party
applications. This option is not available for SQL instance restore. This
option also overwrites the database and then leaves the database in
restoring state.
b. Restore Stop At Time—Set to restore transaction logs from the backup
version that occurred before the specified restore date and time. This option
is only available when you select a specific transaction log backup.
Note
A restore of individual SQL Server databases or instances in the Dell EMC Data
Protection Restore Client will overwrite the existing database, even if your
NetWorker version provides an option where you can unselect Overwrite the
existing DB. Note also there is no option to restore to a database copy.
8. In the Restore Confirmation dialog, click Yes when prompted to continue the
restore, or No to exit the restore. Note that clicking Yes will overwrite the
existing database.
9. To monitor the progress of the restore operation, click the arrow button located
at the lower right-hand corner of the restore client screen.
When you select the arrow button, the Restore Monitor panel slides up. For
SQL database restore, a single line will appear. For SQL instance restore, one
line per database will appear. In both cases, the Target field indicates the
database associated with the progress line. The following figure provides an
example of the Restore Monitor panel.
Figure 69 Restore Monitor panel
Click the Refresh button on the right-hand side of the panel to refresh the
contents as the restore occurs.
Recovery in the vSphere Web Client's VM Backup and Recovery plug-in 155
Recover virtual machines and data
If you do not see the virtual machine backup listed, refresh the window.
4. Browse the list of virtual machines and select the virtual machine backup you
want to recover. You can expand the virtual machine backup to view a list of
restore points from which to select.
Figure 71 Select a restore point
5. Select one of the restore points by clicking the checkbox next to the backup
time, and then click Restore.
The Restore Backup wizard launches.
6. In the Set Restore Options page of the Restore Backup wizard, leave the
default Restore to original location selected and click Next.
Figure 72 Restore to original location
8. Specify a datastore for the virtual machine, and then click Next.
9. In the Ready to Complete page, click Finish to start the recovery.
Results
You can monitor the progress of the recovery in the Running tab of the Recent Tasks
pane. Once the recovery completes successfully, power ON the virtual machine to
validate the recovery.
Results
You can monitor the progress of the recovery in the Running tab of the Recent Tasks
pane. Once the instant access recovery completes, use storage vMotion to save the
virtual machine, and cancel the vSphere NetWorker Recovery task to delete the
datastore. Power ON the virtual machine to validate the recovery.
7. In the Select Backup page, verify that the correct VMDK is selected and click
Next.
8. In the Set Restore Options page, uncheck the default Restore to original
location and then click Next.
9. Click Choose to browse the existing virtual machine where the VMDK needs to
be restored in the vCenter.
Figure 77 Set Restore Options for VMDK recovery
10. Specify a datastore for the VMDK, and then click Next.
11. In the Ready to Complete page, click Finish to start the recovery.
Results
You can monitor the progress of the recovery in the Running tab of the Recent Tasks
pane.
Note
When you start a VMDK recovery, the virtual machine will be powered off
automatically without issuing a warning message.
NetWorker VMware Protection with the VMware Backup Appliance (legacy) 165
NetWorker VMware Protection with the VMware Backup Appliance (legacy)
Program/Role Task
NMC NetWorker Administration window l Create and edit Data Protection policies
to perform actions such as backup, clone,
and checkpoint backup for disaster
recovery.
l Assign a checkpoint discover policy to the
VMware Backup Appliance.
l Assign virtual machines/VMDKs to the
policy.
l Start or schedule a group/policy to run
any backup and clone actions associated
with the group/policy.
When you start a policy from the
Administration window, you can
perform both backups and clones, based
on the actions defined in the policy.
Program/Role Task
EMC Backup and Recovery user interface in l Assign VMs/VMDKs to the policy
the VMware vSphere Web Client workflow created in NMC's
Administration window.
l Start an on-demand (ad-hoc) backup
using Backup Now, which runs the
entire workflow with associated backup
and clone actions, and Backup only out
of date sources options.
l Restore a FULL virtual machine (image-
level) backup.
l Restore a VMDK backup.
l Instant restore from a Data Domain
system.
System requirements
The following table lists the required components for NetWorker VMware Protection
with the VMware Backup appliance.
When you upgrade to NetWorker 9.2 and continue to use the VMware Backup
appliance, ensure that the NetWorker server and storage node are at the same
version, and that you use the latest VMware Backup appliance. For example, for
NetWorker 9.2, install or upgrade to the latest OVA version, 1.5.1.7. NetWorker 9.2 is
not backward compatible with NetWorker 8.x.x versions of the VMware Backup
appliance.
Note
Component Requirements
NetWorker NetWorker 9.2 or later server software with
NMC. NetWorker VMware Protection only
Component Requirements
supports the following NetWorker server
architectures:
l Windows 64-bit
l Linux x86_64
Component Requirements
Note
Note
Port requirements
The NetWorker VMware Protection solution requires the ports outlined in the
following tables.
The following diagram shows the incoming firewall port configuration with the
VMware Backup Appliance.
Figure 78 Firewall configuration (VMware Backup Appliance with internal proxy)
VMware Backup Data Domain 7, 22, 80, 111, 131, 163, Data Domain
Appliance and 2049, 2052 management
external proxy
VMware Backup ESX servers 443, 111, 902 Backup and recovery
Appliance and operations
External Proxy
The following diagram shows the outgoing firewall port configuration with the VMware
Backup Appliance.
Figure 79 Firewall configuration (VMware Backup Appliance with external proxy)
To communicate with the VMware Backup Appliance, the NetWorker server VM web
services (nsrvmwsd) listen on port 8080 by default. Ensure that no other services,
such as HBA, use port 8080. To check port usage for 8080 outside of NetWorker:
l On Windows, run netstat -anbo | findstr 8080
l On Linux, run netstat -anp | grep 8080
Note
Unless you are upgrading from NetWorker 9.0.1 and already have the latest available
VMware Backup Appliance version deployed (1.5.1.7), all tasks in this section must be
performed prior to upgrading to NetWorker 9.2.
Pre-installation requirements
Before you upgrade to NetWorker 9.2, review the pre-installation requirements in this
section.
l For registration of the VMware Backup Appliance with the vCenter server, it is
recommended to use a Service account.
l Deploy the VMware Backup Appliance on shared VMFS5 or higher to avoid block
size limitations.
l For better performance, it is recommended to use a dedicated datastore for the
VMware Backup Appliance.
l Keep the default values for annotations for the VMware Backup Appliance node
and external proxy.
DNS Configuration
The DNS server plays a very important role during the VMware Backup Appliance
configuration and backup/restore operations. You must add an entry to the DNS
Server for the VMware Backup Appliance IP address and Fully Qualified Domain
Names (FQDNs).
The DNS server must support both forward and reverse lookup for the following:
l VMware Backup Appliance
l External Proxy
l NetWorker server
l Data Domain device
l vCenter and ESXi hosts
NOTICE
Failure to set up DNS properly can cause many runtime or configuration issues. Do not
manually change entries in the /etc/hosts file on the VMware Backup appliance.
You can set details for the DNS server and network IP during deployment of the
VMware Backup Appliance in the Deploy OVF Template window, as described in the
section Deploy the VMware Backup Appliance.
To confirm your DNS configuration, open a command prompt and run the following
commands from the vCenter Server.
Procedure
1. To verify DNS configuration, type the following:
nslookup VMware_Backup_Appliance_IP_address DNS_IP_address
2. To verify that the FQDN of the VMware Backup appliance resolves to the
correct IP address, type the following:
nslookup VMware_Backup_Appliance_FQDN DNS_IP_address
Ensure this is the same IP as the previous command.
3. To verify that the FQDN of the vCenter Server resolves to the correct IP
address, type the following:
nslookup vCenter_FQDN DNS_IP_address
If the nslookup commands return the proper information, then close the
command prompt; if not, correct the DNS configuration. If you configure short
names for the DNS entries, then perform additional look-ups for the short
names.
NOTICE
After deployment, check for DNS resolution (forward and reverse) from the
VMware Backup appliances and proxies for vCenter and the NetWorker hosts.
NTP Configuration
The VMware Backup Appliance leverages VMware Tools to synchronize time through
NTP by using the Sync guest OS time with host option by default.
On ESXi hosts, the vCenter server, and the NetWorker server, you must configure
NTP properly. Since the VMware Backup Appliance obtains the correct time through
VMware Tools, the appliance does not require configuration with NTP. However, you
must ensure that the time on the vCenter server and the ESX that hosts the VMware
Backup Appliance are as close as possible, for example, within 30 seconds of each
other. This will occur when the vCenter server is on same host as the ESX that hosts
the VMware Backup Appliance, but when this is not the case, you should configure
NTP on the VMware Backup Appliance in order to keep host times in sync.
Note
If you configure NTP directly in the EMC Backup and Recovery Configuration
Utility window, then time synchronization errors occur.
ESXi and vCenter Server documentation provides more information about configuring
NTP.
Note
EMC does not recommend configuring a NetWorker 9.0.1 VMware Backup Appliance
with a VMware Backup Appliance earlier than NetWorker 9.0.1 in the same vCenter.
Three VMware bundles and one ISO update are available. Each fulfills a specific
requirement:
l 0.5 TB OVA
l 4 TB OVA
l EBR-Proxy OVA — download the external proxy appliance when performing more
than eight concurrent backups, or to improve performance in certain situations.
For example, you may need to deploy an external proxy to an ESX server in order
to perform hotadd backups of VMs on that server. The section Deploy an
external proxy appliance in vCenter provides the steps required to deploy an
external proxy.
l EBRUpgrade — download this ISO if you need to update the deployed VMware
Backup Appliance to the latest version.
The following table provides recommendations on provisioning memory and swap
space based on the storage space in use.
Table 18 Recommended memory and swap space based on storage space utilization
Other system requirements for the appliances are provided in System requirements.
Download the desired OVA and place in shared storage.
Note
The VMware Backup Appliance does not include security roll-ups. As a result, you may
also be required to manually install a security roll-up after you complete the appliance
deployment. You can access the latest version of the ESA for the security roll-up,
titled "EMC Avamar and NetWorker Security Update for Multiple Components", from
the NetWorker advisories page at https://support.emc.com/products/
1095_NetWorker/Advisories/. Scroll to the bottom of the page to view Security
Advisories. The Link to remedies section of the ESA provides instructions on how to
install the roll-up on the appliance.
4. In the filetype drop-down, select OVA Packages then navigate to the directory
that contains the ova files. Select the file and then click Open.
5. On the Deploy OVF Template window, click Next.
6. On the Review Details window, click Next.
7. Accept the EULA and click Next.
8. Specify a name for the VMware Backup appliance, and then select the folder or
datacenter to which you want to deploy the appliance. Click Next.
9. Select the resource where you want to deploy the VMware Backup Appliance,
then click Next.
10. Select Storage, then select the virtual disk format and click Next. EMC
recommends thin provisioning disk format.
11. On Setup Networks, select the destination network from the drop-down, then
click Next.
12. Provide the networking properties, including the correct IP (static IP), DNS,
and so on. Verify this information is correct, otherwise the appliance will not
work. Click Next.
13. In the Ready to Complete window, ensure that the Power-on after
deployment option is selected, then click Finish.
Results
After a few minutes a screen similar to the following figure appears in the console of
the VMware Backup Appliance in vCenter.
Note
The external proxy appliance does not include security roll-ups. As a result, you may
also be required to manually install a security roll-up after you complete the external
proxy appliance deployment. You can access the latest version of the ESA for the
security roll-up, titled "EMC Avamar and NetWorker Security Update for Multiple
Components", from the NetWorker advisories page at https://support.emc.com/
products/1095_NetWorker/Advisories/. Scroll to the bottom of the page to view
Security Advisories. The Link to remedies section of the ESA provides instructions on
how to install the roll-up on the proxies.
Procedure
1. Launch the vSphere client and log in to the vCenter server.
The vSphere Client window appears.
The full path to the appliance template file appears in the Deploy from file
field.
e. Click Next.
The OVF Template Details screen appears.
b. Select a datacenter and folder location for this proxy in the Inventory tree.
c. Click Next.
The Host / Cluster screen appears.
NOTICE
Proxy network settings are difficult to change after you register and activate
the Proxy. Therefore, ensure that you type the correct settings in this
screen.
19. Follow the prompts to register the proxy, as shown in the figure above.
a. Press 1 to register the proxy.
b. At the Enter the EMC Backup and Recovery Appliance address prompt,
type the FQDN of the VMware Backup appliance server name.
c. At the Enter the server domain [clients]: prompt, press enter and do not
modify.
d. Provide the VMware Backup appliance password if using a non-default
password.
e. Wait for the Attempting to connect to the appliance...Connection
successful message.
20. Validate the registration in the NMC Devices tab by ensuring that the external
proxy host appears under the External Proxy Hosts column of the VMware
Backup appliance that it is registered to.
Note
When you upgrade the VMware Backup appliance, you need to deploy a new
proxy appliance. After rebooting the VMware Backup Appliance, you do not
need to re-register the external proxy.
After you deploy external Proxy hosts, each Proxy provides all of the following
capabilities:
l Backup of Microsoft Windows and Linux VMs. This includes entire images or
specific drives.
l Restore of Microsoft Windows and Linux VMs. This includes entire images or
specific drives.
l Selective restore of individual folders and files to Microsoft Windows and
Linux VMs.
Although you can restore data across datacenters by using a proxy deployed in
one datacenter to restore files to a VM in another datacenter, the restores will
take noticeably longer than if the proxy and the target VM are both located in
the same datacenter. Therefore, for best performance, deploy at least one
proxy in each datacenter you are protecting.
The EMC Backup and Recovery Configuration Utility window appears with a
tool icon from which you can select three options—Time zone, password, and
vCenter registration.
Figure 83 Select vCenter registration in the EMC Backup and Recovery Configuration
Utility
2. From the tool drop-down, select vCenter registration to unlock the vCenter
registration.
The vCenter Registration window opens
3. From the vCenter Registration window, select vCenter Configuration.
Figure 84 vCenter Configuration in the EMC Backup and Recovery Configuration Utility
version 6.0 and the VMware Backup Appliance to the latest available version, which is
version 1.5.1.7 for NetWorker 9.0.1.
Note
In the example provided, a dedicated non-root user test has been set up with the
domain name system-domain and configured with a VMware Backup Appliance
previous to NetWorker 9.0.1. You will need to change the domain of the dedicated
non-root user from system-domain to vsphere.local by using the vSphere Web
Client, and change the vCenter username in the EMC Backup and Recovery
Configuration Utility window from test@system-domain to [email protected]
to re-register the VMware backup Appliance with vCenter.
Procedure
1. Upgrade vCenter 5.1 or vCenter 5.5 to vCenter version 6.0.
2. Open the vSphere Web Client for vCenter 6.0 with
[email protected] as the username and use the password you
set during the vCenter upgrade procedure, and perform the following:
a. In the left pane, select Administration > Users and Groups, and then click
the + sign to create a new user, test1.
b. In the Administration pane, select Roles.
c. Right-click on the role which you assigned to the user test and select Clone
to create a new role, test1role.
d. Select vCenter > Hosts and Clusters > Manage > Permissions, and then
click the + sign.
e. In the Users and Groups pane, click Add and select the user test1 with the
domain vsphere.local. Assign the role as test1Role and click Add.
3. Open the EMC Backup and Recovery Configuration Utility window as shown
in the figure above, and change the vCenter username from test@system-
domain to [email protected] to re-register the VMware backup Appliance
with vCenter, and then restart the appliance to apply the changes.
4. Upgrade the VMware Backup Appliance to version 1.5.1.7.
l VMware Backup Appliance version 1.5.1.7 is only compatible with NetWorker 9.1
and later.
Note
When you upgrade to NetWorker 9.1 and later, you must also upgrade the VMware
Backup Appliance to version 1.5.1.7.
l If the internal proxy is disabled before you upgrade the Virtual Backup appliance,
the proxy is reset to enabled when you reboot the appliance. However, the NMC
still shows the internal proxy's state as disabled. If this happens, run the following
command on the NetWorker server:
nsrim -X -S -h <VBA hostname> -f
Note
Do not attempt to enable the proxy manually, because it could result in NetWorker
server connection issues with the appliance.
l You only need to upgrade to DDOS 5.5 if you upgrade the VMware Backup
Appliance to version 1.1.x or 1.5.x.
l You only need to upgrade to DDOS 5.6 or later if you upgrade the VMware Backup
Appliance to version 1.5.x and plan to use Networker 9.1.
l You cannot run backup and recovery operations during an appliance upgrade.
Before performing the upgrade, ensure that you complete any policies running or
disable active policies.
l You cannot upgrade external proxies. If using a previous version of the external
proxy and you want to upgrade, you must redeploy the external proxy.
