The new version of Veeam ONE v8 has been released - a product for monitoring the virtual infrastructure of VMware vSphere and Hyper-V
A month ago, a new version of Veeam ONE v8 was released - a product designed for planning, documenting and real-time monitoring of VMware vSphere virtual infrastructures, Microsoft Hyper-V and Veeam Backup & Replication infrastructures (the backup infrastructure must also be monitored, primarily due to high criticality its failure for business). In this post I will talk about the new functionality available in the commercial and free editions of the product.
Protecting data from failures is a task of critical importance for any infrastructure. However, the software itself, which provides data protection, also needs to be supervised - just like any other software. That is why it would be good to have a tool that allows you to simultaneously control both the virtual environment and the software that is involved in its backup - because failure of one or the other part of this system can turn into a serious problem for the organization’s performance.
It goes without saying that when planning the deployment of any software, including software designed to protect data, you need to have a clear understanding of the current load and performance of the infrastructure, especially for production storage. After all, it depends on its performance, in our case, whether the system will cope with a large number of disk operations for processing snapshots of virtual machines (in particular, whether it can commit several snapshots simultaneously).
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To help analyze the existing infrastructure, Veeam ONE v7 provided a virtual machine configuration report, and in version 8 a new built-in storage performance report “Datastore Performance Assessment” was added. It contains data on storage performance and potential problems that may affect the backup process. When generating a report, you need to set the maximum permissible delay value for read / write operations (Max. Read / write latency) - the default is 50 ms. You can also specify the maximum allowed number of operations per second (IOPS).
For the storage system, the report will show the number of connected hosts, the number of virtual machines and virtual disks, the average value of the delay during the operation. If this value approaches or exceeds the specified limit, the Average Value field will turn yellow or red, respectively, and the Recommendations field will provide recommendations for solving the problem.
(Let me remind you that in version 8 of Veeam Backup & Replication, you can use the automatic control of read / write operations as a setting for all used storage systems (in the Enterprise edition) and for individual storages (in the Enterprise Plus edition), as described in detail in this post .)
Recommendations developed during the use of Veeam Backup & Replication "in the field", as well as issued on the forum and verified by experts - in general, a wealth of expert knowledge and experience of implementation engineers, technical consultants, end users, product managers and all interested parties - This is what served as the basis for a new and, I think, very useful report “Veeam Backup & Replication configuration assessment” . It is clear that it is impossible to grasp the immense (that is, the whole variety of configurations in nature), but this report allows you to answer without a lot of questions to a number of frequent questions that arise before, during and after the deployment of Veeam Backup & Replication. I won’t go into details on exactly how it does it (data sources and verification methods are given in the report description - so far only in English ) - but in the end you get an assessment of your backup infrastructure for a number of factors that can affect its work when performing a particular task. For various tasks, whether optimizing performance or restoring guest OS files, there is a list of such factors and actual results of checking your infrastructure against these criteria for compliance with the optimal recommended values. For example, successful VM processing, taking into account application performance, is affected by the state of VMware Tools inside the guest OS, as well as backup task settings and a number of other factors. Clicking on the name of the factor in the summary table, you can go to detailed information about the current state of affairs and recommendations for optimization - this can be an indication to update VMware Tools or enable the necessary (but for some reason turned off) option in the task settings wizard.
Even after all the above manipulations, the management of the virtual infrastructure is still quite troublesome, requiring vigilance and accuracy. Every day something changes on the farm, new cars are created, old ones are removed, and so on and so on. It is necessary to ensure that the necessary resources are allocated in time, that the machines are protected, and users work without problems.
To identify virtual machines that are not protected in accordance with corporate policies, a report “Protected VMs” was created, and now real-time monitoring has been added to it: as soon as it turns out that the virtual machine does not meet the data protection requirements of the organization (for example, , the last backup is too old, or the machine has completely dropped out of the backup) - so right there in the Infrastructure View an appropriate alert (alarm) is displayed.
The time of the last backup is also tracked and shown in a summary for each VM; There is also a built-in grouping for this time. This allows you to always have on-hand operational data on whether the recovery points for critical machines are relevant, and take timely action.
If the organization does not have a lone system administrator, but a friendly team of IT specialists, then:
Tags (or “business categories”) are gradually “coming into vogue” among VMware administrators, since they provide new infrastructure management capabilities. In version 8.0, tags are supported in both Veeam Backup & Replication and Veeam ONE.
Although vSphere does not allow you to assign tags automatically / dynamically, but Veeam ONE Business View is able to do this successfully. With it, you can assign tags using static rules or dynamic groups based on VM attributes (for example, name, location, or allocated resources). Customize the rule for inclusion in the group in the Business View - and voila! the corresponding tags are picked up automatically in the vSphere. And now you can use them, for example, to assign backup tasks to a VM group with the necessary tag (say, QA ).
