5 1 0:Backup to HPE Cloud Volumes
Overview
With SEP sesam v. 5.0.0 Jaglion, you can use HPE Cloud Volumes as backup storage in addition to HPE StoreOnce Catalyst stores and HPE Cloud Bank storage. The HPE Cloud Volumes solution provides efficient direct backup, replication, and restore - unlike HPE Cloud Bank storage, which cannot be used as a backup target.
Although you can use HPE Cloud Volumes storage for direct backups, in accordance with HPE policy, it is recommended that you use it more as a secondary target repository for replication (Catalyst copy job) due to potential bandwidth and latency constraints. For details on replication, see HPE StoreOnce Replication.
- Before configuring a SEP sesam backup to HPE Cloud Volumes, your HPE StoreOnce backup appliance must be set up and your Catalyst store(s) must be properly configured as described in HPE StoreOnce Configuration.
- See the Support Matrix: SEP sesam integration with HPE StoreOnce Catalyst for system requirements and supported configurations.
Requirements
To ensure error-free operation of SEP sesam and improve performance, ensure that the following conditions are met in addition to the requirements for the HPE StoreOnce backup appliance:
- HPE system ≥ 4.2.3
- SEP sesam Server (≥ 5.0.0 Jaglion) must be connected to the HPE StoreOnce Catalyst via Ethernet for backups and restores.
- On Linux, the secure PROXY Client (secure_client) is required to access the HPE Cloud Volumes data store. See below Creating a Backup Store and setting up the secure client.
- When configuring HPE Catalysts stores, make sure that low bandwidth is set as the transfer policy. It affects how backup data is transferred between SEP sesam and HPE Catalyst store. Note that the HPE Cloud Volumes service does not support high bandwidth data transfer. See HPE StoreOnce Configuration.
Restrictions
- Replication (Catalyst copy) from HPE Cloud Volumes to local HPE StoreOnce Catalyst store or Cloud Bank Storage is not supported.
- Data immutability, which can be defined when creating HPE StoreOnce Catalyst store is not supported for HPE Cloud Volumes.
- No support for instant recovery, live mount, or single file restore.
Configuring backup to HPE Cloud Volume data store
Configuring a backup to HPE Cloud Volume store consists of the following steps:
- Create a Backup Store in HPE CV web portal and set up a secure client
- Configure HPE StoreOnce data store for HPE Cloud Volumes
- Create a media pool for the backup
- Back up to the HPE Cloud Volume data store
Creating a Backup Store and setting up the secure client in HPE CV
- Create a Backup Store. Log in to the HPE CV web portal, go to Backup Stores, and click New Store. Enter a Store Name (it must be a single word with less than 50 lowercase characters and contain only letters, numbers, and dashes), a Description, and select the Region closest to your physical location. Click Create Store.
- Download the text file that contains your connection credentials (your username and password) and click Close.
- Download and set up the Secure Client. The secure client (secure_client) is a Linux-based proxy server that is required to set up and run to backup data to HPE Cloud Volumes.
For this secure client, you should use a Remote Device Server (RDS) on Linux. If you are not familiar with configuring RDS in SEP sesam, see How to create a Remote Device Server (RDS).
For detailed instructions on secure client setup, see official HPE documentation HPE Cloud Volumes - Help: Downloading the Secure Client and Creating a Backup Connection Using the Secure Client.
Configuring the HPE StoreOnce data store for Cloud Volumes in SEP sesam
SEP sesam HPE StoreOnce data store is a special device type used to write savesets directly to HPE StoreOnce Catalyst stores and to HPE Cloud Volumes. The HPE Cloud Volume is addressed via Linux Proxy where secure_client is running and SSH keys to access the HPE Cloud Volume are installed.
- In the Main selection -> Components, click Data Stores to display the data store contents frame.
- From the Data Stores menu, select New Data Store. A New Data Store dialog appears.
- In the Name field, enter the exact name of the backup store you created in the HPE CV web portal, for example, Cloud_Volumes_Store_1.
- From the Store type drop-down list, select HPE StoreOnce.
- Make sure that the Create Drive option is enabled under the Drive parameter properties. The predefined value for the drive is automatically added to the Drive number field.
Then check Create new drive group. By enabling this option, SEP sesam will automatically create a new drive group. - The predefined number of channels is already displayed in the Max. channels drop-down list. The number of available channels depends on your SEP sesam Server package. The standard license supports 10 concurrent streams, enabling 10 backup processes to run simultaneously. For details on SEP sesam licenses, see Licensing.