8. Open the EMC Backup and Recovery Configuration Utility window. Post-
installation configuration on page 197 provides more information.
9. Navigate to the Upgrade tab and click Check Upgrades. The available upgrade
package appears.
10. Navigate to the Status tab to ensure all services are running.
11. Return to the Upgrade tab and click Upgrade EBR.
Note
If you want to access the EMC Backup and Recovery Configuration Utility
online help, click the Help Documentation link located on the Upgrade tab.
When the upgrade completes, the VMware Backup appliance shuts down
automatically.
12. Power on the VMware Backup appliance.
When you launch the EMC Backup and Recovery user interface in the
vSphere Web Client, and then connect to the upgraded appliance and navigate
to the Configuration tab, the new version appears.
Note
To see the new version of the appliance in the VMware console, log out and
then log back in. The previous version is shown in the console until you do this.
13. When you complete a successful upgrade and verify that all backup and restore
functionality is working as expected, return to the vSphere Client and delete
the snapshot taken in step 4.
14. Disconnect from the ISO image used for the upgrade by unmounting or
removing the image.
Enable VMware View in NMC's Administration window after upgrading by creating a NSR
Hypervisor resource
When you upgrade the NetWorker server to NetWorker 9.2 and upgrade to the latest
VMware Backup appliance(s), VMware View may not appear in NMC's Administration
window until you create a NSR Hypervisor resource.
To create the NSR Hypervisor resource, download and deploy a NetWorker 9.0.1
VMware Backup Appliance (version 1.5.1.7) from vCenter, following the registration
steps described in EMC Backup and Recovery Configuration Utility on page 193, or
perform the following to manually create a NSR Hypervisor resource by using the
nsradmin program.
1. Start the NetWorker administration program by running nsradmin. Use the help
command for help, or the visual command to enter full-screen mode.
2. Type the following:
Note
If using NetWorker VMware Protection with the VMware Backup Appliance, ensure
that the vCenter FQDN or IP for the NSR Hypervisor resource matches what you
specified in the vCenter Registration page of the EMC Backup and Recovery
Configure window. You must use only FQDN or only IP in both instances, not a
combination of the two.
Creating a dedicated vCenter user account and EMC Backup and Recovery role 187
NetWorker VMware Protection with the VMware Backup Appliance (legacy)
10. Navigate to Home > Administration > SSO Users and Groups.
11. On the Users tab, click the green +.
The New User window appears.
12. In the Username field, specify a username (for example, EMC Backup and
Recovery).
13. In the Password and Confirm Password fields, specify a password.
You can leave the First name, last name and password fields blank.
14. Click OK.
l Licenses
l Log event
l Manage custom attributes
l Settings
l Set custom attribute
Note
vApp l Export
l Import
l vApp application configuration
Virtual Machine
Note
In high-security environments, you can restrict the vCenter user account permissions
required to configure and administer the vProxy or VMware Backup Appliance. Table
7 on page 52 provides the account permission categories.
The following steps allow you to configure an EMC Backup and Recovery user or SSO
admin user by using the vSphere Web Client.
Procedure
1. From a web browser, access the vSphere Web Client using the following URL:
https://<Ip_address_vCenter_server>:9443/vsphere-client/
Note
When assigning permissions, the vSphere Web Client places the curser in the
location last used. Depending on what level was selected the last time you used
this window, permissions might not get applied to the root level of the vCenter.
For example, if the last item you selected in this window was Cluster Name,
permissions will be assigned at the Cluster level. Review carefully to ensure that
permissions get assigned at the root level of the vCenter.
9. Click OK.
10. From the Assigned Role drop-down list, select the role you created.
11. Confirm that the Propagate to children box is checked.
12. Click OK.
To configure this mode of operation, you can select the option in the NSR VBA Server
Properties window, described in the section VMware Backup Appliance monitoring and
properties on page 208.
Note
The EMC Backup and Recovery Configuration Utility requires Adobe Flash
Player version 11.5 or later. If you do not have the appropriate version of Adobe
Flash Player installed, a message appears with a link to download it. If you are
still unable to connect after installing Adobe Flash Player, then check the
network configuration (IP address, DNS, and so on) by logging into the VMware
Backup Appliance registration screen. If any of the network information was
incorrectly entered, you must re-deploy.
2. Log in with the userid root, and create a password that is a minimum of 9
characters long and contains a combination of one more more upper and lower-
case letters, one or more numbers from 0-9, and at least one special character.
Note
You can use the previous default password 8RttoTriz or a password without
special characters only if you apply a hotfix to the OVA version 1.5.1.7 prior to
running the EMC Backup and Recovery Configuration Utility. The hotfix is
available in the same download location as the OVA.
3. Click Next.
The Network Settings page displays.
Figure 91 Network Settings configuration page
5. Set the time zone to match that of the vCenter appliance, and click Next.
Note
If the time zone does not match that of the appliance, you may encounter
issues connecting with EMC Backup and Recovery from the vCenter. The
default time zone for vCenter is UTC.
6. Specify a new EMC Backup and Recovery password for the root account, and
click Next.
The vCenter Registration page displays.
Figure 94 vCenter Registration configuration page
Note
When you use the FQDN or IP to register the vCenter server in this window and
with the NetWorker server, ensure that you specify only the FQDN or only the
IP in both instances, not a combination of the two.
9. Ensure that Use vCenter for SSO authentication remains selected , and click
Next.
Note
If the vCenter server host is different from the vSphere web server host, use
admin@system/domain as the user name along with the appropriate password.
Note
Note
Post-installation configuration
You can confirm that the installation process successfully registered and configured
the VMware Backup Appliance in NetWorker.
Procedure
1. Ensure that the Log window in NMC's Administration window displays the
following information:
NetWorker server, 'server_name' registration succeeded for
VMware Backup Appliance VBA_hostname
2. Log in to the EMC Backup and Recovery Configuration Utility window at the
following URL by using the new EMC Backup and Recovery password that you
defined during configuration:
http://VMware_Backup_appliance_IP:8580/ebr-configure
You should see the following window, in which you can verify information about
your configuration and ensure that required services are running. You can also
see a summary of storage and capacity usage, and perform tasks such as rolling
Service Description
Core Comprise the backup engine of the appliance.
If these services are disabled no backup jobs
(either scheduled or “on demand”) will run,
and no restore activities can be initiated.
Service Description
Backup Scheduler Allow mounting of backups for file-level
restore operations.
To stop a service, click Stop next to the service on the Configuration tab of EMC
Backup and Recovery Configuration Utility window. In general, you should only stop
running services under the direction of Technical Support.
If you stop a service, you can attempt to restart it by clicking Start. In some cases,
additional troubleshooting steps may be required for the service to work properly.
Note
When any service stops running, the action triggers an alarm on the vCenter server.
When the service restarts, vCenter clears the alarm. A delay of up to 10 minutes can
occur before vCenter clears or triggers an alarm.
The end of the output indicates the current settings for backup window and
maintenance window start times.
Next backup window start time: Sat Sep 28 20:00:00 2013
IST
Next maintenance window start time: Sat Sep 28 08:00:00
2013 IST
2. Change the backup start time (in format HHMM) and duration (in format
HHMM) by running:
The end of the output indicates the new backup window and maintenance
window start times:
Next backup window start time: Sat Sep 28 18:00:00 2013
IST
Next maintenance window start time: Sat Sep 28 14:00:00
2013 IST
Figure 99 Swap network for NICs in the Virtual Machine Properties window
Adding or swapping a NIC for VMXNET 3 on the VMware Backup appliance or external proxy 201
NetWorker VMware Protection with the VMware Backup Appliance (legacy)
f. Select the appropriate virtual machine port group for the production
network/VLAN, and then click Next.
g. In the Ready to Complete page, verify the information and then click
Finish.
4. Right click the VMware Backup appliance and select Power > Power On.
5. Configure the second NIC on the VMware Backup Appliance:
a. After you power on the VMware Backup appliance, log in as root to the
VMware Backup appliance Console by using the vSphere Client.
b. Type yast2 to invoke the YaST configuration tool.
c. Select Network Devices and press Enter.
The Network Devices dialog appears.
d. Select Network Settings and press Enter.
The Network Settings dialog appears.
e. In the Overview tab, select the Second Ethernet Adapter labeled eth1.
f. Use the tab key to select Edit and press Enter.
g. From the Network Card Setup, use the tab key to access Statically
assigned IP Address and select using the spacebar. Use the tab key to
select IP Address and enter the IP Address, the Subnet Mask, and the host
name of the VMware Backup appliance for the backup network.
h. Use the tab key to select Edit, and then press Enter.
i. (Optional when setting up second NIC) From Network Settings, use the tab
key to select Overview. Use the right-arrow key to select Hostname/DNS.
Use the tab key to select and then specify the following fields:
l Host name
l Domain name for the production network
j. From Network Settings, use the tab key to select Hostname/DNS.Use the
right-arrow key to select Routing, and update the routing table by setting
the Default Gateway to the gateway/address for the production network, if
not already set, as shown in the following figure.
Figure 101 Routing table with production network gateway
k. Use the tab key to select OK, and then press Enter.
l. Use the tab key to select Quit, and then press Enter.
6. (Optional) If setting up vNIC on the external proxy, follow the instructions in
the section Re-registering the proxy with a different server.
Note
You can use a non-routable private address space for the subnet used for the backup
traffic/data, providing that:
l All devices/vNICs using a private IP address exist on the same physical switch, and
l There is a DNS server on the non-routed private network so that the proxies can
perform a reverse lookup for its host name.
Note
curl -O ftp://avamar_ftp:[email protected]/software/scripts/
proxycp.jar
For sites where direct download using curl is unavailable, use WinSCP to transfer
the script to the VMware Backup appliance or external proxy.
5. Change the permissions on proxycp.jar:
Setting user privileges for the root user in the NetWorker server
Before you access the VMware Protection solution in NMC to create and assign
policies, you must assign the appropriate user privileges to the root user in a user
group of the NetWorker server.
Procedure
1. Run nsradmin from a Windows command line or UNIX terminal.
2. Type the following command:
create type:NSR usergroup; name:user defined user group
3. When prompted with the question "Create?", type Y, and then exit from
nsradmin.
4. From NMC, navigate to NetWorker Administration > Server > User Groups.
5. Select the created user group for the root user and type the following in the
Users field:
username@VBA node
where username is the name of a user with root privileges.
Procedure
1. In the left panel of the Enterprise window, select the appropriate server.
2. Right-click the server, and select Launch Application.
The Administration window opens.
You can access many of the options for the VMware Protection solution in the
Protection window, as shown in the following figure.
NBD mode (backups over IP) will not occur, even if Hotadd mode is not available.
When set to Disabled, NetWorker will use Hotadd mode, and fallback to NBD
mode if Hotadd mode is not available. This is set to Disabled by default.
Note
When you restrict the transport mode to Hotadd only, backups will fail for any VM
that does not meet the Hotadd criteria as outlined in the VMware knowledgebase
article 2048138. When such a failure occurs, the backup policy only reports that
the backup was “Interrupted.” The correct status displays when you run the
following command:
Note
You cannot create a new policy for VMware Backup Appliance in NetWorker 9.2. You
can only modify existing VMware Backup Appliance policies. For the creation of new
policies, use the vProxy appliance.
Policies provide an organizational container for the workflows, actions, and groups
that support and define the backup, clone, management, and system maintenance
actions that you want to perform.
Workflows
Workflows define the start time for a series of actions, the frequency in which the
actions run, the order of actions in a sequence, and the protection group to which the
workflow applies.
A workflow can be as simple as a single action that applies to a finite list of Client
resources, or a complex chain of actions that apply to a dynamically changing list of
resources. In a workflow, some actions can be set to occur sequentially, and others
can occur concurrently.
You can create multiple workflows in a single policy. However, each workflow can
belong to only one policy. When you add multiple workflows to the same policy, you
can logically group data protection activities with similar service level provisions
together, to provide easier configuration, access, and task execution.
Protection groups
Protection groups define a set of static or dynamic Client resources or save sets to
which a workflow applies. There are also dedicated protection groups for backups in a
VMware environment or for snapshot backups on a NAS device. Review the following
information about protection groups:
l Create one protection group for each workflow. Each group can be assigned to
only one workflow.
l You can add the same Client resources and save sets to more than one group at a
time.
l You can create the group before you create the workflow, or you can create the
group after you create the workflow and then assign the group to the workflow
later.
Actions
Actions are the key resources in a workflow for a data protection policy and define a
specific task, for example, a backup, clone, or snapshot. NetWorker uses a work list to
define the task. A work list is composed of one or several work items. Work items
include client resources, virtual machines, save sets, or tags. You can chain multiple
actions together to occur sequentially or concurrently in a workflow. All chained
actions use the same work list.
When you configure an action, you define the days on which to perform the action, as
well as other settings specific to the action. For example, you can specify a destination
pool, a retention period, and a target storage node for the backup action, which can
differ from the subsequent action that clones the data.
You can create multiple actions for a single workflow. However, each action applies to
a single workflow and policy.
The following figure provides a high level overview of the components that make up a
data protection policy in a datazone.
Note
Each preconfigured data protection policy provides the following best practices that
you should follow when you design the data protection solution:
l Separate the file system backups from application database backups, to provide
ease of access at recovery time.
l Stagger the start times for the file system backups and the application database
backups, to prevent disk contention on the target hosts.
Each default data protection policy mimics the requirements of a service provider, and
are designed to provide protection that is based on service-level agreements.
Platinum policy
The Platinum policy provides an example of a data protection policy for an
environment that contains supported storage arrays or storage appliances and
requires backup data redundancy. The policy contains one workflow with two actions,
a snapshot backup action, followed by a clone action.
Figure 108 Platinum policy configuration
Gold policy
The Gold policy provides an example of a data protection policy for an environment
that contains virtual machines and requires backup data redundancy. The policy
contains two workflows, one to protect Hyper-V hosts and one to protect VMware
hosts. Each workflow contains a backup action followed by a clone action.
Silver policy
The Silver policy provides an example of a data protection policy for an environment
that contains non-virtualized machines and requires backup data redundancy. The
policy contains two workflows, one to protect hosts file systems and one to protect
database applications. Each workflow contains a backup action followed by a clone
action.
Figure 110 Silver policy configuration
Bronze policy
The Bronze policy provides an example of a data protection policy for an environment
that contains non-virtualized machines. The policy contains two workflows, one to
protect hosts file systems and one to protect database applications. Each workflow
contains a backup action.
Figure 111 Bronze policy configuration
2. In the expanded left pane, right-click Policies, and then select New.
The Create Policy dialog box appears.
3. On the General tab, in the Name field type a name for the policy.
The maximum number of characters for the policy name is 128.
Note
nsrlog -f policy_notifications.log
l On Linux, to send an email notification, type the following command:
where:
n -s subject—Includes a standard email header with the message and
specifies the subject text for that header. Without this option, the
smtpmail program assumes that the message contains a correctly
formatted email header and nothing is added.
7. In the Restricted Data Zones tab, leave the Restricted Data Zone field blank.
NetWorker VMware Protection with the vProxy appliance does not currently
support the protection of virtual machines within a Restricted Data Zone.
8. Click OK.
After you finish
Create the workflows and actions for the policy.
Creating a workflow
The policy workflow defines a list of actions to perform sequentially or concurrently, a
schedule window during which the workflow can run, and the client resource or save
set group to which the workflow applies. You can create a workflow when you create a
new policy, or you can create a workflow for an existing policy.
nsrlog -f policy_notifications.log
l On Linux, to send an email notification, type the following command:
where:
n -s subject—Includes a standard email header with the message and
specifies the subject text for that header. Without this option, the
smtpmail program assumes that the message contains a correctly
formatted email header and nothing is added.
n -h mailserver—Specifies the hostname of the mail server to use to
relay the SMTP email message.
n recipient1@mailserver—Is the email address of the recipient of the
notification. Multiple email recipients are separated by a space.
8. In the Running section, perform the following steps to specify when and how
often the workflow runs:
a. To ensure that the actions that are contained in the workflow run when the
policy or workflow starts, in the Enabled box, leave the option selected. To
prevent the actions in the workflow from running when the policy or
workflow that contains the action starts, clear this option.
b. To start the workflow at the time that is specified in the Start time
attribute, on the days that are defined in the action resource, in the
AutoStart Enabled box, leave the option selected. To prevent the workflow
from starting at the time that is specified in the Start time attribute, clear
this option.
c. To specify the time to start the actions in the workflow, in the Start Time
attribute, use the spin boxes.
The default value is 9:00 PM.
d. To specify how frequently to run the actions that are defined in the
workflow over a 24-hour period, use the Interval attribute spin boxes. If you
are performing transaction log backup as part of application-consistent
protection, you must specify a value for this attribute in order for
incremental transaction log backup of SQL databases to occur.
