Recovery Manager for AD 10.1.1 - User Guide

Management Shell

The Recovery Manager for Active Directory Management Shell, built on Microsoft Windows PowerShell technology, provides a command-line interface that enables automation of backup/recovery-related administrative tasks. With this Management Shell, administrators can manage Computer Collections, backup/recovery sessions, compare, and start backup/recovery jobs.

The Recovery Manager for Active Directory Management Shell command-line tools (cmdlets), like all the Windows PowerShell cmdlets, are designed to deal with objects-structured information that is more than just a string of characters appearing on the screen. The cmdlets do not use text as the basis for interaction with the system, but use an object model that is based on the Microsoft .NET platform. In contrast to traditional, textbased commands, the cmdlets do not require the use of text-processing tools to extract specific information. Rather, you can access portions of the data directly by using standard Windows PowerShell object manipulation commands.

Scheduling and automation

Creation of Backups

Recovery Manager for Active Directory enables administrators to schedule the creation of backups. This functionality helps reduce the network workload and can save many hours of the administrators’ valuable time. When scheduling the creation of backups, Recovery Manager for Active Directory relies on Task Scheduler - the native Windows scheduler service. A unified graphical interface and wizard assistance provide easy access to the backup scheduling features of Recovery Manager for Active Directory.
Recovery Manager for Active Directory makes the creation of backups a straightforward task. Once the backup creation options and scheduling are set up, the backup creation process becomes an automatic, unattended operation.

Scalability and performance

Recovery Manager for Active Directory offers scalability and support for large, multi-domain environments. It provides excellent performance, creates backups for multiple computers in parallel, and is easily scalable to service additional domain controllers. Depending on their roles, locations, or other criteria established by an administrator, serviced domain controllers can be logically grouped into easy-to-manage Computer Collections.

Recovery Manager for Active Directory employs agents when creating or applying backups. In this way, scalability is improved and overhead network traffic is decreased because agents compress the data before sending it over network links, and create backups for multiple domain controllers in parallel.

Technical overview

Recovery Manager for Active Directory performs the following functions:

• Regular backup of domain controllers’ components across a network, including the Active Directory database, SYSVOL and Registry, and maintenance of one or more secure repositories containing the backed-up Active Directory data.

• Wizard-driven, remotely administered restoration of Active Directory object data and Group Policy information from a point-in-time backup.

• Active Directory, AD LDS (ADAM), and Group Policy comparison reporting, troubleshooting, and investigation.