Veritas Tech Talks: Introducing NetBackup 8.1.2 – Live VOX coverage

[JustineVelcich]

Welcome to the live-coverage summary feed of Veritas Tech Talks, happening now on the VOX homepage.

Follow this discussion thread for episode summary highlights being shared from the 4-part video series. We will share an episode summary at the end of each show, as a new comment. We welcome your questions – the NetBackup team is ready on hand to answer!

[SiobhanEllis]

As you are probably aware, we have OpsCenter today. I can't comment about our plans for this in an open forum. If you would like to no more, please contact your Account Manager.

[SiobhanEllis]

Are you going to attend the customer Forum week of september 17th in Roseville? If so, I will be talking about that very subject there. If not, please contact your Account Manager.

I'm afraid I can't talk about futures in an open forum.

[Genericus]

Siobhan - I am not going to be able to attend the 9/17 forum, but I wanted to ask about something.

If I do a backup of a client - say for a year. Then remove the client from the policy, say I am decomissioning it.

If I need to do a restore of that client, the client does not showup in the client drop down, because that is populated from clients in policies instead of directories in db/images.

I get around this by moving deleted clients to a deleted clients policy. I would like to stop doing this.

So - my questions - 

A. can we populate the restore client information from either the catalog or the images directory, so when doing a restore the images to restore has some basis in reality of images available.

B. can we clean up these images directories after the backups expire? 

I ran these commands, and found a ton of directories of old clients with no files inside.

for i in `ls -1 /usr/openv/netbackup/db/images`
do
echo $i
bpimagelist -client $i -d 01/01/2007 -e 08/30/2018 -idonly | wc -l
done

[SiobhanEllis]

@Genericus

Are you referring to using the Operational Restore in OpsCenter? I just want to make sure I have the context right.

[mrinalshankar]

@Genericus

Protection Plans are a policy template framework that use SLPs and storage just as any other policy would.

The Protection Plan template framework actually extends beyond just the policy attributes and includes templating the data lifecycle which NetBackup uses a SLP to fulfill.

 Regarding multi-step backups – I am not familiar with that term, would need more clarity.

[Genericus]

multi-step backups would be where you wrote the backup to a disk device, then replicated the image to tape to go off site using SLP

[mrinalshankar]

---

@jeffw4 wrote:

Can we utilize RBAC permissions and setup AD groups to have access to ONLY certain servers through the Web UI? Like if I want to allow the owners of the servers to do their own restores, but I only want them to be able to see their own servers.

---

@jeffw4

An RBAC rule is comprised of:
1. User or Group
2. Role (Canned Role or a Custom Role)
3. Object Groups (Define the assets, application servers, or protection plans that users can view or manage)

So, yes, depending on how you define the Object Group for the User/AD Group and the appropriate Role, you can grant Restore access on a subset of VMs.

Hope that helps.

Thanks,
Mrinal

[Genericus]

From the java admin console; Backup, Archive, and Restore option. Restore files tab

Actions; Specify NetBackup Machines and Policy Type

A window pops up - Source client for restores: this has a drop down listing off all active clients based on inclusion in a policy.

[Glen_Simon]

@Michael_G_Ander,

NetBackup 8.1.2 does include some nice usage reporting within the product (no cloud necessary). Smart Meter provides enhanced reporting that combines usage with entitlement so you can measure consumption. No plans to report on consumption within the product since this requires access to entitlement information within VEMS.

Glen

[Glen_Simon]

@Marianne Thanks for the friendly slap across the head! ;)

I'll chase down some more answers and watch this thread more closely....

Glen

[Glen_Simon]

I'm watching @jeffw4! I understand your cynicism - backup can feel like a thankless chore sometimes. Rest assurred NetBackup is the #1 priority at Veritas these days. I will be hanging out on VOX more often so don't hesitate to give me a shout!

Glen

[mrinalshankar]

---

@jeffw4 wrote:

Looking for clarification on this feature...

• Provide download links to an end-users instead of Admins needing to download, granular restores, full restores, etc.

Does this mean that you can A) stand up a VM via Instant Access and then B) somewhere during that process you will get a link that you can then give to the application/server owner for them to copy what they need over to their server having the issue?

If so how is the cleanup of that Instant Access VM done and who initiates it?