The default Interval attribute value is 24 hours, or once a day. When you
select a value that is less than 24 hours, the Interval End attribute appears.
To specify the last start time in a defined interval period, use the spin boxes.
nsrlog -f policy_notifications.log
l On Linux, to send an email notification, type the following command:
10. In the Running section, perform the following steps to specify when and how
often the workflow runs:
a. To ensure that the actions that are contained in the workflow run when the
policy or workflow starts, in the Enabled box, leave the option selected. To
prevent the actions in the workflow from running when the policy or
workflow that contains the action starts, clear this option.
b. To start the workflow at the time that is specified in the Start time
attribute, on the days that are defined in the action resource, in the
AutoStart Enabled box, leave the option selected. To prevent the workflow
from starting at the time that is specified in the Start time attribute, clear
this option.
c. To specify the time to start the actions in the workflow, in the Start Time
attribute, use the spin boxes.
The default value is 9:00 PM.
d. To specify how frequently to run the actions that are defined in the
workflow over a 24-hour period, use the Interval attribute spin boxes. If you
are performing transaction log backup as part of application-consistent
protection, you must specify a value for this attribute in order for
incremental transaction log backup of SQL databases to occur.
The default Interval attribute value is 24 hours, or once a day. When you
select a value that is less than 24 hours, the Interval End attribute appears.
To specify the last start time in a defined interval period, use the spin boxes.
11. In the Groups group box, specify the protection group to which the workflow
applies.
To use a group, select a protection group from the Groups list. To create a
protection group, click the + button that is located to the right of the Groups
list.
12. The Actions table displays a list of actions in the workflow. To edit or delete an
action in the workflow, select the action and click Edit or Delete. To create one
or more actions for the workflow, click Add.
The Actions table organizes the information in sortable columns. Right-click in
the table to customize the attributes that appear.
13. To create the workflow, click OK.
Note
Note
You can also assign the group to a workflow when you create or edit a
workflow.
8. From the vCenter list, select the vCenter with the virtual machines or VMDKs,
and then select the objects to protect.
For example, you can select a Data Center, ESX host, virtual machine, resource
pool, vApp, or disk.
Note
9. In the Restricted Data Zones tab, leave the restricted data zone field blank.
10. Click OK.
VMware actions
Actions are the key resources in a workflow for a data protection policy. An action is
the task that occurs on the client resources in the group assigned to the workflow.
You can chain multiple actions together to occur sequentially or concurrently in a
workflow.
When you create an action for a policy that is associated with the VMware Backup
Appliance, you can select the following:
l VMware backup—Performs a backup of virtual machines in vCenter to a Data
Domain system. You can only perform one VMware backup action per workflow.
The VMware backup action must occur before clone actions.
l Clone—Performs a clone of the VMware backup on a Data Domain system to any
clone device that NetWorker supports (including Data Domain system or tape
targets). You can specify multiple clone actions. Clone actions must occur after
the VMware backup action.
l VBA Checkpoint discover—Performs a discovery of the last validated checkpoint
backup of the VMware Backup Appliance. If a validated checkpoint is not available,
the action discovers the last non-validated checkpoint. The VBA Checkpoint
discover action must occur before the VBA Checkpoint backup action, but cannot
occur before the VMware backup action.
l VBA Checkpoint backup—Performs a checkpoint backup of the VMware Backup
Appliance at a scheduled time, typically once daily, to be used in case of a disaster
recovery. This action must occur after the checkpoint discover action. You can
only perform a VBA Checkpoint backup to a Data Domain pool, and the backup
requires a local storage node device. The checkpoint backup fails if the backup
device is configured on the remote storage node.
Note
Since the backup to internal storage option is no longer available in NetWorker 9.0 and
later, it is not recommend to use the VBA Checkpoint discover and VBA Checkpoint
backup actions for disaster recovery.
Note
When you clear the Enabled option, actions that occurs after a disabled action
do not start, even if the subsequent options are enabled.
l To specify a schedule for each day of the month, select Monthly by day.
10. Click the icon on each day to specify the backup level to perform.
The following table provides details about the backup level that each icon
represents. To support the same type of backup on each day, select the backup
type from the list and click Make All.
Table 21 Schedule icons
Note
If any of the actions fail in the workflow, the workflow status does not appear
as interrupted or cancelled. NetWorker reports the workflow status as failed.
18. From the Soft Limit list, select the amount of time after the action starts to
stop the initiation of new activities. The default value of 0 (zero) indicates no
amount of time.
19. From the Hard Limit list, select the amount of time after the action starts to
begin terminating activities. The default value of 0 (zero) indicates no amount
of time.
20. (Optional) Configure overrides for the task that is scheduled on a specific day.
To specify the month, use the navigation buttons and the month list box. To
specify the year, use the spin boxes. You can set an override in the following
ways:
l Select the day in the calendar, which changes the action task for the
specific day.
l Use the action task list to select the task, and then perform one of the
following steps:
n To define an override that occurs on a specific day of the week, every
week, select Specified day, and then use the lists. Click Add Rules
based override.
n To define an override that occurs on the last day of the calendar month,
select Last day of the month. Click Add Rules based override.
n In the Override field, type an override.
Note
21. From the Send Notifications list box, select whether to send notifications for
the action:
l To use the notification configuration that is defined in the Policy resource to
send the notification, select Set at policy level.
l To send a notification on completion of the action, select On Completion.
l To send a notification only if the action fails to complete, select On Failure.
22. In the Send notification attribute, when you select the On Completion option
or On failure option, the Command box appears. Use this box to configure how
NetWorker sends the notifications. You can use the nsrlog command to send
the notifications to a log file or you can send an email notification.
The default notification action is to send the information to the
policy_notifications.log file. By default, the
policy_notifications.log file is located in the /nsr/logs directory on
Linux and in the C:\Program Files\EMC NetWorker\nsr\logs folder on
Windows.
Use the default mailer program on Linux to send email messages or the
smtpmail application on Windows:
l To send notifications to a file, type the following command, where
policy_notifications.log is the name of the file:
nsrlog -f policy_notifications.log
l On Linux, to send an email notification, type the following command:
Note
When you clear the Enabled option, actions that occurs after a disabled action
do not start, even if the subsequent options are enabled.
7. Specify the order of the action in relation to other actions in the workflow:
l If the action is part of a sequence of actions in a workflow path, in the
Previous box, select the action that should precede this action.
l If the action should run concurrently with an action, in the Previous box,
select the concurrent action, and then select the Concurrent checkbox.
8. Specify a weekly or monthly schedule for the action:
l To specify a schedule for each day of the week, select Weekly by day.
l To specify a schedule for each day of the month, select Monthly by day.
9. Specify the days to perform cloning:
l To clone on a specific day, click the Execute icon on the day.
l To skip a clone on a specific day, click the Skip icon on the day.
l To check connectivity every day, select Execute from the list, and then click
Make All.
The following table provides details on the icons.
Note
Although the Retries, Retry Delay, or the Inactivity Timeout options appear,
the clone action does not support these options and ignores the values.
14. In the Parallelism field, specify the maximum number of concurrent operations
for the action. This value should not exceed 25.
15. From the Failure Impact list, specify what to do when a job fails:
l To continue the workflow when there are job failures, select Continue.
l To abort the entire workflow if there is a failure with one of the jobs in the
action, select Abort workflow.
Note
If any of the actions fail in the workflow, the workflow status does not appear
as interrupted or cancelled. NetWorker reports the workflow status as failed.
16. From the Send Notifications list box, select whether to send notifications for
the action:
l To use the notification configuration that is defined in the Policy resource to
send the notification, select Set at policy level.
l To send a notification on completion of the action, select On Completion.
l To send a notification only if the action fails to complete, select On Failure.
17. In the Send notification attribute, when you select the On Completion option
or On failure option, the Command box appears. Use this box to configure how
NetWorker sends the notifications. You can use the nsrlog command to send
the notifications to a log file or you can send an email notification.
The default notification action is to send the information to the
policy_notifications.log file. By default, the
policy_notifications.log file is located in the /nsr/logs directory on
Linux and in the C:\Program Files\EMC NetWorker\nsr\logs folder on
Windows.
Use the default mailer program on Linux to send email messages or the
smtpmail application on Windows:
l To send notifications to a file, type the following command, where
policy_notifications.log is the name of the file:
nsrlog -f policy_notifications.log
l On Linux, to send an email notification, type the following command:
where:
n -s subject—Includes a standard email header with the message and
specifies the subject text for that header. Without this option, the
18. From the Soft Limit list, select the amount of time after the action starts to
stop the initiation of new activities. The default value of 0 (zero) indicates no
amount of time.
19. From the Hard Limit list, select the amount of time after the action starts to
begin terminating activities. The default value of 0 (zero) indicates no amount
of time.
20. Optional, in Start Time specify the time to start the action.
Use the spin boxes to set the hour and minute values, and select one of the
following options from the drop-down list:
l Disabled—Do not enforce an action start time. The action will start at the
time defined by the workflow.
l Absolute—Start the action at the time specified by the values in the spin
boxes.
l Relative—Start the action after the period of time defined in the spin boxes
has elapsed after the start of the workflow.
21. (Optional) Configure overrides for the task that is scheduled on a specific day.
To specify the month, use the navigation buttons and the month list box. To
specify the year, use the spin boxes. You can set an override in the following
ways:
l Select the day in the calendar, which changes the action task for the
specific day.
l Use the action task list to select the task, and then perform one of the
following steps:
n To define an override that occurs on a specific day of the week, every
week, select Specified day, and then use the lists. Click Add Rules
based override.
n To define an override that occurs on the last day of the calendar month,
select Last day of the month. Click Add Rules based override.
n In the Override field, type an override.
Note
The Media window displays the save sets contained within the policy. If the save sets
are additionally part of an application-consistent policy, a green check mark appears in
the VM App Consistent column.
Figure 113 VMware protection policy save sets in Media window
Note
To refine items displayed in the right details pane, select containers in the
Virtualization node hierarchy in the left pane. For example, if an individual Cluster is
selected in the Virtualization node, only child elements associated with that Cluster
display.
To filter the visible items to show only protected VMs, unprotected VMs, or
overprotected VMs, click the links located above the right pane, as shown in the
following figure.
Figure 116 Filtering results in VMware View
Note
Table view only displays information for virtual machines. It does not show any details
about VMDKs. You must use Map view to display those details.
The filtering function works the same in Table view as in Map view. Links provided
above the details pane allow you to display only overprotected virtual machines,
unprotected virtual machines, or all virtual machines in the environment. The
NetWorker Administration Guide provides general information on using tables in the
Administration window.
Note
In Table view, the Host field contains an undefined value for virtual machines or
containers that are part of a cluster. The Map view provides a link to the cluster.
Note
Disconnecting an ESXi server from a vCenter server only temporarily disconnects the
server and does not remove the server. To permanently remove the ESXi server from
the vCenter inventory, use the Remove option from vCenter.
Note
You can restart any failed or canceled workflow. However, the restart must happen
within the restart window that you specified for the workflow.
Procedure
1. Select the workflow, or action in the Monitoring window.
2. Right-click, and then select Start, Stop, or Restart.
A confirmation message appears.
3. Click Yes.
Note
Since this same functionality, described in the section Assigning groups within
VMware View on page 232, is available within NMC, EMC recommends that you
only use NMC to assign VMs/VMDKs to policies.
l Backups (Ad-hoc VM backups, also known as Backup Now and Backup only out
of date sources)
l Recoveries (FULLVM image-level recoveries, VMDK recoveries, and instant
access recovery)
l View reports and log files for policies run
l Configuration options such as email notifications
Note
You cannot use the VMware Backup Appliance without a vCenter Server. In linked
mode, the appliance works only with the associated vCenter server.
Benefits of EMC Backup and Recovery user interface in the vSphere Web
Client
The EMC Backup and Recovery user interface provides the following benefits:
l Provides fast and efficient data protection for all of your virtual machines/VMDKs,
even those migrated between ESX hosts.
l Significantly reduces disk space consumed by backup data by using patented
variable-length deduplication with every backup operation. The section
Deduplication store benefits on page 235 provides more information.
l Reduces the cost of backing up virtual machines and minimizes the backup
window by using Changed Block Tracking (CBT) and virtual machine snapshots.
l Allows for easy backups without the need for third-party agents installed in each
virtual machine.
l Uses a simple, straight-forward installation as an integrated component within
EMC Backup and Recovery, which is managed by a web portal.
l Provides direct access to EMC Backup and Recovery configuration integrated into
the vSphere Web Client.
l Protects backups with checkpoint and rollback mechanisms.
l Provides simplified recovery of Windows and Linux files with end-user initiated file
level recoveries from a web-based interface.
Benefits of EMC Backup and Recovery user interface in the vSphere Web Client 235
NetWorker VMware Protection with the VMware Backup Appliance (legacy)
Connecting to the EMC Backup and Recovery user interface in the vSphere
Web Client
Procedure
1. From a web browser, open the vSphere Web Client using the following URL:
https://IP_address_vCenter_Server:9443/vsphere-client/
Note
If you receive an SSL certificate error in your web browser, refer to the
VMware knowledgebase article 1021514.
2. In the VMware vSphere Web Client window, type the vCenter user name and
password for the dedicated EMC Backup and Recovery user you created, and
then click Login.
3. In the left panel of the vSphere Web Client, select EMC Backup and Recovery.
4. In the Welcome to EMC Backup and Recovery Data Protection window,
select a Backup Appliance from the drop-down list. The list contains all the
VMware Backup appliances registered in the vCenter.
Each vCenter Server supports up to 10 appliances. The EBR appliance drop-
down list, shown in the following figure, contains the appliance names in
alphabetical order.
Figure 119 Selecting the Backup Appliance
5. Click Connect.
Note
The maximum retry attempts for the VMware Backup Appliance to connect to
the vCenter is two. Further attempts to connect to the vCenter requires
restarting the EMC Backup and Recovery server by typing the following
command:
ebrserver.pl --restart
Available tasks in the EMC Backup and Recovery user interface (VMware
Backup Appliance only)
The EMC Backup and Recovery user interface in the vSphere Web Client allows you
to configure and manage the VMware Backup Appliance.
When you connect to the vSphere Web Client and then click EMC Backup and
Recovery in the left pane, the following page displays.
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Figure 120 EMC Backup and Recovery user interface in the vSphere Web Client
The EMC Backup and Recovery user interface consists of five tabs:
l Getting Started—Provides an overview of functionality within the EMC Backup
and Recovery user interface along with quick links to assign virtual machines to a
workflow and to perform restores.
l Backup—Provides a list of scheduled backup workflows and details about each
workflow created in NMC. This window enables you to add the virtual machines/
VMDKs that you want protected to the workflows, and to run workflows on
demand.
l Restore—Provides a list of successful backups that you can restore.
l Reports—Provides backup status reports for the virtual machines on the vCenter
Server that you added to the workflow.
l Configuration—Displays EMC Backup and Recovery configuration information
and allows you to edit email settings. It also allows you to run integrity checks (for
example, checkpoint creation and validation).
Backup
The Backup tab displays information about available backup policies.
Column Description
Name The name of the backup policy.
State Whether the policy is enabled or disabled. Disabled backup policies will
not run. Also, a “No Schedule” state displays when you disable
Autostart in NMC for a policy.
Type The type of backup specified in the policy; for example, Image.
Last Start Time The last time the policy was started.
Duration The length of time the policy took to complete the last time it ran.
Next Run Time The next time the policy is scheduled to run.
Column Description
Success Count The number of virtual machines that were backed up successfully the
last time the policy ran. This number updates after each backup.
Changes to a policy between backups will not be reflected in this
number until after the policy runs again. For example, if a backup
reports that 10 virtual machines successfully backed up, and then you
edit the policy so that only one virtual machine remains, this number
remains at 10 until the policy runs again and, if successful, the number
changes to one.
Failure Count The number of virtual machines that did not back up successfully the
last time the policy ran. This number updates after each backup.
Changes to a policy between backups will not be reflected in this
number until after the policy runs again. For example, if a backup
reports that 10 virtual machines failed to back up, and then you edit the
policy so that only one virtual machine remains, this number remains at
10 until the policy runs again and, if the backup fails, the number
changes to one.
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Restore
The Restore tab displays a list of virtual machines that were backed up using the
VMware Backup Appliance. By navigating through the list of backups, you can select
and restore specific backups.
Figure 122 VMware Backup Appliance Restore tab
Over time, the information displayed on the Restore tab may become out of date. To
view the most up-to-date information on backups available for restore, click Refresh.
More information on restore is provided in the section Restoring the VMware
environment on page 250.
Reports
On the Reports tab, you can view lists of task failures, job details, and unprotected
clients. You can also export report information to a CSV file by selecting Actions >
Export to CSV.
The following figure shows the Reports tab with the Job Details report selected.
