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DR Series Software 4.0.4 - Administration Guide

Introducing the DR Series system documentation Introducing the DR Series system Setting up the DR Series system Configuring the DR Series system settings Managing containers Managing replications Monitoring the DR Series system Using GlobalView Configuring and using Rapid NFS and Rapid CIFS Configuring and using Rapid Data Access with NetVault Backup and with vRanger Configuring and using RDA with OST
Understanding RDA with OST Guidelines Terminology Supported RDA with OST software and components Best Practices: RDA with OST and the DR Series System Setting client-side optimization Configuring an LSU Installing the RDA with OST plug-in Configuring DR Series system information using NetBackup Backing up data from a DR Series system with NetBackup Using Backup Exec with a DR Series system (Windows) Understanding the OST CLI commands Understanding RDA with OST Plug-In Diagnostic Logs Collecting diagnostics by using a Linux utility Guidelines for gathering media server information
Configuring and using VTL Configuring and Using Encryption at Rest Support, maintenance, and troubleshooting Supported Ports in a DR Series system About us

Best practices: Rapid CIFS

This topic introduces some recommended best practices for using Rapid CIFS operations with the DR Series system.

  • Containers must be of type NFS/CIFS
    • RDA containers cannot use Rapid CIFS. If you have existing NFS/CIFS containers, you do not need to create new containers to use Rapid CIFS; you can install the plug-in (driver) to existing clients.
  • The Rapid CIFS plug-in (driver) must be installed on client systems

    After the plug-in is installed, write operations will go through Rapid CIFS while metadata operations such as file creates and permission changes will go through the standard CIFS protocol. Rapid CIFS can be disabled by uninstalling the plug-in.

  • Your DR Series system must meet the minimum configuration

    Rapid CIFS is available with a DR Series system and a client with a minimum of 4 CPU cores running at a minimum of 4 GHz cumulative processing power and 2 GB memory. For a list of supported operating systems, see the DR Series System Interoperability Guide.

    If you update your operating system, you must update your Rapid CIFS plug-in as well. Updates are available on the Support site as well as within the GUI on the Clients page.

  • Rapid CIFS is stateful

    If the DR Series system goes down, the connection will terminate. DMAs will restart from the last checkpoint.

  • Rapid CIFS and passthrough mode

    If Rapid CIFS mode fails for any reason, the DR Series system falls back to regular CIFS mode automatically.

  • Rapid CIFS acceleration constraints

    Rapid CIFS does not support:

    • NAS functionality
      • Optlocks (but supported if a single client is writing)
      • Byte-range locks
    • Optimization of very small files (less than 10 MB). File size can be adjusted using configuration settings.
    • FILE_NO_IMMEDIATE_BUFFERING and FILEWRITE_THROUGH operations (sent via CIFS only).
    • File path size greater than 4096 characters

Setting client-side optimization

Client-side optimization (also known as client-side deduplication) is a process that can contribute to saving time performing backup operations and reducing the data transfer overhead on the network.

To configure dedupe/passthrough before the client makes a connection, you need to use the DR Series system command line interface (CLI).

NOTE: To update a client in the DR Series system GUI, the client must already be attached (and therefore enabled to appear in the GUI). If a client connection exists, you can select the radio button in the GUI to modify it.

You can turn client-side optimization On or Off by using the CLI commands, rda --update_client --name --mode. For more information about DR Series system CLI commands, see the DR Series System Command Line Reference Guide.

Installing the Rapid NFS plug-in

The DR Rapid NFS plug-in must be installed on to the media server type you choose (for supported operating systems and DMAs, see the DR Series System Interoperability Guide). The plug-in software enables integration between DR Series system data storage operations and the supported data management applications (DMAs). Before you install, make sure you adhere to the Best Practices covered in another topic in this chapter.

