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NetVault Plug-in for VMware 11.2 - User Guide

Introduction Installing the plug-in Configuring the plug-in Defining a backup strategy Using the image-level backup method Using the file-level backup method Restoring image-level backups Restoring file-level backups Troubleshooting

RDM disks

The following table describes how the plug-in handles RDM (Raw Device Mapping) disks.

Physical compatibility mode

The disk is not backed up. Warning messages are written to the NetVault Backup binary logs and job logs.

Virtual compatibility mode (Independent disks)

The disk is not backed up. Warning messages are written to the NetVault Backup binary logs and job logs.

Virtual compatibility mode

The disk is backed up, but the data can only be restored to a flat file. Warning messages about the change in type are written to the NetVault Backup binary logs and job logs.

Optionally, you can omit the RDM disks in virtual compatibility mode during a restore.

1
Open the vmware.cfg file in a text editor. You can find this file in <NetVault Backup home>\config on Windows® and <NetVault Backup home>/config on Linux®.

Backup and recovery strategy

A well-designed backup strategy helps you to recover from the damages caused by failure and resume normal operations as quickly as possible. Before you start backing up your data, ensure that a good strategy is in place that safeguards your data against various failure modes, such as media failure, data corruption, user error, and complete loss of a data center.

Typically, your backup plan should define what backup methods are used, when and at what intervals the backups are performed, how the backups are stored, how long the backups are retained, and how the backup media are re-used.

The following are some example backup sequences to offer you guidelines:

Full Backups only: You can choose to perform only Full Backups if the backup size is small, backup window is not an issue, or storage media is not a constraint. In such scenarios, you can schedule Full Backups every night or every N hours depending on the frequency of updates.
Full and Incremental Backups: For quicker backups and minimum use of storage media, you can include Full and Incremental Backups in your strategy. For example, you can schedule Full Backups every Sunday and Incremental Backups every day or every N hours depending on the frequency of updates.
Full and Differential Backups: For quicker restores and reduced media usage, you can include Full and Differential Backups in your strategy. For example, you can schedule Full Backups every Sunday and Differential Backups every day or every N hours depending on the frequency of updates.

Using the image-level backup method

Performing image-level backups

1
In the Navigation pane, click Create Backup Job to start the configuration wizard.
In the Navigation pane, click Guided Configuration, and then on the NetVault Configuration Wizard page, click Create Backup Jobs.
2
In Job Name, specify a name for the job.
3
In the Selections list, select an existing Backup Selection Set, or complete the following steps to create a set:
a
To open the NetVault Backup Selections page, click Create New.
c
Open the applicable VMware® ESXi™ or VMware® vCenter™ Server.
NOTE: To switch between the two views (Hosts and Clusters and VMs and Templates), select the ESXi or vCenter Server, and in the Actions list, click Toggle Inventory View. This option is only available when server node is open.
Back up all virtual machines within a container: Select the container node. Data selection is possible at all levels, starting from the Datacenter node. For example, to back up all virtual machines hosted on an ESXi server, select the host node; in the VMs and Templates view, select the corresponding folder node.
Back up individual virtual machines: Open the applicable container nodes, for example, Datacenter, Cluster, and Resource Pool, and select the virtual machines that you want to back up. In the VMs and Templates view, open the folder node, and select the virtual machines that you want to back up.
Back up individual virtual disks: Open the virtual machine node, and select the disks that you want to back up. The virtual disks are named “Hard Disk 1,” “Hard Disk 2,” … “Hard Disk n.” The plug-in only lists those disks for which it can generate a snapshot.
e
Click Save, and in the Create New Set dialog box, type a name for the set.
A set name can contain alphanumeric and non-alphanumeric characters, but it cannot contain non-Latin characters. On Linux® OS, the names can have a maximum of 200 characters. On Windows® OS, there is no length restriction. However, a maximum of 40 characters is recommended on all platforms.
4
In the Plugin Options list, select an existing Backup Options Set, or complete the following steps to create a set:
IMPORTANT: On Windows, when you create a Backup Options Set for image‑level backups, you must use the default set “Default Backup Options — VMware Plugin — Windows” as the template. If you use any other set as the template, the backup may fail.
a
To open the VMware Plugin Backup Options page, click Create New.
b
Under Backup Type, select one of the following options.

Full

Select this option to back up all allocated sectors on a virtual disk.

Incremental

Select this option to back up disk sectors that have changed since the last Full, Differential, or Incremental Backup.

Differential

Select this option to back up disk sectors that have changed since the last Full Backup.

c
Under VM disk selection options, select one of the following options.

Back up all disks

To back up all available virtual disks for the selected virtual machines, use this option.

Exclude boot disk

To back up only the data disks and exclude the boot disks for the selected virtual machines, use this option.

Exclude data disks

To back up only the boot disk and exclude the data disks for the selected virtual machines, use this option.

d
Under Other Options, configure the following settings:

Enable Changed Block Tracking for VM

By default, CBT is disabled for a virtual machine. If you want to perform Incremental or Differential Backups of virtual machines, you must enable CBT for the Full Backup that serves as the base backup for subsequent Incremental and Differential Backups.

To enable CBT on all virtual machines included in the backup job, select this check box. (You can also enable CBT on specific virtual machines by using the Enable Change Block Tracking method. For more information, see Enabling CBT on individual virtual machines.)

If you select this check box and the plug-in fails to change this setting on a virtual machine, a warning message is logged.