Figure 123 VMware Backup appliance Reports tab
Task Failures
The Task Failures tab lets you list all of the tasks that have failed, or filter the failed
tasks by Error, Job, or Client. When filtering task failures, select the options that
display depending on the type of failure you select.
You can rerun a failed task by selecting the task, and clicking Actions > Rerun Task.
The information displayed on the Task Failure tab is described in the following table.
Column Description
Failure Time The date and time that the task failed.
Client/Source The name of the client for which the task failed.
Name
Next Run Time The next time the job is scheduled to run.
Job Details
The Job Details tab lets you display information about backup and restore jobs that
have occurred and that are scheduled. You can view information about all backup or
restore jobs, or filter the jobs by Client, Last Execution, and Next Execution. When
filtering jobs, select the options that display depending on the type of job you select.
The information displayed on the Job Details tab is described in the following table.
Column Description
Client Information
Client Name The name of the client on which the job ran.
Last Execution
Job Name The name of the job that ran.
Completion The date and time the job completed. If the job has not run, this column
contains Never.
Next Execution
Job Name The name of the job that is scheduled to run.
Scheduled The date and time the job is scheduled to run again.
Available tasks in the EMC Backup and Recovery user interface (VMware Backup Appliance only) 241
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Unprotected Clients
The Unprotected Clients tab lets you display information about the clients the are
currently unprotected by the VMware Backup Appliance. You can list all unprotected
clients, or you can filter by Name, IP Address, or VM Path. When filtering clients,
select the options that display, and type the filter criteria in the text box.
The information displayed on the Unprotected Clients tab is described in the
following table.
Column Description
Client Name The name of the client on which the job ran.
Configuration
The Configuration tab allows you to manage the maintenance tasks for the VMware
Backup Appliance.
Figure 124 VMware Backup Appliance Configuration tab
Detail Description
Display name The name of the VMware Backup Appliance in the vCenter.
Detail Description
Product name The name of the product.
Major Version The main version number of the VMware Backup Appliance.
vCenter server The IP address of the vCenter managing the VMware Backup Appliance.
NetWorker The IP address of the NetWorker server on which the VMware Backup
server Appliance is managed.
EBR backup user The user name used to log in to the vSphere Web Client.
EBR appliance The current time in the time zone set on the VMware Backup Appliance.
time
Time zone The time zone in which the VMware Backup Appliance is running.
You can configure these options during the VMware Backup Appliance installation. You
can also edit these options by using the EMC Backup and Recovery Configuration
utility as described in Post-installation configuration on page 197.
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2. Scroll through the log information, using the scroll bar and the Show next 2000
lines and Show all navigation buttons as needed.
3. Click Export View if you want to save the details that are displayed on the
screen to a file on the machine where your browser is running.
The Save As dialog box opens, and you can select where to save the file.
Configuring email
The Email view on the Configuration tab lets you configure EMC Backup and
Recovery to send SMTP email reports to specified recipients.
Procedure
1. On the Configuration tab, click Email.
The Email configuration screen displays.
2. Click Edit.
3. Select the Enable email reports checkbox.
The configuration fields are enabled so that you can enter information.
4. Supply information in the fields using the definitions shown in the following
table.
Red asterisks indicate required information.
My server requires Check this box if your SMTP server requires authentication.
me to log in
Password Enter the password associated with the username. (EMC Backup and
Recovery does not validate the password in any way; the password
entered is passed directly to the email server.)
From address Enter the email address you would like the email report to be from. This
can only be a single address.
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Send day(s) Check the days you want the reports sent.
Report Locale From the drop-down list choose the locale for the email reports.
Enable CSV Select this option to enable the email to attach a CSV file.
Attachment
Results
EMC Backup and Recovery reports sent by email will contain information similar to
that shown below.
Example-6.2.30.40 - (10.5.123.45)
--------------------------------------------------------------------
-
Report Date: February 27, 2012 - 15:12
Last Report Date: February 27, 2012 - 14:45
Even though you can use the EMC Backup and Recovery user interface in the
vSphere Web Client to assign virtual machines or VMDKs to a workflow that you
created in NMC, EMC recommends that you use NMC for this functionality.
You can assign collections of virtual machines (such as all virtual machines in a
datacenter), individual virtual machines, and VMDKs to be included in a policy's
workflow that you created in NMC using the EMC Backup and Recovery user
interface in the vSphere Web Client. If you select an entire resource pool, host,
datacenter, or folder, then subsequent backups will include any new virtual machines
in the container. If you select a virtual machine, then NetWorker includes any disk
added to the virtual machine in the backup. If you move the virtual machine from the
selected container to another unselected container, then the virtual machine is no
longer part of the backup.
You can also manually select a virtual machine for back up, which ensures that
NetWorker will back up the virtual machine, even when you move the virtual machine.
EMC Backup and Recovery will not back up the following specialized virtual machines:
l VMware Backup Appliances
l VMware Data Protection (VDP) Appliances
l Templates
l Secondary fault tolerant nodes
l Proxies
3. Select the workflow to which you want to add a virtual machine or VMDK, and
then click Edit.
The Editing backup policy wizard opens, and displays all of the virtual
machines in the vCenter.
4. Click the checkboxes to select the virtual machines that you want to include in
the selected workflow, as shown in the following figure, or expand the virtual
machines to select VMDKs. You can also select other inventory objects, for
example, Resource Pools or Clusters in addition to specific virtual machines.
Note
You can only assign virtual machines and VMDKs to the workflows that you
create in NMC.
5. Click Finish.
A message indicates that the policy workflow was saved successfully.
6. Click the Refresh button to refresh your screen.
You may have to click Refresh more than once. When the editing process has
completed, the Backup and Edit buttons become active again.
Results
To see which backup sources are protected by a policy workflow, click Show items
next to Sources in the Backup policy details panel.
Note
If you disabled the Backup Now functionality in the NSR VBA Server
Properties window in NetWorker, as described in the section VMware Backup
Appliance monitoring and properties on page 208, a message displays when you
click this button indicating that Backup Now is locked and not available.
Otherwise, you can wait for NetWorker to start the workflow based on the
scheduled start time.
Stopping a workflow
Procedure
1. Select the Backup tab.
2. in the Recent Tasks pane, click the circular x symbol associated with the
workflow.
After the backup completes, you can recover the virtual machine in the vSphere Web
Client or use the EMC Data Protection Restore Client to perform a file-level
restore.
Figure 130 Restore tab in EMC Backup and Recovery user interface
Note
If there is no staging pool available when resurrecting from an AFTD, the restore does
not fail automatically after timing out. You must manually cancel the restore operation.
Note
2. In EMC Backup and Recovery, on the Restore tab, use the Restore points
from drop-down to select the appliance from which you want to restore.
EMC Backup and Recovery displays the virtual machines that are available to
restore.
3. Click the virtual machine that you want to restore to expand its backups.
Use the Filter drop-down to display a specific VM and related items. You can
also click a backup to display the VMDK level and select a single VMDK for
restore, if you only want to restore that disk.
Note
Reconnect NIC is enabled by default and greyed out. Only when you select
Power On are you given the option to clear the Reconnect NIC option.
8. Click Next.
9. On the Ready to complete page, verify the selections. The wizard displays a
summary of the number of machines that will be replaced (restore to the
original location) and the number of machines that will be created (restore to a
new location).
10. To change any of the settings for your restore request, either use the Back
button to return to the appropriate screen, or click the appropriate numbered
step title to the left of the wizard. If the settings are correct, then click Finish.
The Restore Backup wizard displays a message that the restore process
initiated successfully.
11. Click OK.
You can monitor the restore progress by using the Recent Tasks pane.
Note
If you selected Reconnect NIC during the restore process, then confirm the
network configuration for the newly-created virtual machine. Once the restore
completes, the new virtual machine NIC might use the same IP address as the
original virtual machine, which will cause conflicts.
Results
When the recovery starts, a recovery session also displays in NMC. Any activities that
occur on the vCenter side are visible on the NMC side.
backups, the same as you would perform a typical FULLVM restore. No further
configuration is required to use this feature.
The Instant Access restore operation has the following limitations:
l The free space on the Data Domain system must be equal to or greater than the
total disk size of the VM being restored, as the restore does not take into account
the actual space required after deduplication occurs. If there is insufficient disk
space, an error appears indicating "Insufficient disk space on datastore," and
creation of the target VM fails.
l You cannot use the Instant Access button when you select more than one
different Data Domain system backup for multiple VMs.
l You can perform only one Instant Access restore at a time. Ensure that you
vMotion the VM to a different datastore and that you unmount the datastore
before performing another instant access restore for the Data Domain system.
l You cannot recover multiple save sets concurrently using Instant Access restore.
Procedure
1. In the EMC Backup and Recovery user interface, select the Restore tab.
EMC Backup and Recovery displays the virtual machines that are available to
restore.
2. Click a virtual machine to expand the list of available backups, from which to
restore.
Note
You cannot browse and select backup data at the disk level.
3. Select the backup that you want to restore, and click Instant Access.
The Instant Access wizard opens to the Select Backup page.
Figure 131 Select a backup
4. Verify that the list of backups is correct, remove any backups that you want to
exclude from the restore, and click Next.
The Set Instant Access Options page displays.
5. Specify a new name and destination for the restore, and click Next.
The Ready to complete page displays.
Figure 133 Ready to complete
Note
Before you use this option, make sure that you establish a connection to the VMware
Backup Appliance by selecting the EMC Backup and Recovery user interface in the
vSphere Web Client.
Note
You can only perform an emergency restore from a primary backup; you cannot use a
cloned backup.
Procedure
1. Log in to the EMC Backup and Recovery Configure window at the following
URL using the EMC Backup and Recovery username and password credentials
that you defined during configuration:
http://VMware_Backup_appliance_IP:8580/ebr-configure
File-level restore
You can use the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client to perform virtual
machine file-level restores.
The Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client, which is accessed through a web
browser, allows you to select specific virtual machine backups as file systems, and
then browse the file system to locate the directories and files you want to restore.
The Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client operates in one of two modes:
l User—A local user account with administrative privileges that can restore folders
or files to the original virtual. The section Restoring specific folders or files to the
original virtual machine (User mode) provides more information.
l Admin—A vCenter administrator account that can restore folders or files from a
different virtual machine to any available destination client. The section Restoring
specific folders or files from a different virtual machine (Admin mode) provides
more information.
Note
Before you start a file-level restore, review the limitations specified in the section FLR
limitations to ensure that you can perform file-level restores in your configuration.
Note
Before performing a file-level restore, make sure that your browser is updated to the
latest version.
l In a large environment where many virtual machines appear in the Dell EMC Data
Protection Restore Client, the navigation buttons (Back, Next, Finish) may
appear very small, requiring you to zoom in to see the options. If this occurs, it is
recommended that you use the latest versions of the Chrome or Firefox browsers
to avoid the issue.
l You can only restore files and/or folders from a Windows backup to a Windows
machine, or from a Linux backup to a Linux machine.
l You must install VMware Tools to use file-level restore. For best results, ensure
that all virtual machines run the latest available version of VMware Tools. Older
versions are known to cause failures when you perform browse actions during the
file-level restore operation.
l You can perform file-level restore across vCenters as long as the vCenters are
configured in the same NetWorker server, and the source and target virtual
machine have the same guest operating system. For example, Linux to Linux, or
Windows to Windows.
l File-level restore does not support the following virtual disk configurations:
n Dynamic disks
n Unformatted disks
n FAT16 file systems
n FAT32 file systems
n Extended partitions (Types: 05h, 0Fh, 85h, C5h, D5h)
n Two or more virtual disks mapped to single partition
n Encrypted partitions
n Compressed partitions
l File-level restore supports direct restore from a cloned backup only if the clone
copy is on a Data Domain device.
l File-level restore does not restore or browse symbolic links.
l When you create partitions, fill the lower ordered indices first. For example, you
cannot create a single partition and place it in the partition index 2, 3, or 4. You
must place the single partition in partition index 1.
l File-level restore of Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012 virtual machines is not
supported on the following file systems:
n Windows Dynamic Disks
n Deduplicated NTFS
n Resilient File System (ReFS)
n EFI bootloader
Restoring specific folders or files to the original virtual machine in User mode
Select the User tab in the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client login page to
restore specific folders and files to the original virtual machine on Windows and Linux
virtual machines. In this mode, you connect to the Restore Client from a virtual
machine that has been backed up by NetWorker VMware Protection.
Procedure
1. Connect to the host that will receive the file-level restore with a user that is a
member of the administrations group.
2. Open a browser and enter a URL that points to the VMware Backup Appliance
and indicates file-level restore. For example:
http://VMware_Backup_Appliance_host:8580/flr
Note
You must connect to the VMware Backup Appliance from a web browser on the
virtual machine that the files will be restored to.
3. Select the User tab, and then log in to the Restore Client with the local
administrative credentials of the virtual machine to which you are logged in.
When you log in, the Select the backup(s) to restore from page displays with
a list of backups for the local virtual machine.
4. Use the drop-down list to view the available backups. You can view all backups,
or only backups on a specific date or within a specific range. Highlight a backup
and double-click or drag and drop to move the backup to the Select Items
pane. Click Next.
The following figure provides an example of the Select the backups to restore
from page.
Note
When you click Next, if a folder hierarchy does not appear, the file system in
use on the virtual machine may not support file-level restore. The section File-
level restore limitations on page 256 provides more information.
5. On the Select items to restore page, browse and select the files and folders
available for recovery. You can sort items by Name, Date, and so on. Items
marked for restore appear in the Selected Items pane. To mark an item for
recovery, double-click the item, or drag and drop the item into the Selected
Items pane.
6. On the Select destination to restore to page, select the folder to which you
want to restore the items, and then click Finish.
The following figure provides an example of the Select destination to restore
to page.
Figure 138 Select destination to restore to page
When you select the arrow button, the Restore Monitor panel slides up. The
following figure provides an example of the Restore Monitor panel.
Figure 140 Restore Monitor panel
Click the Refresh button on the right-hand side of the panel to refresh the
contents as the restore occurs.
Restoring specific folders or files from a different virtual machine in Admin mode
To restore specific folders or files from a different virtual machine, use Admin mode in
the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client login page. Once connected, you can
browse, select, and restore files and folders from any virtual machine that you backed
up by using NetWorker VMware Protection. You can then restore items to the virtual
machine on which you are currently logged in, or to any available destination virtual
machine.
Procedure
1. Open a browser and specify the URL that points to the EMC Backup and
Recovery appliance and indicates file-level restore (FLR), as in the following
example:
http://VMware_Backup_Appliance_host:8580/flr
Ensure that you launch the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client from a
virtual machine that you backed up using the NetWorker VMware Protection
solution.
2. Click Admin, and then log in to the Restore Client with the vCenter
administrative credentials that you used to register the VMware Backup
Appliance to the vCenter Server.
The following figure provides an example of the Admin login window.
Figure 141 Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client Admin Login
Note
When you use Admin mode, ensure that the user you specify for the vCenter
login has the correct privileges to use this option.
When you log in, the Select the backup(s) to restore from page appears with
a list of all the virtual machines that were backed up by using NetWorker
VMware Protection. The available backups appear under each virtual machine.
3. Use the drop-down list to view the available backups. You can view all backups,
or only backups on a specific date or within a specific range. Highlight a backup
and double-click or drag and drop to move the backup to the Select Items
pane. Click Next.
4. On the Select items to restore page, browse and select the files and folders
available for restore. You can sort items by Name, Date, and so on. Items
marked for restore appear in the Selected Items pane. To mark an item for
recovery, double-click the item, or drag and drop the item into the Selected
Items pane.
5. In the Select Restore Client page, select a destination virtual machine.
A login dialog box similar to the following figure appears for the destination
client.
When you select the arrow button, the Restore Monitor panel slides up. The
following figure provides an example of the Restore Monitor panel.
Figure 144 Restore Monitor panel
Click the Refresh button on the right-hand side of the panel to refresh the
contents as the restore occurs.
Viewing Alarms
EMC Backup and Recovery can trigger the following alarms:
EBR: [003] The VMware Backup appliance is The VMware Backup Appliance does not have
full. any disk space for additional backups. The
appliance will run in read-only (or restore-
only) mode until you make additional space
available. You can free space on the appliance
by manually deleting unnecessary or older
backups and by changing retention policies on
backup jobs to shorten the backup retention
time.
EBR: [004] The VMware Backup appliance The datastore that contains the disks
datastore is approaching maximum capacity. provisioned for the VMware Backup Appliance
is approaching maximum capacity. When
datastore reaches the maximum capacity, the
VMware Backup Appliance will be suspended.
The appliance cannot be resumed until
additional space is made available on the
datastore.
EBR: [005] Core services are not running. The Core services are not running. Start the
Core services by using the EMC Backup and
Recovery Configure window.