The plug-in must be installed on the designated Linux-based media server in the following directory, /usr/openv/lib/. The plug-in is installed using a self-extracting installer that installs the Rapid NFS plug-in and all of its related components. The installer supports the following modes, with the default being Help (-h):

  • Help (-h)
  • Install (-install)
  • Upgrade (-upgrade)
  • Uninstall (-uninstall)
  • Force (-force) 
$> ./QuestRapidNFS-xxxxx-xxxxx-x86_64.bin -help
Quest plug-in installer/uninstaller
usage: QuestRapidNFS-xxxxx-xxxxx-x86_64.bin [ -h ] [ -install ] [ -uninstall ]
-h					: Displays help
-install		: Installs the plug-in
-upgrade		: Upgrades the plug-in
-uninstall	: Uninstalls the plug-in
-force			: Forces the installation of the plug-in

You can download the plug-in installer from the Quest website:

  • Go to support.quest.com/dr-series, select your specific DR Series model, and then navigate to Software Downloads.
  • Locate the DR Rapid NFS plug-in and download it to your system.

After it is downloaded, follow the steps that follow to run the Plug-In Installer to install the plug-in on your designated Linux-based media server.

NOTE: The plug-in needs to be installed on client systems to support client-side deduplication.

  1. Download QuestRapidNFS-xxxxx-xxxxx-x86_64.bin.gz from the website, as detailed previously.
  2. Unzip the package.
    unzip QuestRapidNFS-xxxxx-xxxxx-x86_64.bin.gz
  3. Assign execute bit to change the permission of the binary package:
    chmod +x QuestRapidNFS-xxxxx-xxxxx-x86_64.bin
  4. Install the Rapid NFS package. Before installing, remove the stale NFS entry.
    QuestRapidNFS-xxxxx-xxxxx-x86_64.bin -install
  5. Load the file system in user space (FUSE) module, if not already loaded:
    modprobe fuse
  6. Create a directory on the client. For example:
    mkdir /mnt/backup
  7. Mount Rapid NFS as a file system type using the mount command. For example:
    mount -t rdnfs 10.222.322.190:/containers/backup /mnt/backup

    If you are using a DMA that supports a marker, set the marker by using -o in the mount command. For example, if you wanted to set the CommVault marker (cv):

    mount -t rdnfs 10.222.322.190:/containers/backup /mnt/backup -o marker=cv

    NOTE: If you want to do a mount on AIX, you must set the nfs_use_reserved_ports and portcheck parameters first. The parameters cannot be set to 0. For example: root@aixhost1 / # nfso -po portcheck=1 root@aixhost1 / # nfso -po nfs_use_reserved_ports=1

To ensure that the plug-in is running successfully, check the log file at: tail -f /var/log/oca/rdnfs.log.

Installing the Rapid CIFS plug-in

The DR Rapid CIFS plug-in must be installed on to the media server type you choose (for supported operating systems and DMAs, see the DR Series System Interoperability Guide). The plug-in software enables integration between DR Series system data storage operations and the supported data management applications (DMAs). Before you install, make sure you adhere to the Best Practices covered in another topic in this chapter.

You can download the plug-in installer from the Quest website as follows

  • Go to support.quest.com/dr-series, select your specific DR Series model, and then navigate to Software Downloads.
  • Locate the DR Rapid CIFS plug-in and download it to your system.

After it is downloaded, follow the steps below to run the plug-in installer to install the plug-in on your designated media server.

NOTE: The plug-in needs to be installed on client systems to support client-side deduplication.

  1. On the media server, map a network share to your CIFS-enabled container.
  2. Download the plug-in installer from the website, as detailed previously.
  3. Open a command prompt with the “Run as Administrator” option selected. To do this using the Windows Start menu, click Start → All Programs → Accessories. Right-click Command Prompt and select Run as Administrator.
    This gives all the required privileges to install/copy the driver files to the Windows drivers folder.
  4. Run QuestRapidCIFS-xxxxx.msi.
  5. Follow the installation prompts.

To ensure that the plug-in is running successfully, check the Windows Event log file.

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