NetVault Plug-in for VMware 10.5 - Release Notes

Product licensing

To obtain the license key for your NetVault Backup Server environment, you must first provide the NetVault Machine ID of your main NetVault Backup Server along with the machine IDs of clients running any licensed plug‑in.

You can use the NetVault Configuration Wizard to install the product license keys. Alternatively, you can install the license keys from the Manage Clients page.

To obtain the machine ID for a NetVault Backup machine

1	Start the NetVault WebUI, and in the Navigation pane, click Manage Clients.

2	In the NetVault Backup Clients list, select the client, and click Manage.

3	On the View Clients page, note the machine ID exactly as it appears in the Client Summary table.

To install the license keys using the NetVault Configuration Wizard

1	In the Navigation pane, click Guided Configuration, and then on the NetVault Configuration Wizard page, click Install Licenses.

2	In the NetVault Backup Clients list, select the client on which you want to install the license key, and click Next.

3	In the Enter the license key string box, type or copy and paste the license key, and click Apply.

After the key is applied successfully, a message is displayed.

To install the license keys from the Manage Clients page

1	In the Navigation pane, click Manage Clients.

2	In the NetVault Backup Clients list, select the client on which you want to install the license key, and click Manage.

3	On the View Clients page, click Install License.

4	In the Install License dialog box, type or copy and paste the license key, and click Apply.

After the key is installed successfully, a message is displayed. Click the Close button to close the dialog box.

Getting started with Plug‑in for VMware 10.5

•	Upgrade and installation instructions

•	More resources

Upgrade and installation instructions

To upgrade the plug-in

The standard method for upgrading the plug-in is to install the latest version over the previous version of the plug-in.

To use the plug-in for file-level backup operations, complete the following tasks in the given order:

•	Verify that no virtual machine is mounted for a file-level browse or backup operation. If any virtual is mounted in a browse session, unmount it, or if it is mounted for a backup, wait until the backup completes.

•	From the NetVault Backup Process Viewer, check if any instance of “NetVault VM mount daemon” or “NetVault VM mount CLI” is running on the client. Alternatively, use the Windows Task Manager to see if any instance of nvvmwmount.exe is running. If yes, restart the NetVault Backup Service.

•

Verify that the Working Directory configured for the plug-in does not contain any subfolders named after the display names of virtual machines. If the directory includes any mount folder, manually remove the folder. For more information, see the user’s guide. If you fail to complete the cleanup routine, a subsequent mount operation fails with the error “A stale mount was found.”

•

VDDK uses a kernel-mode driver for mounting a virtual machine during file-level backup and browse operations. The Plug‑in for VMware automatically starts a service for the driver when you install the plug-in, but it does not check if the service is running when you perform an upgrade or a reinstallation. For more information about this error condition, see Known issues.

To make sure that this error does not occur, and complete the following steps before upgrading from 2.x.

 

Table 7. Upgrade requirements for file-level browse and backups

Current installation status	Upgrade procedure
Version 2.x is removed from the client	1 Start the command prompt. 2 Stop the service, if it is running. sc stop vstor2-mntapi20-shared 3 Delete the service. sc delete vstor2-mntapi20-shared 4 Verify that the service has been deleted. sc query vstor2-mntapi20-shared 5 Install the plug-in.
Version 2.x is currently installed on the client	1 Start the command prompt, and type: sc query vstor2-mntapi20-shared 2 If the drive service is found, type: sc qc vstor2-mntapi20-shared This command should return the following output: On 32-bit NetVault Backup Client: <NV_HOME>/dynlib/vddk/bin/vstor2-mntapi20-shared.sys On 64-bit NetVault Backup Client: <NV_HOME>/dynlib/vddk/bin/vstor2-mntapi20-shared-64.sys 3 If the binary path is valid and exists on the client, do the following: Install the plug-in. Verify that the service has started. sc query vstor2-mntapi20-shared 4 If the binary path is invalid or does not exist, do the following: Stop the service, if it is running. sc stop vstor2-mntapi20-shared Delete the service. sc delete vstor2-mntapi20-shared Verify that the service has been deleted. sc query vstor2-mntapi20-shared Install the plug-in.

To install the plug-in

1	In the Navigation pane, click Guided Configuration, and then on the NetVault Configuration Wizard page, click Install Plugins. In the NetVault Backup Clients list, select the clients on which you want to install the plug-in.

You can also install the plug-in from the Manage Clients page. In the Navigation pane, click Manage Clients. In the NetVault Backup Clients list, select the client on which you want to install the plug-in, and click Manage. At the lower-right corner of the Installed Software table, click the Install Plugin button ().

 

NOTE: The configuration wizard lets you install a plug-in on multiple clients at the same time. Before using this method, you must verify that the selected clients are all of the same type. You must also verify that the binary file is compatible with the client OS and platform. From the Manage Clients page, you can install the plug-in on a single client.

2	Click Choose Plug-in File, and in the browse window, navigate to the location of the “.npk” installation file for the plug-in (on the installation CD or the directory to which the file was downloaded from the website).

3	Select the file named vmw-w.x.y.z-<platform>.npk (where w.x represents the version number, y represents the patch level, and z represents the build number), and click Next to begin installation.

4	After the plug-in is installed successfully, a message is displayed.

More resources

Additional information is available from the following:

•	Online product documentation

•	NetVault community