EBR: [006] Management services are not The Management services are not running.
running. Start Management services by using the EMC
Backup and Recovery Configure window.
EBR: [007] File system services are not The File system services are not started. Start
running. the File system services by using the EMC
Backup and Recovery Configure window.
Note
EBR: [008] File level restore services are not The File level restore services are not started.
running. Start the File level restore services by using
the EMC Backup and Recovery Configure
Note window.
This alarm does not apply to EBR version
1.5.1.7.
EBR: [009] Maintenance services are not The Maintenance services are not running.
running. Start Maintenance services by using the EMC
Backup and Recovery Configure window.
EBR: [010] Backup scheduler is not running. The Backup scheduler is not running. Start
Backup scheduler by using the EMC Backup
and Recovery Configure window.
Note
VMware documentation provides for details about how to inflate thin provisioned disks
to thick provisioned disks. This procedure requires that you shut down the VMware
Backup Appliance and might take several hours to complete.
nsrmm -d -S ssid/cloneid
where ssid/cloneid is the SSID and cloneID of the save set that you want to delete.
When you delete a save set from NetWorker server, NetWorker will also remove the
corresponding backup from the EMC Backup and Recovery Appliance.
Creating a checkpoint using the EMC Backup and Recovery user interface
You can create a validated checkpoint by using the command line or the EMC Backup
and Recovery user interface in the vSphere Web Client. The section Preparing the
VMware Backup appliance for disaster recovery on page 273 provides information on
creating and validating checkpoints from the command line.
Procedure
1. In the EMC Backup and Recovery user interface, select the Configuration tab.
2. Click the gear icon, and then select Run integrity Check as shown in the
following figure.
Note
NetWorker does not support disaster recovery from a checkpoint backup that
was performed with a VMware Backup Appliance version earlier than the
currently installed version. For example, if you upgrade to a NetWorker 9.2
server and VMware Backup Appliance version 1.5.1.7 from NetWorker 8.2 SP1
and VMware Backup Appliance version 1.1.1.50, you cannot perform a disaster
recovery from a checkpoint backup created with OVA 1.1.1.50. Backup and
restore operations will hang in "Waiting: Queued" state.
You should run backups once or twice daily that occur a couple hours after checkpoint
creation, to secure the checkpoint files on the NetWorker media. Preparing the
VMware Backup appliance for disaster recovery on page 273 provides a list of
checkpoint locations.
Cross Sync
A cross sync operation synchronizes the VMware Backup Appliance and NetWorker
databases for backups and configurations. A VMware Backup Appliance rollback
automatically starts a cross sync operation on the NetWorker server. You can also
perform a cross sync manually from the command line to check the consistency of the
NetWorker metadata. Before you perform a cross sync, ensure that the VMware
Backup Appliance is online.
Use the following command to manually perform cross sync from the command line of
the NetWorker server:
nsrim -X -S -h EMC_Backup_and_Recovery_appliance_hostname -t last
checkpoint time -f
where:
l -S initiates the VMware Backup appliance cross sync.
l -h specifies the VMware Backup appliance server name.
l -t is an optional parameter that specifies the last checkpoint time. EMC Backup
and Recovery performs a cross sync for the backups that occur only after the
specified time. Specify the time in a format that NetWorker accepts. The
nsr_getdate man page provides information on acceptable formats.
l -f synchronizes the entire database and deletes out of sync backups. If the
backups exist only on the VMware Backup appliance, then you can only delete the
backups by using this option.
To cross sync the entire database, specify -f without specifying the time.
If you do not specify a time when you perform a manual cross sync, NetWorker
retrieves the most recent validated checkpoint from the VMware Backup appliance
and performs a cross-sync starting from that time.
If you perform a cross sync on an entire database and the database is very large, the
synchronization process may take longer than normal.
Cross sync generates the following NMC events:
l “Cross sync with appliance name VMware Backup Appliance is
started.”
l “Cross sync with appliance name VMware Backups Appliance is
successful for configuration and backups.”
Disaster Recovery
In the event of failure, as a first course of action, NetWorker VMware Protection will
perform a rollback to a known validated checkpoint. To recover from a VMware
Backup Appliance failure, refer to the following disaster recovery guidelines.
take one hour to complete, you have an additional seven hours before maintenance
tasks are scheduled. This is an ideal time to shut down and backup the appliance.
l To shutdown the appliance, use the vSphere Client to perform a Shut Down
Guest OS task on the virtual machine. Do not use a Power Off task, which is the
equivalent to unplugging the power cord on a physical server and may not result in
a clean shut down process. Shutdown and Startup Procedures on page 266
provides more information.
Note
When you perform a disaster recovery for a VMware Backup Appliance without using
checkpoints, you can only perform a FULL VM (image-level) restore. VMDK, FLR, and
instant access restores are not supported in this case. You can, however, perform
these types of restore after a resurrection restore.
Procedure
1. Deploy a new VMware Backup Appliance and specify the same IP address that
was used at the time of the backup, from which you are recovering.
EMC Backup and Recovery Configuration Utility on page 193 provides
instructions.
2. Configure the new VMware Backup Appliance.
During the NetWorker Registration step, select the Override NetWorker
registration check and the Force cross sync with NetWorker after re-
deployment options.
The following figure provides an example of the NetWorker Registration page.
Figure 147 Networker registration during new appliance configuration
Note
When you use ssh to connect to or log in to the EMC Backup and Recovery console,
ensure that you log in with admin account instead of the root account. Log in to the
EMC Backup and Recovery Console as admin instead of root on page 287 provides
more information.
Procedure
1. If you do not have a recent checkpoint or want to create a new checkpoint
backup, create the checkpoint by running the following command:
# mccli checkpoint create --override_maintenance_scheduler
2. Use the mccli command to verify that you have created a successful
checkpoint by running:
mccli checkpoint show
An output similar to the following displays:
Tag Time Validated Deletable
----------------- ----------------------- ---------
---------
cp.20130206170045 2013-02-06 09:00:45 PST Validated Yes
4. Use the NetWorker Administration GUI to add two actions to a workflow for the
VMware Protection Policy, in the following order:
a. VMware checkpoint discover action.
b. VMware checkpoint backup action.
Note
Optionally, add a clone action after the checkpoint backup action to clone
the checkpoint backup to a Data Domain system, AFTD, or tape.
For any disaster recovery, you must repeat any changes previously made to the
configuration files. For example, the changes performed in the section Restrict
mapping of datastores on page 192.
Procedure
1. Redeploy the VMware Backup Appliance with the same network configuration
that was used at the time of the checkpoint. Use the Override button within
the EMC Backup and Recovery Configure window.
Note
Ensure that the password for the system that you plan to recover to matches
the password that was defined for the system when the checkpoint was taken.
3. Use NMC to connect to the NetWorker server, and then select the Devices tab
in Administration GUI.
4. In the left pane, select VMware Backup Appliance.
The backup appliances display in the right pane.
5. In the right pane, right-click the VMware Backup Appliance that you want to
recover, and then select Start VBA Recover for Checkpoints, as shown in the
following figure.
Figure 148 Starting a VMware Backup Appliance disaster recovery
7. Check for restores of old backups and that the policies are intact as per the
checkpoint.
Complete disaster recovery of the VMware Backup Appliance and the Data
Domain or tape device
The following sections describe the steps that are required to a complete disaster
recovery, where you need to restore both the connection to the VMware Backup
Appliance, and the Data Domain or tape device that has completely failed.
Note
Ensure that the password for the system that you plan to recover to matches
the password that was defined for the system when the checkpoint was taken.
3. Use NMC to connect to the NetWorker server, and then select the Devices tab
in Administration GUI.
4. In the left pane, select VMware Backup Appliance.
Complete disaster recovery of the VMware Backup Appliance and the Data Domain or tape device 275
NetWorker VMware Protection with the VMware Backup Appliance (legacy)
3. Type the username and password for the VMware Backup Appliance, and click
OK.
4. Browse restores from the VMware Backup Appliance and select the VMs/
VMDKs that you want to restore to the new location. Performing a FULLVM
restore on page 251 provides more information.
Note
Backups from the VMware Backup Appliance and external proxy create sessions with
NetWorker devices. The count of sessions is driven by the number of appliances,
external proxies, clone jobs and other backups running through this server. Every
VMware Backup Appliance and external proxy can run up to 8 sessions. If using
external proxies, EMC recommends that you disable the internal proxy on the VMware
Backup Appliance. The values calculated in the table above reflects a disabled internal
storage.
Note
For more best practices related specifically to the deployment of the VMware Backup
Appliance in new or upgraded installations of NetWorker, review the section VMware
Backup Appliance requirements.
l Ensure that the NetWorker server and storage node are at the same version, and
that the VMware Backup Appliance you deploy is compatible with this version, for
example, NetWorker 9.2 with OVA 1.5.1.7.
l Use Hotadd transport mode for faster backups and restores and less exposure to
network routing, firewall, and SSL certificate issues. To support Hotadd mode,
deploy the VMware Backup Appliance on an ESXi host that has a path to the
storage that holds the target virtual disk(s) for backup. In environments that use
the older VMFSv3 format datastore, deploy the proxy on the datastore with the
largest block size.
Note
Hotadd mode requires VMware hardware version 7 or later. Ensure all Virtual
Machines that you want to back up are using Virtual Machine hardware version 7
or later.
For sites that contain a large number of Virtual Machines that do not support
Hotadd requirements, NBD backups will be used. This can cause congestion on the
ESXi host management network. Plan your backup network carefully for large
scale NBD installs. You may consider configuring one of the following options:
Note
You cannot use hotadd mode with IDE Virtual disks and therefore backup of these
disks will be performed using NBD mode.
l During policy configuration, assign clients to a policy based on logical grouping to
allow for better scheduling of backups that will help you avoid resource contention
and create more organized logs for review.
l It is recommended that you perform regular checkpoint backups to protect the
VMware metadata in your environment. You can schedule daily checkpoint
discover and checkpoint backup actions for a VMware Protection Policy, within
NetWorker.
l When you plan the backups, ensure that NetWorker VMware Protection supports
the disk types that you use in the environment. Currently, NetWorker VMware
Protection does not support the following disk types:
n Independent (persistent and non-persistent)
n RDM Independent - Virtual Compatibility Mode
n RDM Physical Compatibility Mode
l When you enable Change Block Tracking (CBT) NetWorker can achieve faster
incremental backup performance. The default VMware Backup Appliance
configuration has a threshold of 25% change per client, which means that if the
particular Virtual Machine has changed more than 25% since the last backup,
NetWorker will perform a level full backup. In order to support Changed Block
Tracking (CBT):
n Ensure that all Virtual Machines run VMware hardware version 7 or higher.
n If you add a disk or dynamically expand a disk on a Virtual Machine, you must
take a new full backup for CBT to function.
For Incremental backups with CBT, remove any existing snapshots of a Virtual
Machine before you add the VMware Backup Appliance.
Note
include the VDP plug-in, and the HP Insight Manager plug-in. VMware knowledge
base article 1025360 at http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1025360 provides the
instructions to remove conflicting plugins.
l EMC recommends that you set an appropriate NetWorker server/storage
parallelism value, according to the available resources, to reduce queuing. For
example, a VMware Backup Appliance with 5 external proxies and clones requires
more than 64 parallel sessions. Therefore, setting the parallelism for the
NetWorker server to 128 or higher (while also setting the server with 32+ GB
memory and 8+ CPUs) will suit such an environment. The NetWorker Performance
Optimization Planning Guide provides more details.
If you require a larger number of parallel image backups, also consider setting the
maximum number of vCenter SOAP sessions to larger value. Note that this
requires careful planning and additional resources on the vCenter Server You can
configure this by modifying the following line in the vCenter vpxd.cfg file:
<vmacore><soap><maxSessionCount> N </maxSessionCount></soap></
vmacore>
This applies specifically to SDK sessions as opposed to VI client sessions:
l Each Virtual Machine backup to a Data Domain system consumes more than one
session on the Data Domain device. The default device configuration is target
sessions=6 and max session=60, however EMC recommends that you
configure additional devices for more than 10 parallel backups.
l Virtual Machines with extremely high IO may face hangs during consolidation due
to the ESXi forced operation called synchronous consolidate. Plan your backups of
such Virtual Machines according to the amount of workload on the Virtual
Machine.
l When you work with the vCenter database either directly or by using scripts, do
not change the name attribute for the vmfolder object. VMware knowledge base
article at https://support.emc.com/kb/190755 provides more information.
l When you set up multiple devices locally on the NetWorker server, this can lead to
resource contention. Large VMware environments will have more stability when
most backup devices are set up on a remote storage node.
When you mount a backup or clone pool volume on a remote storage node, then
modify the client properties for the VMware Backup Appliance resource in
NetWorker to add the remote storage node names to the Storage nodes attribute
on the Globals (2 of 2) tab.
l Resource contention can occur at various points during the backup cycle. When
NetWorker runs larger policies issues due to contention of resources can occur,
which impact all running operations. Adjust your resources and times for other
larger policies to avoid overlaps, and avoid resource contention.
For example, you configure one pool named Bronze, with one device. If you set up
a policy where every day at 10 pm two policies called 'Bronze1' and 'Bronze2' with
400 clients each start writing to the device in the 'Bronze' pool, then the long wait
for device availability may cause unexpected delays or timeouts. To fix this, set the
policy start times 4 hours apart and add more devices, to allow for stable backups.
Note
VMware Backup Appliance versions must be the same when deploying multiple
VMware Backup Appliances in same vCenter
When you deploy more than one VMware Backup Appliance in your environment and
the appliances are registered to the same vCenter, then these VMware Backup
Appliance versions must be the same.
Cannot add Actions to workflows that have the same name in different policies
For traditional workflows, VMware allows you to use the same workflow name in
different policies. However, if you add such a workflow to a policy, you cannot add
actions to the workflow.
Datastore names cannot contain special characters
Using special characters in datastore names can cause problems with the Virtual
Backup Appliance, such as failed backups and restores. Special characters include the
following: % & * $ # @ ! \ / : * ? " < > | ;, etc.
External proxy appliance must be at same version as VMware Backup Appliance
Performing an image level recovery in the vSphere Web Client fails with error code
10002 when the external proxy is running an older awncomm version than the VMware
Backup Appliance, due to the addition of the NW_VBA_NAME flag in later versions.
Ensure that the external proxy appliance is at the same version as the VMware Backup
Appliance and if not, upgrade the external proxy. If you require an immediate recovery
in an environment with mixed versions, temporarily shut down all of the external
proxies while you start the Virtual Machine restore. This will ensure that the recovery
gets assigned to the VMware Backup Appliance internal proxy. Knowledge base article
457952 available at http://support.emc.com provides more information.
Avamar image backups to Data Domain fail if proxies not added to DD Boost
Access list
Avamar VMware image backups to Data Domain fail with errors when you do not add
the proxies to the DD Boost access list.
To add the proxies to the DD Boost access list, run the following command: ddboost
access add clients client-list. Knowledge base article 453486 available at
http://support.emc.com provides more information.
FLR browse in EMC Data Protection Restore Client may not display second of
three disks
When you use the EMC Data Protection Restore Client to browse disks for FLR, the
second of three disks may not display due to partition detection failing for this specific
disk. The disk will display properly from the command line.
Knowledge base article 457783 at http://support.emc.com provides possible
workarounds and more information on this issue.
Data Domain SMT not supported
The NetWorker VMware Protection Solution does not support Data Domain SMT. You
can create different DDBoost users to segregate access to specific DD Boost devices.
However, DD Admin credentials are required for performing instant access and file-
level restore workflows.
Backups to Data Domain device over WAN may fail if TLS used
Backups to a DDBoost device over WAN occasionally fail when you use TLS. DDBoost
fails to establish a TLS connection to the Data Domain device due to an SSL
Handshake Failure. DDBoost can successfully connect to the same Data Domain
device when TLS is not used.
Do not use combination of FQDN and IP when registering vCenter server
When you register the vCenter server with the VMware Backup Appliance and the
NetWorker server, ensure that you specify only the FQDN or only the IP in all
instances. Do not use a combination of the two.
VMware Backup appliance must be deployed to an ESX host managed by the
same vCenter you register the appliance to when using multiple vCenters
When you have multiple vCenters, you must deploy the VMware Backup Appliance to
an ESX host that is managed by the same vCenter you register the appliance to.
Otherwise, a connection error message similar to the following appears: “Unable to
find this EBR in the vCenter inventory.”
Only hotadd and NBD transport modes supported
The NetWorker VMware Protection solution supports only the hotadd and NBD
transport modes. The hotadd mode is the default transport mode.
Higher default target session and max session values for VMware Backup
Appliance
NetWorker creates the default VMware Backup Appliance with the values target
session=50 and max session=200. These values are higher than normal default values
for a device created in NetWorker because each appliance or external proxy comes
with 8 proxy agents.
