Description
Issue: When customers have a large number of media servers, adding and maintaining these media servers to NetBackup clients can be challenging at times. Updating hundreds or thousands of clients when a new media servers is added can be time consuming even when using scripts.
With Secure Comms (i.e., since 8.1), we no longer have the strong dependence that NetBackup had on using DNS for host authentication. NetBackup hosts are now authenticated using their x.509 certificates, and each NetBackup host is assigned a unique NetBackup Host ID (GUID) by the master server. The master server maintains a list of valid names (a.k.a. host mappings) for each Host ID. These mappings and aliases that are made to the NetBackup Host ID (GUID) need not necessarily have to be hostnames/DNS names. When two NetBackup hosts communicate securely, they refer to the mappings database on the master server to determine the valid names for the peer host and not necessarily their host names.
This new Secure Comms authenticate using their x.509 certificates allows a NetBackup administrator to create any custom name/aliases which need not be hostname and can assign one or more NetBackup hosts to these custom names/alias mappings. This concept can be used to group multiple media servers or hosts belonging to a cluster to logical grouping of hosts. This grouping is maintained in the master server and can be modified by adding/deleting hosts to this grouping without the need to make any changes on NetBackup clients.
To create a new group mapping, go to Security Management -> Host management on the NetBackup Console.
Right click and click on Add Shared or Cluster Mapping
Once the “Add Shared or Cluster Mapping” windows pop’s up, type in the mapping name that you want to create for the group of hosts that you intend to create. We are going to create a grouping called “mediaservers” and map media1 and media2 to this group.
Click the “Select Host” button and select the check box for the list of hosts that you want to add to this mapping..
Click on “Add to List” and then “Save” in the Add Shared or Cluster Mappings window. Click Ok when a window below pops up:
We have now successfully created a mapping called “mediaserver” for media1 and media2 as shown below.
The mapping called “mediaserver” is not a dns name but is identifiable by NetBackup. When NetBackup clients are deployed, the clients will have just two server entries for the SERVER list.
The first entry is for the master server and the second entry is for the media server which is the “mediaserver” mapping which we created.
If a new media server (media3) is added to the environment, we can easily modify the mapping to add the new media server that was just added instead of updating hundreds of clients with a new server entry.
Under Security Management -> Host Management Right click on the right hand side of the window and click on “Add or Remove Host Mappings”
Click on Add when the “Add or Remove Host Mapping windows pop’s up and add the mapping name “mediaserver” which we used before.
You will get a warning that the “mediaserver” mapping is shared across multiple hosts. Click yes to the warning.
And click on “Close”.
The new mediaserver mapping is mapped across all media servers and there is no modification needed on clients.
The new media server can now backup any client which have the “mediaserver” mapping defined in the server list.