Forum Discussion

SteveLaw's avatar
SteveLaw
Level 5
9 years ago
Solved

Restore Netbackup catalog to a test server?

We're preparing to upgrade our Netbackup master and media servers from v7.5.0.6 to 7.6.1.2. Part of the process involves upgrading the catalog and according to the documentation this process could take anywhere from 6 - 14 hours. Our master is a VM and the disk performance doesn't seem to be very good. I'd like to run through the whole upgrade process and get some idea of how long the catalog conversion will take when we upgrade the live system. There are settings that can be applied that are supposed to speed up the process etc.

I cloned the master in the hope that I could run through the process on the clone, but for unclear reasons this doesn't work - the cloned master has to be on an isolated network, and it's a domain server that can no longer reach the domain, and this makes Netbackup unhappy - it complains that the clone is not the original server, and it refuses to run or services continually shut down due to errors.

Therefore my only option is to create a new temporary master (with a different server name) and restore the catalog from the live master to this test server. Is this feasible?

We use Data Domain disk storage in the live system, but I don't see how we could restore to the new test master from Data Domain. I'm thinking a I could create a basic disk on one of the media servers and write the catalog to that, then switch that media server to the new master and read the catalog that way. But I would also need the small DR file that the catalog backup creates, and surely the new master won't be able to process that, as it was written by the Netbackup master in our live environment?

Am I going about this all wrong? Any thoughts and suggestions gratefully received :-) 

 

2008) Not Applicable
7.5

12 Replies

  • mph999's avatar
    mph999
    Level 6
    9 years ago

    You cannot restore a catalog to a server with a different hostname.  Unfortunately, the server name is deeply embedded in the NBDB.

    The rules for catalog restore:

    1. NBU must be installed in exactly the same path

    2. NetBackup version must be exactly the same

    3. Hostname must be identicle

  • Marianne's avatar
    Marianne
    Level 6
    9 years ago

    I have suggested in your previous post over here that you add an entry in the test server's hosts file.

    Have you tried that?

    Something like :
    <IP-address> swn009.corpds.net  swn009 

    Then install NBU specifying wn009.corpds.net as master and EMM server.
    (See rest of requirements in Martin's post.)

    Rather add a Basic Disk (USB or CIFS share) to the master server for the catalog backup which you can then attach to the test master (using exact same path/mount point as original server).
    Backup to a media server will add additional complexity when trying to restore catalogs to test server. 

     

    • SteveLaw's avatar
      SteveLaw
      Level 5
      9 years ago

      Hi Marianne,

      I did take note of your response on my previous post ( wow, you keep track of everything!).
      We don't actually have an isolated test network in vmware. I first brought the cloned swn009 master up with the vm nic disabled then added the hosts entry, but Netbackup still refused to start. It seemed that with the nic disabled it wasn't reading the hosts file. So I then enabled the nic and changed the ip address to something else with no gateway, so it couldn't route, then I added that a hosts file entry so the new "fake" ip resolved to the master hostname. That seemed to work, but I found that if Netbackup was left running for a while services would stop and errors came up and if I restarted Netbackup most of the services failed to start.
      Maybe I just needed to cancel all jobs, disable all SLPs etc....? 

      You wrote:
      "Something like :
      <IP-address> swn009.corpds.net  swn009 

      Then install NBU specifying wn009.corpds.net as master and EMM server.
      (See rest of requirements in Martin's post.)"

      Are you saying that I can install Netbackup to a different host but trick Netbackup into thinking that server has the same hostname as the original master by adding a hosts file entry? e.g. if new test server is SWN011 IP 10.0.0.2 and original master is SWN009 IP 10.0.0.1, then I add a hosts entry on SWN011 that says "10.0.0.2  SWN009", then install Netbackup? 

       


      • Marianne's avatar
        Marianne
        Level 6
        9 years ago

        I would not personally try that.

        I would only install to hostname swn009  with different IP address and network enabled and FQDN as alias in the hosts file.

        After installation, bpclntcmd -self must list swn009.FQDN linked to swn009 IP address.

        Please note that NBU is also case sensitive.

        SWN009 != swn009 != swn009.corpds.net  

        Whatever the NBU master server hostname is on the production server, must match and be in place before you start with installation.

        As soon as NBU is up and running, deactivate all media servers, policies and SLPs.