Backup of individual folders within a Virtual Machine is not supported
The NetWorker VMware Protection solution only supports image-level backup and
disk-level backup. You cannot perform backups of individual folders within the Virtual
Machine.
VMware View in the NetWorker Administration map view does not display when
configuration for Virtual Machines within the vCenter is incomplete
When you use VMware View, the map view does not appear when the configuration
for one or more Virtual Machines in the vCenter is incomplete. To avoid this issue,
remove the incomplete Virtual Machine configurations from vCenter.
I/O contention when all Virtual Machines on a single data store
I/O contention may occur during snapshot creation and backup read operations when
all Virtual Machines reside on a single datastore.
Configuration checklist
The following configuration checklist provides best practices and troubleshooting tips
that may help resolve some common issues.
Basic configuration
l Synchronize system time between vCenter, ESX/ESXi/vSphere, and VMware
Backup appliance.
l Assign IPs carefully — do not reuse any IP address.
l Use FQDNs (Fully Qualified Domain Names) everywhere.
l For any network related issue, confirm that forward and reverse DNS lookups
work for each host in the datazone.
NetWorker configuration
l Ensure that the relevant devices are mounted
l Wait until you successfully configure a policy before you run the policy.
l A message appears after successful registration in NMC.
IPv6 considerations
The following considerations apply when using IPv6 instead of IPv4 for NetWorker
VMware Protection.
Register with FQDN instead of IP in EMC Backup and Recovery Configuration
Utility
During registration of the VMware Backup Appliance in the EMC Backup and
Recovery Configuration Utility window, if using IPv6 do not specify the IPv6
address. Use the FQDN of the vCenter server to register the appliance instead.
Additional zeros display in IPv6 address in EMC Backup and Recovery
Configuration Utility
The IPv6 static address tab in the EMC Backup and Recovery Configuration Utility
window displays additional zeros in the address.
Remove the extra zeros, or re-type the correct IPv6 address prior to clicking Next.
Emergency restore (Direct to host recovery) unavailable
Emergency restore, also referred to as Direct to host recovery, is currently unavailable
in an IPv6 environment.
Log in to the EMC Backup and Recovery Console as admin instead of root
When you use ssh to connect or login to the EMC Backup and Recovery Console,
ensure that you login as the admin user instead of root. Direct login as the root user is
not permitted.
EMC does not recommend that you modify the ssh configuration file in /etc/ssh so
that a user can ssh into the appliance directly as root. Changes this file can result in
future upgrade failures.
After you ssh to the Console as admin, you can then switch to the root user, as
shown in the following example:
If you use the vSphere Client to connect to the EMC Backup and Recovery Console,
you can log in as the root user.
Note
The password for the admin user is the same as the password that you specified in the
EMC Backup and Recovery Configure window during the initial installation of the
VMware Backup Appliance.
Launching the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client after upgrade on
Mozilla Firefox browser
After upgrading the VMware Backup Appliance from a NetWorker 8.2 release to
NetWorker 9.0 and later, the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client window
might not launch when using the Mozilla Firefox browser.
If you cannot launch the Dell EMC Data Protection Restore Client window, run the
following commands on the VMware Backup Appliance as the root user:
l /usr/java/latest/bin/keytool -delete -alias tomcat -storepass
changeit
l /usr/java/latest/bin/keytool -genkeypair -v -alias tomcat -keyalg
RSA -sigalg SHA256withRSA -keystore /root/.keystore -storepass
changeit -keypass changeit -validity 3650 -dname
"CN=localhost.localdom, OU=Avamar, O=EMC, L=Irvine, S=California,
C=US"
l emwebapp.sh --restart
If you use the Mozilla Firefox browser on a Linux machine and are unable to browse
the backups even after you upgrade the browser to the latest version, an error
message similar to the following might appear: sec_error_ca_cert_invalid
issue
To resolve this issue, perform the following steps:
Log in to the EMC Backup and Recovery Console as admin instead of root 287
NetWorker VMware Protection with the VMware Backup Appliance (legacy)
Launching the EMC Backup and Recovery Configuration Utility after upgrade
on Mozilla Firefox browser
After upgrading the VMware Backup Appliance from a NetWorker 8.2 release to
NetWorker 9.0.1 and later, the EMC Backup and Recovery Configuration Utility
window may not launch when using the Mozilla Firefox browser.
If you cannot launch the EMC Backup and Recovery Configuration Utility window,
perform the following:
1. Login via SSH to the VMware Backup Appliance Console as the admin user.
2. Switch to the root user by running the following command:
su -
Password:
3. Run the following commands on the VMware Backup Appliance:
emwebapp.sh --stop
emwebapp.sh --start
2. Restart the EMC Backup and Recovery database by running:
emwebapp.sh --stop
su – admin
ebrdbmaint.pl --startdb
exit
emwebapp.sh --start
3. Patch the EMC Backup and Recovery server by running:
emwebapp.sh --stop
cd /usr/local/avamar/lib/ebr
mv ebr-server.war ebr-server.war.orig
4. Use SFTP to upload the new war file to this location:
emwebapp.sh --start*
Note
When you use ssh to connect or log in to the EMC Backup and Recovery Console in
the vSphere Client, ensure that you login as admin instead of root. Log in to the EMC
Backup and Recovery Console as admin instead of root on page 287 provides more
information.
NetWorker operations
The following troubleshooting items provide some direction on how to identify and
resolve common issues with NetWorker and VMware Protection Policies.
VMware Protection Policy fails for manually created client resource with DataDomain backup
attribute enabled
When you manually create a client resource and enable the DataDomain backup
attribute (using nsradmin or the NMC Client Properties window), the default VMware
Protection Policy fails with the following error:
Adding or removing a policy to or from a VM using VMware view results in "RPC server is
unavailable" error
If you are using a version of NMC that is NetWorker 9.0 and later, and add a
NetWorker 8.2 server and an 8.2 compatible Virtual Backup appliance, you may see
the error, RPC server is unavailable.
To address this issue, do one of the following:
l Use the EMC Backup and Recovery user interface in the vSphere Web Client for
the 8.2 VMware Backup appliance to add and remove VMs to and from policies.
l If the first choice is not suitable, use an 8.2 version of the NMC to use the
Networker server to add and remove VMs to and from policies.
“No proxies running on VBA {appliance name} for backing up VM {VM name}”
When the avagent is not running, or no proxies are running, this error appears in the
VMware Protection Policy details window in NMC.
If you see this error, log in as root from the EMC Backup and Recovery Console in the
vSphere Client and invoke service avagent restart:
/etc/init.d/avagent restart
NSR_VBA_CONNECT_TIMEOUT=900
NSR_VBA_REQUEST_TIMEOUT=2400
If your timeout values are lower than these numbers, it is recommended to these
values.
Note
Changes to these values may depend on the operating system of the NetWorker
server. The sections "Setting environment variables on UNIX" and "Setting
environment variables on Windows systems" in the NetWorker Administration Guide
provide more information. If VMware Backup Appliance registration fails with the
Networker server after the initial deployment and registration, you can also set
NSR_VBA_CONNECT_TIMEOUT at the operating system level for successful
registration.
On Linux, login to the NetWorker server and perform the following:
1. Run # printenv | grep NSR_VBA_CONNECT_TIMEOUT export
NSR_VBA_CONNECT_TIMEOUT=900.
2. Restart NetWorker services by using the command /etc/init.d/networker
restart.
3. Run emwebapp.sh --restart on the VMware Backup Appliance.
To re-register the VMware Backup Appliance on Windows:
1. Right-click My Computer > Select Environment Variables.
2. Add a new variable NSR_VBA_CONNECT_TIMEOUT with the value 900.
3. Restart NetWorker services on the NetWorker server and run emwebapp.sh --
restart on the VMware Backup Appliance.
Note
Allow a couple of minutes after making the changes for times to merge.
4. Log in to the vSphere Web Client. If the time synchronization message does not
appear when you launch the EMC Backup and Recovery user interface, the times
have been synchronized successfully.
Start user interface does not display as available in vSphere Web Client
If the user interface does not display as available in the vSphere Web Client, log into
vCenter and restart the vSphere Client Services by running the following from a
command prompt:
cd /usr/lib/vmware-vsphere-client
./vsphere-client stop
./vsphere-client start
When you deploy a VM, do not change the default network (VM Network) provided by
the wizard. After the deployment completes and prior to powering on the VM,
reconfigure the VM to use the appropriate network if VM Network is not correct. If
you change the network in the wizard, EMC Backup and Recovery looks for eth1
instead of eth0, and network connectivity fails.
If you see this message, do not shutdown the VM, and allow time for the reboot to
complete.
The EMC Backup and Recovery appliance is not responding. Please try your request again
If you were previously able to connect to EMC Backup and Recovery and this message
appears, check the following:
l Confirm that the user name or password used to validate EMC Backup and
Recovery to the vCenter Server has not changed. Only one user account and
password are used for EMC Backup and Recovery validation. This is configured
through the EMC Backup and Recovery Configure window.
l Confirm that the name and IP address of the appliance have not changed since the
initial EMC Backup and Recovery installation. DNS Configuration on page 173
provides additional information.
Integrity Check
After you start an integrity check, a delay of several seconds may occur before the
“EBR: Integrity Check” task shows up in the Recent Tasks pane of the EMC Backup
and Recovery user interface in the vSphere Web Client. Similarly, when you cancel an
integrity check, a delay of several seconds may occur before the task is cancelled.
In some cases (for example, when the integrity check progress is above 90%), the
integrity check may actually complete before the cancel operation completes. Even
when the integrity check completes successfully, the Task Console may still show an
error indicating that the integrity check was cancelled.
If you knew that the Integrity Check Status of the appliance (shown on the Reports
tab) was “Out of Date” before you started the integrity check, then you can look at
the status immediately after you cancel the job to see if the cancel operation
succeeded. If the Integrity Check Status is “Normal,” then the check was successful.
If the status is “Out of Date,” then the check was cancelled.
Backups fail with external proxy after upgrading from NetWorker 8.1.x to 9.2
Backups may fail with the external proxy after an upgrade from NetWorker 8.1.x to
version 9.2 has occurred.
If this happens, delete the peer information for the external proxy from the NetWorker
server.
Backups fail when EMC Backup and Recovery plug-in registers with an incorrect version string
in vCenter
Backups may fail when the EMC Backup and Recovery plug-in registers with an
incorrect version string in vCenter. Additionally, EMC Backup and Recovery cannot
co-exist with VMware VDP or any third-party backup plug-in in the same vCenter. If a
conflict occurs, then unregister the EMC Backup and Recovery plug-in extension from
the managed object browser (MOB):
1. Navigate to http://vcenter-ip/mob.
2. In the Properties table, select the content link.
3. Select Extension Manager and verify that the Properties table lists
“com.vmware.ebr2”.
4. From the Methods table, select UnregisterExtension.
5. Type com.vmware.ebr2 and select Invoke Method.
Note
This name will be different if removing VDP or a third party backup plug-in.
6. Verify in Extension Manager that the plug-in is no longer listed in the Properties
table, and then restart vCenter services or the vCenter server.
7. Restart emwebapp on the EMC Backup and Recovery appliance by using the
command emwebapp.sh --restart.
“Unable to add client {client name} to the EMC Backup and Recovery appliance while creating
backup job {backupjob name}.”
This error can appear when there is a duplicate client name on the vApp container or
the ESX/ESXi host. In this case only one backup job is added. Resolve any duplicate
client names.
“The following items could not be located and were not selected {client name}.”
This error can occur when the backed up VM(s) cannot be located during Edit of a
backup job. This is a known issue.
Windows 2008 R2 VMs may fail to backup with “disk.EnableUUID” configured to “true.”
Windows 2008 R2 backups may fail if the VM is configured with the disk.EnableUUID
parameter set to true. To correct this problem, manually update the vmx configuration
parameter disk.EnableUUID to false by using the vSphere Web Client:
1. Shut down the VM by right clicking the VM and selecting Shut Down Guest OS.
2. Right click the VM and select Edit Settings.
3. Click VM Options.
4. Expand the Advanced section and click Edit Configuration.
5. Locate the name disk.EnableUUId and set the value to false.
6. Click OK on the next two pages.
7. Right click the VM and select Power On.
After you update the configuration parameter, the backups of the Windows 2008 R2
VM should succeed.
Backup fails if EMC Backup and Recovery does not have sufficient datastore capacity
Scheduled backups fail at 92% complete if there is insufficient datastore capacity. If
you configured the EMC Backup and Recovery datastore with thin provisioning and
maximum capacity has not been reached, then add additional storage resources. If you
configured the EMC Backup and Recovery datastore with thick provisioning and it is
at full capacity, see EMC Backup and Recovery Capacity Management on page 266.
When VMs are moved in or out of different cluster groups, associated backup sources may be
lost
When you move hosts into clusters with the option to retain the resource pools and
vApps, the containers get recreated, not copied. As a result, the container is no longer
the same container even though the name is the same. To resolve this issue, validate
or recreate any backup jobs that protect containers after moving hosts in or out of a
cluster.
After an unexpected shutdown, recent backup jobs and backups are lost
When an unexpected shutdown occurs, the VMware Backup appliance performs a
rollback to the last validated checkpoint. This is expected behavior.
expected behavior. Wait until all backup operations have completed prior to
performing a vMotion operation.
Backups fail if certain characters are used in the virtual machine name, datastore, folder, or
datacenter names
When you use spaces or special characters in the virtual machine name, datastore,
folder, or datacenter names, the .vmx file is not included in the backup. The vProxy
appliance and VMware Backup appliance do not back up objects that include the
following special characters, in the format of character/escape sequence:
l & %26
l + %2B
l / %2F
l = %3D
l ? %3F
l % %25
l \ %5C
l ~ %7E
l ] %5D
Restore operations
The following troubleshooting items describe how to identify and resolve some
common issues with restores.
Restore to new virtual machine not available for backups that included physical RDM disks
When you back up a virtual machine that contains both virtual disks and physical Raw
Device Mapping (RDM) disks, the backup successfully processes the virtual disks and
bypasses the RDM disks, which are not supported for backup. However, when you
restore data from one of these backups, you cannot restore the data to a new virtual
machine because data residing on the physical RDM disks that were bypassed during
the backup cannot be restored.
If you need to restore the data to a new virtual machine, perform the following:
1. Manually create a new virtual machine in vCenter. This new virtual machine must
contain the same number of virtual disks as the original virtual machine from which
the backup was taken.
2. Manually add the new virtual machine to NetWorker.
3. Restore the data to this virtual machine.
Restore tab shows backups taken after checkpoint backup as "not available"
When you complete a successful disaster recovery of the VMware Backup appliance,
and then attempt to restore a backup performed after the last checkpoint backup, the
Restore tab in the EMC Backup and Recovery user interface in the vSphere Web
Client displays these backups as "not available." This occurs because no account for
these backups exists, since the client or VM was added to the policy after the
checkpoint backup.
When you add the client or VM back into a policy, backups display correctly with a
valid path in the Restore tab.
Message appears during FLR indicating “error finding vm by ipAddr” when you do not install
VMware Tools
You must install VMware Tools to perform FLR. When you do not install VMware
Tools, a message appears indicating the restore client is unable to find a backup of a
VM by IP.
Note
NetWorker 9.1 and later releases do not feature a new version of the VADP proxy. For
VADP backups, use a NetWorker 9.0.x VADP proxy on a NetWorker 9.1 or later server.
The NetWorker Online Compatibility Guide available on the EMC Online Support site
at https://support.emc.com/products/1095_NetWorker provides the most up-to-
date compatibility information.
l One or more VADP proxy systems running any of the following 64-bit operating
systems (English versions only):
n Windows 2008 R2
n Windows 2012
l One or more vCenter servers running any of the following versions:
n vSphere 5.5 with ESX 5.5 and vCenter 5.5
n vSphere 6.0 with ESX 6.0 and vCenter 6.0
Note
'HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE/SOFTWARE/Wow6432Node/VMware, Inc./VMware
Virtual Disk Development Kit'
l You must install the NetWorker 9.0.x or later client software on the VADP Proxy
host.
l The NetWorker server requires NetWorker 9.1 or later software.
l The VADP proxy host must have access to the LUNs required for backing up
supported VMs. Considerations vary depending on the environment, for example,
physical and virtual Compatibility RDMs are not supported and therefore do not
require proxy access. The section VADP proxy access to LUNs on page 337
provides more information.
l You must install VMware tools on the VM to ensure consistent state backups.
Also, backups via FQDN/hostname require VMware tools.
Note
Attempting to launch the VADP recovery dialog without following this procedure
results in the overwriting of the local system files, which can lead to machine
corruption.
