How to Clone and Restore VM's under VRP Control.

Description

This tech note is to provide the recommended methods to backup(clone)  / restore the VMs under VRP control. 

-  Cloning VM protected by VAIO in VRP .

1. Login to vCetner – > Right click on VM which is protected by VAIO – > Clone – > Clone to Virtual Machine.
2. Once cloning VM operation complete then make sure that newly cloned VM 'BIOS UUID' is not the same as the VM from which it is cloned.
3. If the newly cloned VM 'BIOS UUID' is the same as cloned VM then change it using the steps which are recommended by VMware. (Please refer VMware documentation for how to check/change 'BIOS UUID' for VM.) If newly cloned VM 'BIOS UUID' is not the same as cloned VM then you can ignore this step.

4. Stop the cloned VM and detach the vtstap policy from the disk attached to this VM, check from the ESX if policy is still attached to VM or not for each disk of VM

vmkfstools --iofilterslist <pathofvmdisk>.vmdk

if attached then detach it by below command for the disks to which policy is attached
vmkfstools --iofilters ""  <pathofvmdisk>.vmdk

5. Start the Virtual machine

- Cloning VM protected by in-guest VRP Data Mover

1. Login to vCetner –- > Right click on VM which is protected by in guest -–> Clone to Virtual Machine.

2. Once cloning VM operation complete then make sure that newly cloned VM 'BIOS UUID' is not the same as the VM from which it is cloned.

3. If the newly cloned VM 'BIOS UUID' is the same as cloned VM then change it using the steps which are recommended by VMware. (Please refer VMware documentation for how to check/change 'BIOS UUID' for VM.) If newly cloned VM 'BIOS UUID' is not the same as cloned VM then you can ignore this step.

4. Login to the Cloned VM and delete Consistency Group

Delete the Veritas Replication Sets if the state is active.

Linux host:
/opt/VRTSitrptap/bin/vxtapaction stop -cg <CG_ID>
/opt/VRTSitrptap/bin/vxtapconfigure delcg -cg <CG_ID> -force
Windows host:
C:\Program Files\Veritas\VRTSitrptap \cli\vxtapaction stop -cg <CG_ID>
C:\Program Files\Veritas\VRTSitrptap\cli\vxtapconfigure delcg -cg <CG_ID> -force
 
5. Change the IP address of newly cloned VM, and uninstall existing MH and IOTAP package from it.

6. Now you can use newly cloned VM to create in guest RG.

Note : Steps are similar for VMWare as well as for HyperV protected VMs 

-  Restoring VM from backup image protected by VAIO in VRP .

1) Restore the VM from backup, say VM1
2) Perform edit RG operation by using 'Edit Configuration' option and remove VM1 from the RG
3) After successful execution of steps 2 perform edit RG operation by using 'Edit Configuration' option again and add VM1 from the RG

For VMware :
The following risk got raised on RG(Snapshot reverted on Virtual Machine. This risk affects Resiliency Platform Data Mover.)
and resolution is 'Perform Resync operation on the resiliency group.'

-  Restoring HyperV virtual machine from a backup image protected by VRP using VRP Datamover.

1) Restore the HyperV virtual machine from backup/snapshot.
2) Perform the resync operation on the affected resiliency group(RG) from VRP UI.
3) After the successful execution of steps 2, the Customer can perform any VRP operations.

Note :
After the restoration of the protected virtual machine, the target disk becomes inconsistent with respect to the source virtual machine disk. No risks found like VMWare. Fix planned for upcoming version(VRP 3.6).