- Enter the name of the device server. This is the name of the Linux-based proxy server that you used to set up the secure client.
- Size and Disk space usage
The SEP sesam data store Disk space usage option for HPE StoreOnce Catalyst Store supports Catalyst Store Physical Storage Quota and Logical Storage Quota (≥ Beefalo V2). Depending on your StoreOnce store configuration at the time of this setup, the Capacity and High watermark values are set automatically according to the HPE Catalyst store storage quotas or its overall size (if no quotas are set). For details on quotas, see HPE StoreOnce Configuration – Storage Quotas. The following applies:- If Physical Storage Quota is set, the Disk space usage shows the Used/Total/Free values that correspond to the physically occupied space for the HPE Catalyst Store.
- If Logical Storage Quota is set, the Disk space usage values are set to reflect the Logical Storage Quota specific values.
- If neither storage quota is set, the calculation considers the overall HPE StoreOnce sizes. Note that Catalyst stores may consume capacity from the common storage pool and the values displayed indicate the actual disk space usage of the latter.
- Switch to the HPE Credentials tab, click New and create a new credential set. Enter the same credentials that you set up when you created the HPE Cloud Volumes Backup store.
- You can create the media pool(s) for the HPE StoreOnce data store immediately by clicking the Create Media Pool button, or later in the HPE StoreOnce data store properties. If you chose to create the media pool(s) later, click OK to configure your StoreOnce data store.
Creating a media pool for Cloud Volumes backups
After you configure the HPE StoreOnce data store for Cloud Volumes, you must create a media pool for backup to HPE Cloud Volumes. Note that you can create media pools during configuration of a data store (by clicking the Create Media Pool button) or later in the HPE StoreOnce data store properties, as described here.
- Double-click the HPE StoreOnce data store you created earlier and click Create Media Pool in the Properties window.
- Enter a name for the media pool, for example, MP_Cloud_Volumes-1_dly.
- Set the Retention time for which the savesets from the pool are protected from writing. For details, see Automatic Retention (EOL) Management).
Backup to HPE Cloud Volumes
After you configure the HPE StoreOnce data store for Cloud Volumes and one or more media pools, proceed as follows:
- Create a backup task for backup to HPE Cloud Volumes.
- Configure a schedule as described in Creating a Schedule.
Once you have configured a task and schedule, create a backup event as follows.
Creating a backup event
By creating a backup event, you select the backup level, set event priority, and specify where to back up your data. You can create an event for a specific task or for a task group. The latter enables you to trigger all the tasks in the task group with a single event.
- From Main Selection -> Scheduling -> Schedules, right-click the schedule you created earlier and click New Backup Event.
- Under the Sequence control, set the Priority of your backup event. SEPuler always executes the schedules with the highest priority first. The default priority level is 1, which is the lowest priority (the highest priority is 99). The only exception are schedules with priority 0, which override all other priorities and are always executed. For details, see Setting Event Priorities. You can also enable the Blocking date. This option should be used together with the high priority for special events. When this option is enabled, events of the same type but with lower priority are blocked, so that the backup is executed even if other backups are scheduled for the same time.
- Under Object, select the task (or task group) you configured earlier and with which you want to link this event.
- Under Parameter, specify the Backup level.
- From the Media pool drop-down list, select the media pool you created for the HPE StoreOnce data store for Cloud Volumes. The data is backed up to this pool. You can also activate the option HPE StoreOnce Bandwidth Optimized Data Transfer. For details, see Option HPE StoreOnce Bandwidth Optimized Data Transfer.
- Optionally, specify the drive number of the drive to be used to write the data. Typically, you use this option if you have configured additional drives and want to assign a specific drive exclusively for backup.
- In the Follow up field, you can configure events (e.g., migration) that are triggered on the SEP sesam Server as soon as the first event (e.g., backup) is completed. For details, see Follow-up events.
Monitoring backups
You can view the status of your backup jobs in the GUI (Monitoring -> Last Backup State or Job State -> Backups) or SEP sesam Web UI. The backup status overview provides detailed information about the last run of backup jobs, including the task name, start and stop time of the last backup, backup level, data size, throughput, assigned media pool, etc.
See also
HPE StoreOnce Configuration – HPE Replication – Monitoring and Reporting – Support Matrix: SEP sesam integration with HPE StoreOnce Catalyst