Transport modes
The VADP proxy host supports advanced transport modes for image level recovery.
You can set the configured network transport mode to the following values during
backup or recovery:
l SAN (Storage Area Network): selecting this mode completely offloads the backup
related CPU, memory or I/O load on the virtual infrastructure. The backup I/O is
fully offloaded to the storage layer where the data is read directly from the SAN or
iSCSI LUN.
SAN mode requires a physical proxy with SAN access, and the VMs need to be
hosted on either Fibre Channel or iSCSI-based storage. The corresponding VMFS
volumes must be visible in the Microsoft Windows Disk Management snap-in of
the VADP proxy host.
l Hotadd: in this mode, the backup related I/O happens internally through the ESX
I/O stack using SCSI hot-add technology. This provides better backup I/O rates
than NBD/NBDSSL. However, selecting this mode places backup related CPU,
memory and I/O load on the ESX hosting the VADP proxy.
Hotadd mode requires a virtual proxy, and the ESX hosting the virtual proxy should
have access to all the datastores where the VMs are hosted So, if the datastores
are SAN/iSCSI/NFS and if the ESX server where the VADP proxy resides is
separate from the ESX server where the VMs are hosted, then:
n In the case of SAN LUNs the ESX hosting the proxy and the ESX hosting the
VMs should be part of the same fabric zones.
n In the case of iSCSI LUNs the ESX hosting the proxy and the ESX hosting the
VMs should be configured for the same iSCSI-based storage targets.
n In the case of NFS datastores, the ESX hosting the proxy and the ESX hosting
the VMs should be configured for the same NFS mount points.
l NBD (Network Block Device): in this mode, the CPU, memory and I/O load gets
directly placed on the ESX hosting the production VMs, because the backup data
has to move through the same ESX and reach the proxy over the network. NBD
mode can be used either for physical or virtual proxy, and also supports all storage
types.
l NBDSSL (Network Block Device with SSL): NBDSSL transport mode is the same
as NBD except that the data transferred over the network is encrypted. Data
transfer in NBDSSL mode can therefore be slower and use more CPU due to the
additional load on the VADP host from SLL encryption/decryption.
You can set multiple transport modes to be used by the VADP proxy host using the
pipe symbol “|” (for example, san|nbd|nbdssl).
By default, the transport mode field in the NetWorker User program is blank. Specify
one transport mode to use for recovery.
More information on configuring transport modes is provided in Configuring the VADP
proxy host and Hypervisor resource. The transport modes are outlined in the table
Table 33 on page 305.
Note
If multiple client instances of the same VADP proxy host exist in the NetWorker
server, ensure that all the instances have the same application information attributes
related to VADP. Manually copy the application information attributes into all the
VADP proxy client instances. Note, however, that when a virtual proxy is used, it
cannot be created by copying the template of other VMs that are being protected.
Creating a NetWorker client for the VADP Proxy host by using the Client
properties windows
Table 33 Application information values
Creating a NetWorker client for the VADP Proxy host by using the Client properties windows 305
VADP Backup and Recovery (legacy)
Procedure
1. In the NMC Protection window, right-click Clients, and select New.
The Create Client dialog box displays.
2. Select the General tab.
3. In the Name attribute field, type the name of the proxy.
4. Select the Apps and Modules tab, shown in the following figure.
Creating a NetWorker client for the VADP Proxy host by using the Client properties windows 307
VADP Backup and Recovery (legacy)
VADP_HYPERVISOR=any.vc
VADP_HYPERVISOR=another.vc
VADP_BACKUPROOT=G:\mnt
VADP_TRANSPORT_MODE=Hotadd
VADP_MAX_RETRIES=2
VADP_MAX_BACKOFF_TIME=15
6. Click OK.
Note
Since index entries are required for VADP image level restores, ensure that the browse
policy is set appropriately. Index entries can still be created using the scanner
command after the browse policy has expired.
The following table lists the recovery options that are available based on the virtual
client’s configuration. Recovery steps are described in Recovering VADP Backups on
page 316.
Table 34 Recovery options that are available based on the virtual client configuration
4. In the Name attribute field, type the name of the proxy client.
5. In the Save Set attribute, type the name of the files or directories to be backed
up:
l To specify a file or directory for backup such as C drive, type c:\.
l To backup all VM file systems, type ALLVMFS.
l To backup up the entire VM image, type *FULL*.
6. Select the Virtual client checkbox to enable the virtual client, and then type
the name of the ESX server where the virtual client resides in the Physical
Host attribute.
7. Disable the Backup renamed directories field, which is enabled by default.
8. Select the App and Modules tab.
a. In the Backup command field, type nsrvadp_save.
Note
9. In diagnostic mode, select VADP for the Proxy backup type, and specify the
Proxy backup host.
10. Select the Globals (2 of 2) tab.
11. Under Configuration, type *@* in the Remote access field.
12. Click OK.
Assigning the VADP User role to the user specified in the NetWorker
Hypervisor resource
Note
Procedure
1. Log in to the vCenter Server with Administrator privileges using vSphere Client.
2. Select the vCenter server in the left pane.
3. Click the Permissions tab in the right pane.
4. Right-click inside the right pane and select Add Permission.
5. Add the NetWorker Hypervisor user and assign the VADP User role.
6. Ensure Propagate to Child Objects is enabled and click OK.
Setting Privileges
Virtual machine > Configuration l Add existing disk
l Add or Remove device
l Change Resource
l Disk Change Tracking
l Disk Lease
l Raw device
l Remove disk
l Settings
Setting Privileges
l Update task
Setting Privileges
Global l Cancel task
l Licenses
l Log Event
l Settings
Minimum vCenter permissions needed to back up and recover using VADP 313
VADP Backup and Recovery (legacy)
Setting Privileges
l Remove disk
l Rename
l Reset guest information
l Settings
l Swapfile placement
l Upgrade virtual machine compatibility
Note
When Changed Block tracking (CBT) is enabled, incremental and differential backups
are supported only for Windows VMs, and all attached disks must be NTFS file
systems.
Note also that CBT-based incremental backups are always file based. Image level
recovery from a CBT-based incremental backup is not supported.
Note
In the following example, the command line interface is used to enable CBT on a VM
vm31-w2k3x64:
c:\bin\nw_762\nsr\bin>nsrvadp_modify_vm.exe -H 10.13.187.212 -P
https -u administrator -p password1 -l vm-name -k vm31-w2k3x64 -c
cbt-enable
Monitor VMs
Monitoring of VMs, including notification when there is a new VM, can be done
through NMC in the same manner used to monitor other events. The NetWorker
Administration Guide provides information on monitoring.
If you click OK without specifying a restore path in the Recover Options dialog,
a warning message displays, indicating that restoring data to the proxy storage
node from the VM image can result in overwriting system files. To ensure
overwriting of files does not occur, enter a restore path prior to clicking OK.
Figure 153 Recover Options dialog
Procedure
1. Launch the NetWorker User program on the NetWorker server or VADP proxy.
2. Browse the file system for the VM client and select file to recover, as outlined in
the NetWorker Administration Guide’s Recovery chapter.
3. Set the destination directory to the CIFS share of the VM client.
4. Recover the files onto the CIFS share.
5. At the VM client, move the files from the CIFS share to the appropriate
directory.
Procedure
1. Launch the NetWorker User program on the NetWorker server or VM client.
Note
The user must have the Remote Access All Clients privilege.
For example, a Linux client has a schedule of daily level FULL client-based backups
along with monthly VADP image based backups. In this case, it is recommended to
set the browse policy of the client-based backups to a maximum of 1 month.
l If the image level backup of the VM being recovered was performed with the
Encryption directive, the current Datazone pass phrase by default is automatically
used to recover the VM image. If the current Datazone pass phrase was created
after a password-protected backup was performed, you must provide the
password that was in effect when the VM image was originally backed up.
Note
Only level full of FULLVM save sets are supported for VM image restore.
5. In the VADP Restore dialog box, type the following information depending on
the type of recovery and then click the Start button.
Restore to VMware vCenter (VC):
Note
Only level FULL of FULLVM save sets are supported for VM image recovery.
VADP:datastore=”config=stor1#disk1=stor2#disk2=stor3”
recover.exe -S 413546679 -o
VADP:host=esxDemo1.emc.com;
VADP:transmode=Hotadd
Recover VMs that have a mix of VADP image-level and traditional guest based backups
If your VMs have a mix of both VADP image level backups and traditional guest based
(also known as client based) backups, you may have to use the following recovery
procedure.
Example
The following VM (host name mars) has a mix of both VADP and traditional guest
based backups. This example shows how to recover a traditional backup save set on
the VM by first locating the time of the backup save set using the mminfo command
and then by using that time with the recover command. The host name of the
NetWorker server in this example is jupiter.
full FULLVM
kuma-6.RO Data Domain mars 5/24/2011 10:59:22 PM 5243 MB 1440475890
cb full FULLVM
C:\recover -t "5/24/2011 10:38:39 PM" -s jupiter -c mars
Notice that in the previous example output from the mminfo command, the first two
lines listed are for traditional backup and the last two lines are for a VADP backup,
which is denoted with the save set name, FULLVM. The NetWorker Command
Reference Guide provides more information about using the recover command to mark
(select) files and to perform the recovery.
DISKPART
SAN POLICY=OnlineALL
Note
After the recovery is successful, SAN POLICY can be changed back to the
default value (SAN POLICY=offline or SAN POLICY=offlineshared).
Note
If recovery is initiated from a Windows machine other than the proxy, these steps
need to be performed on the machine where the recovery is initiated.
Note
Backup and recovery directly to a standalone ESX/ESXi host is not supported. The
ESX/ESXi must be connected to either VirtualCenter or vCenter to perform
backup and recovery operations.
l VADP does not support IPv6. Instructions for disabling IPv6 and using IPv4 are
provided in the section Network and Firewall port requirements on page 329.
l Ensure that the client parallelism on the VADP proxy machine is set to the
maximum number of VM backups to be run concurrently. The section
Recommendations and considerations for transport modes on page 333 provides
information on the maximum supported concurrent backups for each transport
mode.
For example if running 10 VM backups simultaneously, ensure that the client
parallelism in the VADP proxy Client resource is set to 10.
l It is recommended to keep the vCenter and VADP proxy as separate machines to
avoid contention of CPU and memory resources.
l The vSphere client does not need to be installed on the NetWorker server.
l Ensure the path specified in VixDisklib and VixMountAPI config files are enclosed
in double quotes as below:
Note
Double quotes should be specified in the path even though the path is already
present.
l EMC recommends using the VADP proxy host as the storage node. This provides
the optimal configuration for any given transport mode as data transfer occurs
directly from the ESX/ESXi datastore to the storage node.
disk.EnableUUID = "true"
Note
Note
This requires that data transport is set to NBD/NBDSSL mode since VMware does
not allow Hotadd mode in conjunction with VMDirectPath.
l The maximum number of concurrent sessions when using a physical proxy is higher
than that of a virtual proxy. The section Recommendations and considerations for
transport modes on page 333 provides more information on concurrent sessions
for specific transport modes.
l Recommendations for a physical proxy is 4 CPU cores with 8GB of RAM.
Recommendations for a virtual proxy is 4 vCPUs and 8GB vRAM per proxy, where
each vCPU is equal to or greater than 2.66 GHz.
l NetWorker supports up to 12 parallel sessions using a single virtual proxy. This
refers to the number of virtual disks processed in parallel, so if a single VM
contains multiple virtual disks, this must be taken into account.
l Number of virtual proxies per ESX host depends only on the type of hardware on
which the ESX has been installed.
l For lower-end ESX hosts, it is recommended not to mix I/O load on ESX (with the
virtual proxy and backup VMs residing on a single ESX), but to have a separate
ESX for the virtual proxy.
l For high-end ESX hosts, it is recommended to have a maximum of 5 virtual proxies
concurrently running on a single ESX host.
l Optimal CPU load and performance when using DDBoost devices is observed with
4 concurrent backups per device. Lower number of parallel sessions to a single
device does not achieve full performance while higher number increases CPU load
without additional performance gain. Based on the CPU load, there is typically no
performance improvement from adding more than 3 DDBoost devices per proxy
node.
Note
When the datastore is almost out of space, VMware creates a snapshot named
Consolidate Helper while attempting to delete snapshots. This snapshot cannot be
automatically deleted by the backup application. To remove the Consolidated
Helper snapshot, the VM must be shut down and the snapshot manually deleted
from vCenter before the next backup. Otherwise, change files may accumulate on
the datastore. The accumulation of such files can affect both the backup
performance and the I/O performance of the VM. Information about deleting the
Consolidate Helper snapshot is provided in the following VMware knowledge base
article:
http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1003302
To avoid this issue, ensure that there is always sufficient space available for
snapshots.
l In the case of VMs that have a large amount of change rate during backups, the
snapshots can grow in size considerably while the backup is running. Therefore,
ensure that the snapshot working directory on the VMFS datastore has enough
space to accommodate the snapshot during the backup.
l VMs with physical and virtual compatibility RDM disks are not supported for VADP
backups, because VM snapshots cannot be applied to such VMs. During
NetWorker backup of a VM, no RDM related information is backed up, and no
RDM disks/data are restored upon VM recovery. If RDM disks are required, they
must be reattached after the recovery.
Note
If reattaching RDM disks after recovery, make note of all LUNs that are zoned to
the protected VMs.
l VMware snapshots by default reside on the datastore where the VM configuration
files are located. Therefore, ensure that the snapshot working directory supports
the size of all the disks attached to a given VM.
Starting with version 4.0, ESX and ESXi will compare the maximum size of a
snapshot redolog file with the maximum size of files on the datastore. If the file
could grow beyond the maximum size, ESX cancels the Create Snapshot operation
and displays the following error:
Procedure
1. Uninstall VMware Tools from the VM.
2. Reboot the system.
3. Reinstall VMware Tools. Ensure to select Custom Install.
4. Deselect VSS.
minimize the impact on production VMs during the backup window. These
ESX/ESXi hosts should not be running any other VMs.
n A maximum of 5 virtual proxies per one standalone ESX is recommended.
n A maximum of 3 virtual proxies per ESX is recommended in a DRS cluster for
proxies.
Note
ESX/ESXi refers to the actual host system and not the VMs to be backed up.
Disable IPv6 using Network Connections in the Control Panel, then add an IPv4
entry like the following to the hosts file on the system where vCenter is
installed:
After this entry has been added, run the following command in the VADP proxy
host to verify that the IPv4 address is being resolved:
C:\Users\Administrator>ping <vCenter hostname>
Note
Once the backup of the VM completes, all the above processes exit, releasing the
memory consumed on the proxy host.
Note
**200 MB is the memory needed per Windows VM for the nsrvddk and save
processes.
l If the proxy is also being used as storage node, the following nsrmmd overhead
needs to be included in the total memory requirement:
n DD BOOST per device memory usage- approximately 500MB
n backup to disk per device memory usage- approximately 50MB
l Do not use any special characters (for example, *, # and so on) in the VM name or
the name of the datastore associated with the VM. If these names contain special
characters, the mount operation fails.
l The VADP mount point cache requires temporary space equal to at least 5-10% of
the total amount of data being backed up in the case of Windows VMs. This space
is required for storing the VMDK index during the backup, and is only used during
the parsing of metadata while the backup is in progress. The space required for
this task clears once the backup completes. In the case of Linux or FLR-disabled
Windows VMs, minimal space is required as indicated in the note below.
For a VM with a large number of files, using a faster disk to cache files will help
during parsing
As an example of how much space is required for a Windows VM:
If the proxy client parallelism is set to 5 so that a maximum of 5 Windows VMs are
backed up concurrently, then calculate the total used disk space for the 5 largest
Windows VMs in the environment. Allocate at least 10% of this total used space for
the VADP_BACKUPROOT mount point.
So, if each VM in the above example has around 2 disks and each disk has 40GB used
space.
l Total amount of data being backed up=40GB*2*5=400GB
l Total amount needed for mount point=400*10%=40GB
In this case, ensure that the drive specified for VADP_BACKUPROOT has at least
40GB of free space.
Note
This mount point space is only needed when performing FLR-enabled image level
backups of Windows VMs. It is otherwise very minimal (in the order of a few MB
per VM) when performing image level backups of Linux VMs or FLR-disabled
image level backups of Windows VMs.
VMDirectPath restrictions
The following restrictions apply during the configuration of VMDirectPath:
l The ESX host must be rebooted after VMDirectPath is enabled.
l The VM must be powered down when VMDirectPath is enabled in order to add the
PCI/PCIe device directly to the VM.
l Using Fibre Channel tape drives in a VM is not supported without VMDirectPath in
production environments due to the lack of SCSI isolation. Tape drives can be
configured and used without VMDirectPath, but the support is limited to non-
production environments.