If you do not select this check box, the plug-in does not change the CBT setting on the virtual machines during backups. Depending on whether CBT is enabled or disabled, the plug-in uses the appropriate backup method (CBT-based Full, Incremental, or Differential or non-CBT Full Backup) to back up the virtual machines.

Note the following:

Perform File Level Indexing

When you perform an image-level backup, the plug-in automatically generates file-level indexes for all supported volumes that are included in the backup snapshot. File-level indexing allows you to restore individual files and directories from Full, Incremental, and Differential image-level backups of virtual machines.

File-level indexing is available to volumes that use the following file systems:

Windows®: NTFS
Linux® and UNIX®: EXT2, EXT3, and EXT4

The Plug‑in for VMware also supports volumes managed by Logical Volume Manager (LVM) on Linux-based systems and Logical Disk Manager (LDM) on Windows-based systems as single or spanned disks.

NOTE: The current version of the plug-in does not support Windows Server® 2012 ReFS (Resilient File System) and Striped Disks.

File-level indexing does not affect the backup size. However, it increases the backup index size and the total backup time. The amount of time taken to perform file-level indexing depends on several factors, including the number of files, fragmentation of files on the volumes, network traffic, and load on the ESXi or vCenter Server.

If you do not want to use image-level backups for file-level restores, clear this check box.

Enable Active Block Mapping

The Active Block Mapping (ABM) technology provides filters to remove unused blocks during backups. Removing the unused blocks reduces the backup size and the amount of data transferred over the network. You can use ABM with CBT to back up only active and changed blocks during Incremental and Differential Backups.

ABM is supported on the NTFS file system on basic disks and EXT file systems.

ABM is disabled by default. Selecting this check box enables ABM, which allows the plug-in to back up only those sections of the virtual disks that are active. ABM scans the disk and detects inactive blocks; these blocks are then omitted during backups.

If a backup job includes any unsupported disk types, this option is ignored for those disks.

Remove snapshots from previous backups

When you run a backup job, the plug-in creates a snapshot named “BKB_SNAP” on the virtual machine to back up the selected data. Regardless of whether the backup completes successfully or fails, the plug‑in removes the snapshot on job completion. The plug-in also removes the snapshot if the job is aborted or the parent or child processes are terminated for any reason. However, if a job exits abnormally, the cleanup process may fail to remove the snapshot. To address such cases, the plug‑in provides an option to delete the snapshot when you run the job next time.

You can select the Remove snapshots from previous backups check box to remove any existing snapshots when you run the current job. Only the snapshots named “BKB_SNAP” are removed from the virtual machines. This option does not remove any other snapshots that exist on the virtual machine.

Maximum Number of Parallel Streams

By default, the plug-in generates a single data stream for a backup job, and backs up the selected virtual machines in a sequential manner. To increase throughput and reduce overall backup time for image-level backups, you can configure the plug-in to perform parallel backups of multiple virtual machines.

This setting determines the maximum number of parallel data streams that can be generated for an image-level backup job. For example, if 10 virtual machines are included in a job, and you set this parameter to four, the plug-in tries to back up four virtual machines in parallel.

The actual number of parallel streams for a job depends on the following factors:

For parallel backups, the plug-in generates a parent process that coordinates the overall backup and individual child processes that perform the actual task of backing up the virtual machines. The maximum child processes that can be generated for a backup job is equal to the Maximum Number of Parallel Streams configured for the job. The parent and the child processes are all created on the NetVault Backup Client on which the plug-in is running.

When a child process acquires a backup device and creates a backup stream, it is assigned a task to back up a virtual machine. After the task completes, the process is assigned the next task if there are any more virtual machines to be backed up. Each task is assigned a Task ID. A snapshot is generated only when a virtual machine is assigned to a child process.

When configuring Maximum Number of Parallel Streams, consider the following:

 

Automatic diagnose virtual machine on backup failure

To run predefined tests that can identify the cause of a virtual machine backup failure, select this check box.

For more information about the Diagnose method, see Diagnosing virtual machine issues.

You can access the Diagnostic Results dialog box from the View Logs page. The details are stored as log context objects.

Enable Restartable backups

This option allows you to restart a job that completes with some failed virtual machines. The restarted instance backs up only those virtual machines that failed previously; virtual machines that are backed up successfully are not included in the restarted instance.

When a restartable backup completes with some failed virtual machines, the plug-in generates a backup index for the completed virtual machines and sets the job status to Job Stopped. The log messages and log context show which virtual machines have failed for the job. When you restart the job later, the plug-in runs an Incremental Backup job to back up the failed virtual machines.

You can restart a job from the Job Status page. For more information about this method, see Restarting a backup job. A restarted instance does not back up virtual machines that are added to the host after the initial job is run.

NOTE: If all virtual machines fail for a job, the job status is set to Backup Failed. You cannot restart a failed backup job.
e
Click Save, and in the Create New Set dialog box, type a name for the set.
For more information about these sets, see the Dell NetVault Backup Administrator’s Guide.
NOTE: When performing multi-stream backups, do not select the Ensure backup is the first on the target media check box. If you select this check box for multi-stream backups, each data stream targets a separate piece of media to exist as the first backup on the media item. Thus, if a backup generates five streams, the job tries to obtain five blank or new media items.

This option does not apply to disk-based storage devices.

To save the job definition without scheduling it, click Save. You can view, edit, or run this job from the Manage Job Definitions page. This job is not displayed on the Job Status page until you submit it.
You can monitor the job progress from the Job Status page and view the logs from the View Logs page.
For more information about Job Status, View Logs, and Manage Job Definitions, see the Dell NetVault Backup Administrator’s Guide.
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