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NBU agent for VCS

mikebounds
Level 6
Partner Accredited

Where would I find the VCS NBU agent package and documentation.  Normally you can find an agent at https://sort.symantec.com/agents or in the bundled agents guide, but I cannot find NBU agent in either of these locations.

I am planning to upgrade an NBU (master) VCS cluster from 5.1 to 6.1 so wanted to look at VCS 5.1 and 6.1 agent docs and also obtain the 6.1 VCS agent package

Mike

17 REPLIES 17

Wally_Heim
Level 6
Employee

Hi Mike,

The VCS agent for NBU should come on the NBU media. 

Here is the link to the NBU 7.5 Clustered Media Server Administrator's Guide:  http://www.symantec.com/business/support/index?page=content&id=DOC5184

You can search the sort.symantec.com site under NetBackup - Documentation if you need the doc for a different version of NBU.

Thank you,

Wally

 

joseph_dangelo
Level 6
Employee Accredited

Mike,

What OS are looking to perform this on?  NBU OS qualification for VCS 6.1 is not ubiquitous. 

 

Joe D

mikebounds
Level 6
Partner Accredited

Solaris 10 (sparc).  I couldn't find any VCS versions in the doc that Wally linked to - this information is normally on the VCS agent guides, so where would I find information about what VCS versions are supported.

Mike

Wally_Heim
Level 6
Employee

Hi Mike,

The NBU Cluster Compatiblity guide would be the go to resource for what versions of VCS are supported with a specific version of NBU.  Here is a link to the NBU compatiblity guide: 

http://www.symantec.com/business/support/index?page=content&id=TECH126902

The SFW-HA Software compatibility guide also shows what versions of NBU have been tested with what versions of NBU.  But the NBU guys are very picky about the combination has to be on their Cluster Compatiblity guide.  The SFW-HA guys will usually defer to the NBU Cluster Compatibility Guide if there are differences in the two guides.

Thank you,

Wally

mikebounds
Level 6
Partner Accredited

Thanks Wally for your last post and your previous post.  So can someone confirm if I can use VCS 6.1 on Solaris 10 Sparc to cluster Netbackup 7.5 as the guide in the link Wally gave lists the highest version as VCS 6.0.3.

Mike

mikebounds
Level 6
Partner Accredited

I have read doc downloaded from http://www.symantec.com/business/support/index?page=content&id=TECH126902 but this does not contain information on how to upgrade VCS agent - it only covers a new installation which seems to run some wizard to set-up NBU resource after installing NBU, but NBU is already installed - I just need to upgrade VCS and then agent.

Without exception, every VCS agent I have used in VCS over the last 14 years comes with a document that describes:

  1. The agent entry points - online, offline, monitor, clean
  2. The agent attributes
  3. A sample configuration
  4. How to add and remove the agent package

Does this doucment exist for the VCS NBU agent? - I am would at least expect a document that describes the VCS NBU agent attributes.

Mike

Marianne
Moderator
Moderator
Partner    VIP    Accredited Certified

You are right about serious lack of documentation for VCS agent for NBU.
NBU documentation for initial installation and NBU upgrade is good, but no documentation for VCS upgrade...

I would recommend that NBU also be upgraded to 7.6 as it seems that support for VCS 6.1 is slowly but surely getting introduced for NBU 7.6.

I have poked Riaan Badenhorst - I am pretty sure that I saw in NBU forum that he has performed NBU and VCS upgrade recently (cannot find it right now).

RiaanBadenhorst
Moderator
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Hi Mike,

 

What I was told that because the NBU team control their agent, they say what is supported and what is not (also why you wont find it on sort). So as they do NOT have 6.1 on the list, it means it is not supported. Highest you can use is 6.0.3.

mikebounds
Level 6
Partner Accredited

Thanks Marianne and Rian,

So looks like the only VCS agent without any proper document is for the Netbackup Symantec product - this is poor indeed and not providing support for any VCS version really frustrates me.  As a consultant I spent a lot of time explaining to application vendors who supported particular VCS versions, that the VCS version doesn't matter except where there has been a VCS agent framework change which has only happened once in the last 15 years.  VCS just start, stops and monitor the application so if NBU agent works in 6.0, it will work in 6.1 and to not support 6.1 shows an ignorance of VCS which is understandable for non-Symantec products, but as far as I am concerned is not acceptable for Symantec products.

