Ferdinando Pasqualetti <fpasqual AT ccci DOT it> wrote:
>
> the cleanest way I found was a script to stop and export
> the VMs on a local (to VM server) disk and rsync them on
> a bacula server disk. In this manner we can move the VM on
> another VMserver and save it on tape using bacula.
I have attacked this problem with a two-pronged approach.
For VM's that need file-level restore and nightly incrementals,
I have the Bacula client installed inside the client VM.
Nothing special here at all, except that my Bacula Director
is running on a VM as well. :-)
For VM's that don't need file-level restore (as well as the
above VM's), I am running monthly DR snapshots of every VM
and storing those snapshots on a cheap portable NAS device.
There's really no reason to involve Bacula in the process
of backing up DR images, since you don't need file-level
restores and let's face it 95% of the VM's in use these
days probably won't fit on a tape or virtual tape library.
I'm using a pair of consumer-grade portable NAS devices for
these off-site DR backups, and they were just over $1,100
for about 5TB of formatted storage.
VMware ESX/ESXi has the ability to snapshot a running VM
and export it's disks into a backup image natively through
the ESX service console. The commands for doing this are
a little bit cryptic, but the API is there and it can easily
be scripted with a little bit of research.
The script that I am using to do this came from the VMware
user forums a few years back, and is named vi-backup.pl .
Unfortunately, a VMware partner vendor now owns this simple
backup script, and you probably can't get your hands on it
without paying for it. The nice thing about it was that
it could mount/export to a CIFS network share (NAS), compressed
the disk images down using VMware's tools, and the backup
image that it built included a simple restore script to
put the backup image back online with all of the restore
options pre-filled in.
I was just looking at ghettoVCB.sh for the first time
yesterday, and it seems to have much of the base features
of vi-backup.pl . It apparently can't do an export to a
CIFS share, and looks like it needs a separate restore
program to bring the image back in. It will do a hot
snapshot backup to SAN, local disk, or NFS though.
When VMware released ESX 3.0, the architecture included
a well-documented API for third-party enterprise backup
software to utilize for doing VM backups. It may be worth
someone with some programming experience investigating
this interface scheme to see if Bacula can exploit it for
a plugin or something...
-Arthur
-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Arthur Emerson III Email: emerson AT msmc DOT edu
Network Administrator InterNIC: AE81
Mount Saint Mary College MaBell: (845) 561-0800 Ext. 3109
330 Powell Ave. Fax: (845) 562-6762
Newburgh, NY 12550 SneakerNet: Aquinas Hall Room 60
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