---

Instant Access recovery operations are visible to the Workload Administrator role as:

1. "Create instant access virtual machine"
2. "Browse files for single file recovery"

"Create instant access virtual machine" option does a live mount of the VM directly from the backup copy selected and registers the VM with vCenter depending on the options selected. Once the user is done using the Instant Access VM, he/she has the ability to delete the Instant Access VM.

"Browse files for single file recovery" performs a live mount in the background and gives the user a file/folder tree view to locate the file that needs to be recovered. Once the file is selected, the user can choose to either "Download" the file onto the machine/laptop where he has logged into the Web UI from. Alternatively, he can choose the "Restore" option which enables the ability to restore the file to the source VM directly in an agentless manner. In both cases, once the recovery is done and the user navigates out of this view, the VM is automatically unmounted.

HTH,
Mrinal

[SiobhanEllis]

@Michael_G_Ander. With regard to an On-prem reporting capability. We are currently developing a new reporting application which will have a smooth upgrade from existing OpsCenter implementations. This will also become available as a SaaS application later, for customers who want the functionality, but do not want to deploy the infrastructure necessary.

I can't give much more detail in an open forum. I will be presentinga t the customer forum and, if you can't attend there, please contact your account manager to get an update.

Regards

[Michael_G_Ander]

@Glen_SimonWhen you write in product are you refering to something like OpsCenter ? Can we still make a consolidated Capacity report ? This what we have used to calculate our consumption.  There will be no direct acces to VEMS due our security requirements.

[Michael_G_Ander]

@SiobhanEllisWill probabbly not attend as this the first I hear about a customer forum. 

Regarding Capacity reporting, we have 3 major wishes:

- That it can be done directly the reporting tool without needing external tools to open

- That the Capacity can be scheduled.

- That the data from the reporting database is used for master servere not connected at time the report run.

[Michael_G_Ander]

@SiobhanEllisWill probabbly not attend as this the first I hear about a customer forum. 

Regarding Capacity reporting, we have 3 major wishes:

- That it can be done directly the reporting tool without needing external tools to open

- That the Capacity can be scheduled.

- That the data from the reporting database is used for master servere not connected at time the report run.

[SiobhanEllis]

@Michael_G_Ander what you are describing there is OpsCenter today.

[Michael_G_Ander]

@SiobhanEllisNo, needs excel to open the Capacity licens report, which cannot be scheduled and it requires the master server(s) to be connected when running the report. This has been the case with OpsCenter version 6.5 to 7.7.3, have asked multiple Symantec/Veritas employees through the years and nobody have could show or tell me how to do what you describe.

[Genericus]

Drive throughput for the last 24 hours, run at mightnight

TAPE DRIVE THROUGHPUT

Legend: Idle, 1 - 59999, 60000 - 79999, 80000 - 119999, >= 120000 KBytes/Sec

Filters: Library = 'ACS-0-acsls' , Media Server = All, Tape Drive = All , Disp = S (Shared) or D (Dedicated)

Aggregation Level: Physical Drive

Filler

Avg (Kb/sec)	Library	Media Server	Drive Name	Disp	00:00	01:00	02:00	03:00	04:00	05:00	06:00	07:00	08:00	09:00	10:00	11:00	12:00	13:00	14:00	15:00	16:00	17:00	18:00	19:00	20:00	21:00	22:00	23:00
53579			lorenzo_ACS-LTO5-BAY.14-0.3.1.8	S
55699			lorenzo_ACS-LTO5-BAY.34-0.1.1.11	S
57465			lorenzo_ACS-LTO5-BAY.46-0.1.1.8	S
58932			lorenzo_ACS-LTO5-BAY.50-0.0.1.11	S
59568			lorenzo_ACS-LTO5-BAY.30-0.2.1.8	S
112949			lorenzo_ACS-LTO5-BAY.62-0.0.1.8	S
131165			lorenzo_ACS-LTO5-BAY.54-0.0.1.10	S
151797			lorenzo_ACS-LTO5-BAY.26-0.2.1.9	S
83854	ALL DRIVES AVERAGE				0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	0	83854

Report generated on Sep 6, 2018 12:00:37 AM

[Glen_Simon]

@Michael_G_AnderNo, I am referring to a new usage tracking feature in NetBackup 8.1.2 that will allow you to measure usage in real time. You will be able to see it from the new NetBackup Dashboard. You can see it displayed in the new screen shot we recently posted on the NetBackup page, at the top of the screen: https://www.veritas.com/product/backup-and-recovery/netbackup-8.

You will be able to download the new release and try it out on September 17.

Glen