Mike

RiaanBadenhorst
Moderator
Moderator
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Exactly, we can cluster anything but when its in-house products there is always a wait, some interdependency that blocks it, etc etc. I waited 4-5 months because i was told 7.6 is only supported on 6.1. Then when 6.1 was released i found its actually not supported and 6.0 had support for 7.6 all along. Face Palm!

Marianne
Moderator
Moderator
Partner    VIP    Accredited Certified

I have heard that NBU 7.6.0.4 (targeted release date Nov 2014) will support VCS 6.1.

So, hopefully not long to wait....

RiaanBadenhorst
Moderator
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6.1 is now supported on all platforms :)

mikebounds
Level 6
Partner Accredited

Is 6.1 just supported for NBU 7.6.0.4, or is this for NBU 7.5 too?

Mike

RiaanBadenhorst
Moderator
Moderator
Partner    VIP    Accredited Certified

Wait, I'm wrong, I read Oracle and thought its Solaris, it was Oracle Linux.

 

Seems Solaris has been left off the list still so you'll still have to wait. It might still come. The certification does not co-incide with the release of the MP as you'll see below. The latest 4 certifications are on 7.6.0.3 but came out on the same day as the 7.6.0.4 release.

 

It would however not support 7.5 once it comes as its "Start of support" which as I understand it is that way because the NBBU agent is update in that code release and can now support 6.1. So unless 7.5.0.8 is release (or its just certified by engineering) it wont be supported (technically).

 

Sorry for the mistake.

Added VCS (SFHA) 6.1 support on Red Hat Enterprise Linux 6 - Master Server 2014-11-10 7.6.0.3
Added VCS (SFHA) 6.1 support on SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 11 - Master Server 2014-11-10 7.6.0.3
Added VCS (SFHA) 6.1 support on Oracle Linux 5.9 - 5.10 - Master Server 2014-11-10 7.6.0.3
Added VCS (SFHA) 6.1 support on Oracle Linux 6.3 - 6.5 - Master Server 2014-11-10 7.6.0.3
Added MSCS support on Windows Server 2012 - Master Server 2014-11-10 7.6.0.4
Added VCS (SFHA) 6.0.3 support on Oracle Linux 5.5 - 5.8 2014-08-18 7.6.0.3
Added VCS (SFHA) 6.0.1 support on Oracle Linux 6.1 - 6.3 2014-08-18 7.6.0.3
Added VCS (SFHA) 6.0.2 support on Oracle Linux 5.5 - 5.8 2014-08-11 7.6.0.3
Added VCS 6.1 (SFWHA) support on Windows Server 2012, 2012 R2 2014-08-08 7.6.0.3
Added VCS (SFHA) 6.0.1 support on Oracle Linux 5.5 - 5.9 2014-08-08 7.6.0.3
Added VCS (SFHA) 6.0.1 support on HP-UX 11.31 2014-07-29 7.5.0.6
Added VCS (SFWHA) 6.0.2 support on Windows Server 2012 2014-07-29 7.6.0.2
Added MSCS support on Windows Server 2012 R2 2014-07-29 7.6.0.3

mikebounds
Level 6
Partner Accredited

Ok thanks Riaan.

I think someone in VCS product team needs to speak to someone on Netbackup product team as there are about 100 VCS agents and the NBU agent is the most poorly documented and supported without even basic information like a list of the attributes and this is far from ideal when VCS and NBU are owned by the same company.

I think someone from VCS team needs to explain to the NBU team what documents to produce and that VCS versions do not matter (i.e you will notice there are a lot of VCS agents with version 5.x which are supported on 6.x as there is no change in the VCS agent framework from 5.x to 6.x).

Coupling the VCS agent with the NBU release is not a good idea - it should be an independent agent in its own package like every other VCS agent.

Mike

RiaanBadenhorst
Moderator
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YesI don't see much changing, it needs to start and monitor a bunch of services. There are few new ones in 7.6 but in most cass, not all services are monitored, and you can configure what is monitored in the reponse file or registry.

 

Should compare the perl scripts and see if its different.

joseph_dangelo
Level 6
Employee Accredited

Riaan and Mike,

Please contact me directly regarding this issue.

joseph_dangelo@symantec.com

Thanks,

Joe D