Veritas NetBackup Data Protection on VMware vCloud Director
Article ID: 302943
Updated On:
Products
Issue/Introduction
Purpose
This article provides information about data protection for VMware vCloud Director using Veritas NetBackup.NetBackup provides highly customized protection of vCloud Director (VCD) hosted workloads such as vApps and templates and supports granular recoveries of vApp, virtual machines, template, VMDKs and individual files and folders with-in a VM from a single pass optimized backup.
Resolution
Resolution
NetBackup and vCloud Director Server Configuration/Architecture
Supported Use-cases
- Automatic discovery and selection of workloads across VCD servers using Organizations, Organization VDC, vApp names, template and other attributes.
- Single-pass backup of VCD workload such as vApps and templates
- Granular recovery from single-pass backup
- vApp
- vApp as template
- Individual VMs (to vSphere environment)
- VMDKs of a VM
- VM files and folders
Operations Overview
Adding vCloud Director Server Credentials
To back up or restore virtual machines, NetBackup requires logon credentials to the VMware vCloud Director server and corresponding vCenter servers.To add NetBackup credentials in the NetBackup Administration Console
- Click Media and Device Management > Credentials > Virtual Machine Servers.
- Click Actions > New > New Virtual Machine Server.
- On the New Virtual Machine Server dialog, enter the name of a vCloud Director server and choose VMware vCloud Director as the Virtual Machine Server Type.
Configuring VMware vCloud Director protection in a VMware policy
Instead of manually selecting the vApps, template or VMs for backup, you can configure NetBackup to automatically select workloads based on a range of criteria. You specify the criteria (rules) in the Query Builder on the NetBackup policy Clients tab. NetBackup creates a list of the workloads that currently meet the rules and adds those to the backup. This feature is called the VMware Intelligent Policy.vCloud Director protection can be easily enabled in a VIP policy by selecting ‘Enable vCloud Director integration’ check-box.
With the Enable vCloud Director option, the policy selects only vCloud-managed virtual machines for backup.
NetBackup collects information on the vCloud Direct environment across all configured VCD server, this information includes details of Organizations, Virtual Datacenters, and vApps. This information is used to show all possible values of a field/attribute while configuring the VIP queries.
Further details about vCloud Director policies can be found at: https://www.veritas.com/content/support/en_US/doc/21902280-136588229-0/v80002010-136588229
Best practices/notes for vCloud Director policies can be found at: https://www.veritas.com/content/support/en_US/doc/21902280-136588229-0/v76073645-136588229
Recovering vCloud Director objects
NetBackup supports following use cases around recovering vCloud Director workloads:- Restoring virtual machines into a vApp
- Restoring a single virtual machine into a vApp template.
- Restoring a vApp template that has multiple virtual machines.
- Alternate location restores are supported to restore into an existing vApp or into a new vApp or vApp template.
Steps to recover vCloud Director workloads
1. Selecting policy type and search for virtual machine backups to recover
2. Explore the vCloud Director object hierarchies in NetBackup image catalog and choosing the required virtual machine to recover
3. Choosing different restore types
After choosing the target VM user can decide what type of restore to perform.- Normal Backup to restore specific files and folders in the VM,
- Virtual Machine Backups to recover entire VM/vApp/template
- Virtual Disk Restore for recovering individual VMDK files.
4. Launch Restore wizard by clicking on Restore…
Virtual Machine Recovery wizard will present vSphere and VCD details of the chosen backup image. After verifying the details, user can choose desire recovery destination. Click Next to proceed.5. Recovery Options
Recovery process can be customized by selecting recovery host and media server to use as well as choosing a preferred transport mode . This screen is shown only if restore is back to vCloud director (See below) Click Next to proceed.This dialog is similar to the standard Virtual Machine restore workflow.
6. Recovery vApp options
Based on the chosen recovery destination, different options are presented to the user:In either case, restored vApp can be also captured as a template. Click Next to proceed.
Click Next to proceed.
7. Recovery Destination Options for vCloud Director
This screen appears only in ‘Alternate location restores to the vCloud’ workflow, user can see details of selected vCloud Director details and change the virtual machine restore parameters.
Click Next to proceed.
8. Recovery options
In case of ‘Alternate location in vSphere’, user can customize the virtual machine recovery by changing vCenter server, ESXi hosts, datastore, display name, etc. All fields are populated with relevant default values and support select/browse or search as applicable.
This dialog is similar to (non-VCD) Virtual Machine restore.
Click Next to proceed.
9. Virtual Machine Restore Options
Various VM customization and VMDK provisioning options are presented. Some options might be unavailable depending on what kind (original vs. alternate) restore is selected.
This dialog is similar to (non-VCD) Virtual Machine restore. Click Next to proceed.
10. Storage, Network and other recovery options
Based on selected recovery type user is presented with options to further customize storage…
...and/or network configuration
This dialog is similar to (non-VCD) Virtual Machine restore. Click Next to proceed.
11. Pre-recovery check
NetBackup does a pre-recovery check to verify/test all the recovery option selected by the user. It validates chosen vCloud Director hierarchy and objects, space requirements, connectivity, credentials and checks against some common pitfalls. Result of the pre-recovery check are presented to the user and user can start the recovery.
This process same as a standard Virtual Machine restore, certain pre-recovery checks are performed only if recovering to a vCloud Director environment.
12. Once initiated recovery progress can be monitored from Activity Monitor or from Progress log file
Additional details this recovery wizard are available at: https://www.veritas.com/content/support/en_US/doc/21902280-136588229-0/v76229433-136588229
Best practices/notes for vCloud Director restores can be found at: https://www.veritas.com/content/support/en_US/doc/21902280-136588229-0/v76049930-136588229
Additional Information
Veritas NetBackup - VMware Data Protection:
https://www.veritas.com/protection/netbackup/vmware-data-protectionVeritas NetBackup™ for VMware Administrator's Guide: https://www.veritas.com/support/en_US/doc/21902280-127283730-0/index
Veritas Open eXchange - NetBackup Community:
https://vox.veritas.com/t5/NetBackup/bd-p/netbackup
Known Issues
- Enabling Support for VCD(VMware vCloud Director) 9.x on NetBackup 8.1.2 and below https://www.veritas.com/support/en_US/article.100045683
Support Information
Veritas support has multiple offering across the globe that can match your business needs.
- Essential Support: All customers
- Business Critical Support Remote Product Specialist: Designated technical support engineer
- Business Critical Support Premier: Proactive support with designated support account manager
United States
Telephone: 1 866 837 4827 or 1 512 813 2376
Business Hours: 5:00 am - 5:00 pm PST ( Monday to Friday )
Language: English
Additional information: For companies with Essential or Business Critical Service Support, phone support is always available in English 24x7.
https://www.veritas.com/support/en_US/
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