Fileserver OS Upgrade

[Popfan]

Hi,

I want to upgrade the operating system on my virtual windows fileserver which is backed up with IBM Spectrum Protect Client (8.1.1). My plan is to set up a new virtual server and move the block storage disks to the new server. Is there a chance, expect to use the same server hostname + nodename, not to have a full backup at first backup?
I have not found any official documentation to migrate a fileserver from IBM, is there one?

Best Regards

 

[marclant]

It's not cut and dry. There are several things that are evaluated if a file is different or not. The hostname and nodename need to be the same, so if you do that, that's already a plus for you. But if one of attributes is different on the other system, then it could result in all files being backed up. Since it will be a new machine, it will have a new computer SID, so there's a possibility that the file permissions appear different. There's really no way to know until you test.

If you want, you can test with a few files, I put an example below. I did a security change on a file to simulate what it would look like if you would see a change and traced it:

dsmc i c:\test\test*.txt -traceflag=fioattribs -tracefile=trace1.txt

As you can see below, it shows that "File Security changed since backup" and "File Security CRC changed since backup" for test1.txt, so it's returning ATTRIBS_BACKUP.

12/03/2020 08:10:21.577 : ..\..\common\ba\incrdrv.cpp(12610): Incremental attrib compare for: \\node1\c$\test\test1.txt
12/03/2020 08:10:21.577 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3152): ***** A t r i b  T r a c e *****
12/03/2020 08:10:21.577 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3155): fioCmpAttribs(): ignoring attributes: '--N A -------- -- -- --  (0x000000a0)'
12/03/2020 08:10:21.577 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3174): fioCmpAttribs(): File Size unchanged since backup
12/03/2020 08:10:21.577 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3180): fioCmpAttribs(): Compared FILETIME formated time stamps.
12/03/2020 08:10:21.577 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3208): fioCmpAttribs(): File Date/Time unchanged since backup
12/03/2020 08:10:21.577 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3225): fioCmpAttribs(): File Attributes unchanged since backup
12/03/2020 08:10:21.577 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3279): fioCmpAttribs(): File MSDfs unchanged since backup
12/03/2020 08:10:21.577 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3283): fioCmpAttribs(): File Security changed since backup
12/03/2020 08:10:21.577 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3287): fioCmpAttribs():    Old security desc size = 168
12/03/2020 08:10:21.577 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3289): fioCmpAttribs():    New security desc size = 204
12/03/2020 08:10:21.578 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3318): fioCmpAttribs(): File Share unchanged since backup
12/03/2020 08:10:21.578 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3321): fioCmpAttribs(): File Security CRC changed since backup
12/03/2020 08:10:21.578 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3336): fioCmpAttribs(): Named Stream Size unchanged since backup
12/03/2020 08:10:21.578 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3349): fioCmpAttribs(): Backup Stream Size unchanged since backup
12/03/2020 08:10:21.578 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3371): fioCmpAttribs(): GPFS attributes unchanged since backup
12/03/2020 08:10:21.578 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3382): fioCmpAttribs(): Hard Links Hash unchanged since backup
12/03/2020 08:10:21.578 : ..\..\common\fio\fileio.cpp(3635): fioCmpAttribs(): old attrib's data from build (IBM TSM 8.1.8.0)
12/03/2020 08:10:21.578 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3387): ***** A t r i b  T r a c e  E n d *****
12/03/2020 08:10:21.578 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3408): fioCmpAttribs(): returning ATTRIBS_BACKUP

Now, test2.txt didn't change, all the attributes show "unchanged" and it returns ATTRIBS_EQUAL, so it will not back it up:

12/03/2020 08:10:21.578 : ..\..\common\ba\incrdrv.cpp(12610): Incremental attrib compare for: \\node1\c$\test\test2.txt
12/03/2020 08:10:21.579 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3152): ***** A t r i b  T r a c e *****
12/03/2020 08:10:21.579 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3155): fioCmpAttribs(): ignoring attributes: '--N A -------- -- -- --  (0x000000a0)'
12/03/2020 08:10:21.579 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3174): fioCmpAttribs(): File Size unchanged since backup
12/03/2020 08:10:21.579 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3180): fioCmpAttribs(): Compared FILETIME formated time stamps.
12/03/2020 08:10:21.579 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3208): fioCmpAttribs(): File Date/Time unchanged since backup
12/03/2020 08:10:21.579 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3225): fioCmpAttribs(): File Attributes unchanged since backup
12/03/2020 08:10:21.579 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3279): fioCmpAttribs(): File MSDfs unchanged since backup
12/03/2020 08:10:21.579 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3313): fioCmpAttribs(): File Security unchanged since backup
12/03/2020 08:10:21.579 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3318): fioCmpAttribs(): File Share unchanged since backup
12/03/2020 08:10:21.580 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3323): fioCmpAttribs(): File Security CRC unchanged since backup
12/03/2020 08:10:21.580 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3336): fioCmpAttribs(): Named Stream Size unchanged since backup
12/03/2020 08:10:21.580 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3349): fioCmpAttribs(): Backup Stream Size unchanged since backup
12/03/2020 08:10:21.580 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3371): fioCmpAttribs(): GPFS attributes unchanged since backup
12/03/2020 08:10:21.580 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3382): fioCmpAttribs(): Hard Links Hash unchanged since backup
12/03/2020 08:10:21.580 : ..\..\common\fio\fileio.cpp(3635): fioCmpAttribs(): old attrib's data from build (IBM TSM 8.1.8.0)
12/03/2020 08:10:21.580 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3387): ***** A t r i b  T r a c e  E n d *****
12/03/2020 08:10:21.580 : ..\..\common\fio\ntfileio.cpp(3425): fioCmpAttribs(): returning ATTRIBS_EQUAL

 

[Popfan]

Hi marclant,

thanks for your answer, I was already afraid of that

There are several things that are evaluated if a file is different or not

Is there a documentation about what's important to know for this type of migration?

Best Regards

 

[marclant]

Hi marclant,

thanks for your answer, I was already afraid of that
Is there a documentation about what's important to know for this type of migration?

Best Regards

Not to my knowledge, but the trace extracts above that I put shows you what Spectrum Protect compares to tell if a file is the same or different. So in order to avoid that the files will be backed up again, you have to make sure that your migration strategy doesn't alter any of those attributes.

The only way you can know for sure what will happen is to do a small scale test, which should always be done anyway when doing a migration.

The key point to remember is that Spectrum Protect will make the right decision. If the file is different after the migration for some reason, it will back it up. While this may seem like a major inconvenience at the time, if there's a disaster the following week and you need to restore the files, you want to be sure that they will be able to be restored successfully.

 

[Popfan]

Thanks for your quick reply and help.