-----Original Message-----
From: veritas-bu-bounces at mailman.eng.auburn.edu
[mailto:veritas-bu-bounces at mailman.eng.auburn.edu] On Behalf Of Ed Wilts
Sent: Monday, July 17, 2006 7:41 AM
To: Drunen van, Marcel
Cc: veritas-bu at mailman.eng.auburn.edu; james.c.siano at lmco.com
Subject: Re: [Veritas-bu] Unix Master, Windows Media server possible?

On Mon, Jul 17, 2006 at 12:53:51PM +0200, Drunen van, Marcel wrote:
> The whole concept of NetBackup ensures multiplatform operations, which
> is one of the main reasons why I suggest it to my major customers. In
> general my advise is to have the master server on a Windows system, as
> the GUI is much easier to use (and often faster). 

I disagree.  Put the master server on a Unix system, and then use the
Windows GUI on a Windows media server or other server.  You'll get the
best of both worlds.

JL: Or just use the Java GUI on a Windows workstation.  We have our
master on Unix and use the Java GUI loaded on our Windows desktops for
administration.

Also by having the master on Unix rather than Windows you get full CLI
control so that you can script things the way you want rather than
having to rely on the GUI's sometimes incredibly slow way of doing
things.

> The majority of problems I encounter with multi-OS systems is the
> slightly different way UNIX and Windows work with name resolution when
> multiple LAN segments are involved. Make sure your Windows system only
> has one network name, don't try to bind a different name to each NIC,
as
> you can easily do on UNIX systems. 

Again, I disagree.  Whenever possible, you should use a dedicated backup
interface and you can refer to it by its own name - i.e.
server.prod.foo.com for the front side and server.back.foo.com for the
backup network.  Just make sure that NetBackup is configured properly
and you won't have any problems.  We've been doing this for years.

The only place we've been hurt by this is if you have a master/media
server and try to use 2 names for the system at the same time (one for
the master functionality and one for the media functionality).  This
worked fine in the 3.x, 4.x, and 5.x days, but broke with 6.0.

> Plan your LAN segments carefully, make sure your binding order is
> correct. Preferably you should only use DNS for name resolution, 

I strongly agree.

> If your name resolution is consistent and your servers are on
> approximately the same patch level, multi-OS environments work fine.
It
> is also no problem to make a backup of a Windows server using a UNIX
> media server or vice-versa. 

Correct on both counts.  There were problems a few years ago with a
Windows client and FlashBackup when the master (and/or media) was Unix,
but that's been fixed.
 
> There are rumors about UNIX media servers being faster, or vice-versa,
> but that depends on the peculiarities of the individual systems. 

The biggest difference is the stability of the platform.  With Windows,
you'll find yourself rebooting whenever you have any tape drive
maintenance - add, replace, etc.  With Unix, you can just restart
NetBackup (which can be a pain by itself).

JL: Not to say you NEVER have to reboot Unix to help solve an issue.
Just that it is a much rarer event.  Personally whenever I have to stop
the master's daemons it means I have to bounce them on the media servers
as well (which I was able to script - see CLI above).   I figure if I'm
doing all that it's a good time to bounce the server and the library for
good measure.  Of course I have a dedicated master.  If it weren't I
might not choose to do that.

-- 
Ed Wilts, Mounds View, MN, USA
mailto:ewilts at ewilts.org
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