The VMware knowledge base article http://kb.vmware.com/kb/1010789 provides
information on configuring VMDirectPath.
The following features are not available for a VM configured with VMDirectPath, as
the VMkernel is configured without the respective device under its control when
passed to a VM:
l vMotion
l Storage vMotion
l Fault Tolerance
l Device hot add (CPU and memory)
l Suspend and resume
l VADP Hotadd transport mode (when used as virtual proxy)
Note
If using VMDirectPath in a NetWorker VADP virtual proxy host, then the transport
modes are limited to either NBD or NBDSSL. This is due to a VMware limitation.
l Ensure that the device drivers for the HBA are updated on the guest operating
system.
Note
If the VMs in the environment have more than 12 disks attached per VM, then
use NBD or NBDSSL mode instead of Hotadd mode.
l The virtual proxy can only back up those VMs whose virtual disk size does not
exceed the maximum size supported by the VMFS datastore where the
configuration files of the virtual proxy reside.
As a best practice, always place the configuration files of the virtual proxy on a
datastore that has a block size of 8MB. This will ensure that the virtual proxy can
back up all of the supported virtual disk sizes.
l The datastore for the VADP proxy VM must have sufficient free space before the
Hotadd backup begins.
l If there are multiple virtual proxies, it is recommended to host all the virtual proxies
in a dedicated ESX/ESXi server. This would keep the virtual proxy resource
consumption of CPU and memory isolated within that ESX/ESXi environment
without impacting the production VMs.
l VMs having IDE virtual disks are not supported for Hotadd mode. Instead, nbd
mode is recommended for these.
l The VM to back up and the VM that contains the Hotadd VADP proxy host must
reside in the same VMware datacenter. This requirement also applies to VM
restore — the VM to restore and the VM where the restore is initiated must reside
in the same VMware datacenter.
l If a backup failure occurs, the virtual proxy may sometimes fail to unmount Hotadd
disks. In such cases, you must manually unmount the Hotadd disks from the virtual
proxy. If any of the client VM disks are still attached to the virtual proxy, perform
the following:
1. Right-click the virtual proxy and go to Edit Settings.
2. Select each of the Hotadd disks and choose Remove.
Note
Ensure that you select Remove from virtual machine and not Remove and
delete… when unmounting.
– When using multiple proxies to backup a given ESX via NBD/NBDSSL, then
the client parallelism on each VADP proxy should be calibrated such that the
total concurrent disk connections per ESX host does not exceed 20.
n If ESX is part of a DRS-enabled VMware cluster, then apply one of the
following best practices:
– When using a single proxy to backup via NBD/NBDSSL, set the client
parallelism of the VADP proxy Client resource such that the limit of 20
concurrent disk connections per cluster is not exceeded.
– When using multiple proxies to backup via NBD/NBDSSL, then the client
parallelism on each VADP proxy should be calibrated such that the total
concurrent disk connections per cluster does not exceed 20.
Note
In the following examples, the backup group parallelism would take effect
only if the VADP proxy host client parallelism is set to an equal or higher
number.
One proxy in the environment, all VMs on the same ESX (no cluster)
In the following example, there is a single proxy in the environment and 11 VMs need to
be backed up via NBD/NBDSSL. All 11 VMs are hosted on the same ESX, which is not
part of a cluster, and both of these jobs have to be run at the same time:
l 8 VMs from ESX contains 2 disks disk.
l 3 VMs from same ESX contains 3 disks each.
Use one of the following best practices:
l Set the client parallelism of the proxy to 8.
l Create a single backup group containing all 11 VMs from the given ESX and set the
group parallelism to 8.
Either of the above would ensure that at any given time, the maximum number of disks
being backed up from that ESX will not exceed 20.
Two proxies in the environment, all VMs on the same ESX on DRS-disabled cluster
In the following example, there are two proxies in the environment to back up 11 VMs
via NBD/NBDSSL. All 11 VMs are hosted on the same ESX, which is part of a DRS-
disabled cluster, and both of these jobs have to be run at the same time:
l Proxy1 has been assigned to backup 8 VMs, each VM contains 2 disks.
l Proxy2 has been assigned to backup 3 VMs, each VM contains 3 disks.
Use one of the following best practices:
l Set the client parallelism of Proxy1 and Proxy2 to 5 and 2 respectively.
l Create a single backup group containing all 11 VMs from the given ESX and set the
group parallelism to 8.
Either of the above would ensure that at any given time, the maximum number of disks
being backed up from that ESX will not exceed 20.
Two proxies in the environment, all VMs hosted on DRS-enabled cluster
In the following example, there are two proxies in the environment to back up 11 VMs
via NBD/NBDSSL. All 11 VMs are hosted on one DRS-enabled cluster:
l Proxy1 has been assigned to backup 8 VMs, each VM contains 2 disks.
l Proxy2 has been assigned to backup 3 VMs, each VM contains 3 disks.
Note
Steps 1 and 2 are only applicable in the case of SAN transport mode where SAN fabric
zoning is already in place such that the VADP proxy host is already displaying the SAN
LUNs in Windows disk management. If this does not apply, skip to Step 3.
6. Clean out entries of previously mounted volumes in the registry by entering the
following in the diskpart command prompt:
automount scrub
Prerequisites
Domain Name System (DNS) resolution is critical for NetWorker deployment and
configuration. All infrastructure components should be resolvable through a fully
qualified domain name (FQDN). This is especially important for the NetWorker Server,
NetWorker vProxy, Data Domain appliance, and CloudBoost appliance. Resolvable
means that components are accessible through both forward (A) and reverse (PTR)
look-ups.
Review the following prerequisites prior to configuring NetWorker in a VMware Cloud
on AWS. Also, ensure that you plan your firewall according to these prerequisites.
VMware Cloud on AWS web portal console
In the VMware Cloud on AWS web portal console, note the following requirements:
l By default, there is no external access to the vCenter Server system in your SDDC
(Software Defined Data Center). You can open access to your vCenter Server
system by configuring a firewall rule. Set the firewall rule in the compute gateway
of VMware Cloud on AWS to enable communication to the vCenter public IP
address from the desired logical network of your SDDC. The NetWorker server will
not allow you to add the vCenter Server if this firewall rule is not configured in the
SDDC.
l The default compute gateway firewall rules prevent all virtual machine traffic from
reaching the internet. To allow your NetWorker Server virtual machine to connect
to the internet, you need to create a compute gateway firewall rule to allow
outbound traffic on the logical network that your NetWorker Server virtual
machine is connected to.
l Configure DNS to allow machines in your SDDC to resolve fully-qualified domain
names (FQDNs) to IP addresses belonging to the internet. The NetWorker Server
will not allow you to add the vCenter Server using the server's public FQDN or IP
address if the DNS server is not configured in your SDDC.
l It is recommended that you deploy the Data Domain system as a virtual appliance
in the Amazon VPC (Virtual Private Cloud) of your choice. During the SDDC
creation, ensure that you connect your SDDC to an AWS account, and select a
VPC and subnet within that account.
l The Data Domain system running in your Amazon VPC must be connected to your
VMware SDDC by using the VMware Cloud Elastic Network Interfaces (ENIs),
allowing your SDDC and services in the AWS VPC and subnet in your AWS
account to communicate without requiring the routing of traffic through the
internet gateway. The same ENI channel is recommended for access to Data
Domain systems (for the vProxy solution) and access to cloud object storage (for
the CloudBoost solution). Detailed steps on configuring ENI are provided by
VMware at https://vmc.vmware.com/console/aws-link.
l Ensure that you configure the inbound and outbound firewall rules of your
compute gateway for Data Domain connectivity if DDVE is running in your Amazon
VPC.
Amazon AWS web portal
In the AWS web portal, note the following requirements:
l Configure the inbound and outbound firewall rules of your Amazon VPC security
group to provide connectivity between the VMware SDDC compute gateway and
Data Domain connectivity if Data Domain is running in your Amazon VPC.
l If cloning from one Data Domain system to another, ensure that you configure the
inbound rule for the security group in AWS to allow all traffic from the respective
private IPs of Data Domain Virtual Editions running in your Amazon VPC.
l If you have more than one Data Domain running in AWS to perform cloning, then
ensure that both Data Domain systems can ping each other using the FQDNs.
vCenter server inventory
In the vCenter Server inventory of your SDDC, note the following requirements:
l An internal DNS name lookup server must be running inside the vCenter inventory.
This will be referenced by all the workloads running in the VMware SDDC.
l The internal DNS server must have Forwarders enabled to access the internet.
This is required in order to resolve the vCenter Server's public FQDN
Prerequisites 341
NetWorker VMware Protection in VMware Cloud on Amazon Web Services
8. On the Review details window, review the product details such as the product
name, version, vendor, publisher, and download size, and then click Next.
9. On the License agreements window, review and accept the EULA, and then
click Next.
10. On the Select storage window, select the disk format and the destination
datastore where the virtual appliance files will be stored, and then click Next.
It is recommended that you select Thick Provision Lazy Zeroed to ensure that
amount of storage space allocated to the virtual appliance is available.
11. On the Select networks window, select the Destination Network. Provide the
IP address in the text box and click Next.
12. On the Customize template window, expand Networking properties, and then
specify the following attributes:
a. In the Network IP address field, specify the IP address for the vProxy
appliance.
b. In the Default gateway field, specify the IP address of the gateway host.
c. In the Network Netmask/Prefix field, specify the netmask for an IPv4
Network IP address. vProxy backups do not support the use of IPv6
Network IP addresses.
d. In the DNS field, specify the IP address of the DNS servers, separated by
commas.
e. In the FQDN field, specify the fully qualified domain name of the vProxy
appliance.
13. Expand Timezone settings, and then perform the following tasks:
a. in the Timezone setting field, select the time zone.
b. SSH into the vProxy appliance using root credentials and run the following
command: /usr/bin/timedatectl set-timezone new-timezone.
Note
To set a time zone outside of the list supported by the vProxy appliance, you
need to change the time zone manually.
14. Expand Password settings, and then perform the following tasks:
a. In the Root password field, specify a password for the root account or leave
the field blank to use the default password. The default password is
changeme.
b. In the Admin password field, specify a password for the admin account or
leave the field blank to use the default password. The default password is
a3dp@m8n.
15. Click Next.
The Ready to Complete window displays.
16. On the Ready to Complete window, review the deployment configuration
details, and then click Finish.
Deploy the vProxy OVA on a vCenter server in VMware Cloud on AWS 343
NetWorker VMware Protection in VMware Cloud on Amazon Web Services
Results
The Deploying template task appears in the vCenter and provides status information
about the deployment.
l Add the vCenter Server to the NetWorker Server using either the public FQDN of
the vCenter Server or the public IP address of the vCenter Server. It is
recommended to use the FQDN.
l When adding the vCenter Server to the NetWorker Server, specify the login
credentials for the cloudadmin user
l When configuring the vProxy in the NetWorker Server, set the Maximum NBD
sessions for the vProxy to zero. VMware Cloud on AWS does not support NBD
transport mode.
This glossary contains terms related to disk storage subsystems. Many of these terms
are used in this manual.
Backup proxy The system designated as the off-host backup system. This is a host with NetWorker
client package installed and the VADP software.
changed block tracking A VMkernel feature that keeps track of the storage blocks of virtual machines as they
change over time. The VMkernel keeps track of block changes on virtual machines,
which enhances the backup process for applications that have been developed to take
advantage of VMware’s vStorage APIs.
checkpoint A system-wide backup, taken only after 24 hours (and at the time of the checkpoint
after that first 24 hours have elapsed), that is initiated within the vSphere Web Client
and captures a point in time snapshot of the EMC Backup and Recovery appliance for
disaster recovery purposes.
client Host on a network, such as a computer, workstation, or application server whose data
can be backed up and restored with the backup server software.
client file index Database maintained by the NetWorker server that tracks every database object, file,
or file system backed up. The NetWorker server maintains a single index file for each
client computer. The tracking information is purged from the index after the browse
time of each backup expires.
EMC Backup and The EMC Backup and Recovery appliance (or VMware Backup Appliance) is an
Recovery Appliance appliance that, when deployed, enables VMware backup and clone policy creation in
NMC, and enables the EMC Backup and Recovery plug-in in the vSphere Web Client to
assign VMs to those policies.
EMC Data Protection A browser that allows for file-level restores, where specific folders and files are
Restore Client restored to the original virtual machine on Windows and Linux virtual machines.
file-level restore (FLR) Allows local administrators of protected virtual machines to browse and mount backups
for the local machine. From these mounted backups, the administrator can then restore
individual files. FLR is accomplished using the EMC Data Protection Restore Client. See
“Using File Level Restore” on page 63 for additional information on FLR.
hotadd A transport mode where the backup related I/O happens internally through the ESX I/O
stack using SCSI hot-add technology. This provides better backup I/O rates than NBD/
NBDSSL.
inactivity timeout Time in minutes to wait before a client is considered to be unavailable for backup.
JAR (Java Archive) A file that contains compressed components needed for a Java applet or application.
managed application Program that can be monitored or administered, or both from the Console server.
media database Database that contains indexed entries of storage volume location and the life cycle
status of all data and volumes managed by the NetWorker server.
metadata VSS-defined information that is passed from the writer to the requestor. Metadata
includes the writer name, a list of VSS components to back up, a list of components to
exclude from the backup, and the methods to use for recovery. See writer and See VSS
component.
NBD A transport mode over LAN that is typically slower than hotadd mode. In NBD mode,
the CPU, memory and I/O load gets directly placed on the ESX hosting the production
VMs, since the backup data has to move through the same ESX and reach the proxy
over the network. NBD mode can be used either for physical or virtual proxy, and also
supports all storage types.
NBDSSL A transport mode that is the same as NBD except that the data transferred over the
network is encrypted. Data transfer in NBDSSL mode can therefore be slower and use
more CPU due to the additional load on the VADP host from SLL encryption/
decryption.
NetWorker administrator NetWorker server user who may add, change, or delete NetWorker server users.
NetWorker Management Software program that is used to manage NetWorker servers and clients. The NMC
Console (NMC) server also provides reporting and monitoring capabilities for all NetWorker processes.
NetWorker server Computer on a network that runs the NetWorker server software, contains the online
indexes, and provides backup and restore services to the clients and storage nodes on
the same network.
online indexes Databases located on the NetWorker server that contain all the information pertaining
to the client backups (client file index) and backup volumes (media index).
recover To restore data files from backup storage to a client and apply transaction (redo) logs
to the data to make it consistent with a given point-in-time.
SAN (storage area A transport mode that, when used, completely offloads the backup related CPU,
network) memory or I/O load on the virtual infrastructure. The backup I/O is fully offloaded to
the storage layer where the data is read directly from the SAN or iSCSI LUN. SAN
mode requires a physical proxy.
save NetWorker command that backs up client files to backup media volumes and makes
data entries in the online index.
save set 1. Group of tiles or a file system copied to storage media by a backup or snapshot
rollover operation.
2. NetWorker media database record for a specific backup or rollover.
single step backup and See image level backup and recovery.
recovery
storage node Computer that manages physically attached storage devices or libraries, whose backup
operations are administered from the controlling NetWorker server. Typically a
“remote” storage node that resides on a host other than the NetWorker server.
update enabler Code that updates software from a previous release. It expires after a fixed period of
time.
VADP An acronym for vStorage APIs for Data Protection. VADP enables backup software to
perform centralized virtual machine backups without the disruption and overhead of
running backup tasks from inside each virtual machineVADP supersedes the VCB
framework for VMware backups.
vCenter An infrastructure management tool that provides a central point for configuring,
provisioning, and managing virtualized IT environments, and is part of the VMware
Virtual Infrastructure package.
Virtual machine Software that creates a virtualized environment between the computer platform and its
operating system, so that the end user can install and operate software on an abstract
machine.
VMDK Virtual Machine Disk (VMDK) is a file or set of files that appears as a physical disk drive
to a guest operating system. These files can be on the host machine or on a remote file
system. These files are commonly called VMDK files because of the .vmdk extension
that VMware adds to these files.
VMware Backup The VMware Backup Appliance (or EMC Backup and Recovery appliance) is an
Appliance appliance that, when deployed, enables VMware backup and clone policy creation in
NMC, and enables the EMC Backup and Recovery plug-in in the vSphere Web Client to
assign VMs to those policies.
VMware Tools Installed inside each virtual machine, VMware Tools enhance virtual machine
performance and add additional backup-related functionality.
VSS (Volume Shadow Microsoft technology that creates a point-in-time snapshot of a disk volume.
Copy Service) NetWorker software backs up data from the snapshot. This allows applications to
continue to write data during the backup operation, and ensures that open files are not
omitted.
writer Database, system service, or application code that works with VSS to provide metadata
about what to back up and how to handle VSS components and applications during
backup and restore. See VSS (Volume Shadow Copy Service).