Note that this way the assigned tags will work in any product that uses vSphere tags.
And, which is nice, this functionality is available in the free edition of Veeam ONE Free Edition.
In the new version, going to meet service providers and large organizations, Veeam ONE offers simple and secure monitoring for both internal cloud structures (private cloud) and public (public cloud). Users can monitor the status of their cloud resources using the access rights configured in the vCenter Server and the vCloud Director.
It should be noted that the infrastructures of different clients of the same provider are always logically isolated from each other, so that one client of the provider cannot see the data of another client of the same provider, even if they physically share the same virtual infrastructure.
In addition to the commercial version, Veeam ONE is available in the free version. It, of course, does not contain a full set of features, but is also quite effective and useful as a solution for monitoring infrastructure. In particular, it makes sense to use it to evaluate your environment when planning deployment Veeam Backup & Replication.
What is in the free version? Many useful, for example:
For a complete list of free and commercial versions, see here . If you decide to purchase a commercial version after becoming acquainted with the free version, you just need to enter the license key.
Data protection from failures is good, but taking into account and control is better!
Protecting data from failures is a task of critical importance for any infrastructure. However, the software itself, which provides data protection, also needs to be supervised - just like any other software. That is why it would be good to have a tool that allows you to simultaneously control both the virtual environment and the software that is involved in its backup - because failure of one or the other part of this system can turn into a serious problem for the organization’s performance.
It goes without saying that when planning the deployment of any software, including software designed to protect data, you need to have a clear understanding of the current load and performance of the infrastructure, especially for production storage. After all, it depends on its performance, in our case, whether the system will cope with a large number of disk operations for processing snapshots of virtual machines (in particular, whether it can commit several snapshots simultaneously).
')
To help analyze the existing infrastructure, Veeam ONE v7 provided a virtual machine configuration report, and in version 8 a new built-in storage performance report “Datastore Performance Assessment” was added. It contains data on storage performance and potential problems that may affect the backup process. When generating a report, you need to set the maximum permissible delay value for read / write operations (Max. Read / write latency) - the default is 50 ms. You can also specify the maximum allowed number of operations per second (IOPS).
For the storage system, the report will show the number of connected hosts, the number of virtual machines and virtual disks, the average value of the delay during the operation. If this value approaches or exceeds the specified limit, the Average Value field will turn yellow or red, respectively, and the Recommendations field will provide recommendations for solving the problem.
(Let me remind you that in version 8 of Veeam Backup & Replication, you can use the automatic control of read / write operations as a setting for all used storage systems (in the Enterprise edition) and for individual storages (in the Enterprise Plus edition), as described in detail in this post .)
"... Sow sensible, good, eternal"
Recommendations developed during the use of Veeam Backup & Replication "in the field", as well as issued on the forum and verified by experts - in general, a wealth of expert knowledge and experience of implementation engineers, technical consultants, end users, product managers and all interested parties - This is what served as the basis for a new and, I think, very useful report “Veeam Backup & Replication configuration assessment” . It is clear that it is impossible to grasp the immense (that is, the whole variety of configurations in nature), but this report allows you to answer without a lot of questions to a number of frequent questions that arise before, during and after the deployment of Veeam Backup & Replication. I won’t go into details on exactly how it does it (data sources and verification methods are given in the report description - so far only in English ) - but in the end you get an assessment of your backup infrastructure for a number of factors that can affect its work when performing a particular task. For various tasks, whether optimizing performance or restoring guest OS files, there is a list of such factors and actual results of checking your infrastructure against these criteria for compliance with the optimal recommended values. For example, successful VM processing, taking into account application performance, is affected by the state of VMware Tools inside the guest OS, as well as backup task settings and a number of other factors. Clicking on the name of the factor in the summary table, you can go to detailed information about the current state of affairs and recommendations for optimization - this can be an indication to update VMware Tools or enable the necessary (but for some reason turned off) option in the task settings wizard.
Maintaining a virtual farm
Even after all the above manipulations, the management of the virtual infrastructure is still quite troublesome, requiring vigilance and accuracy. Every day something changes on the farm, new cars are created, old ones are removed, and so on and so on. It is necessary to ensure that the necessary resources are allocated in time, that the machines are protected, and users work without problems.
To identify virtual machines that are not protected in accordance with corporate policies, a report “Protected VMs” was created, and now real-time monitoring has been added to it: as soon as it turns out that the virtual machine does not meet the data protection requirements of the organization (for example, , the last backup is too old, or the machine has completely dropped out of the backup) - so right there in the Infrastructure View an appropriate alert (alarm) is displayed.
The time of the last backup is also tracked and shown in a summary for each VM; There is also a built-in grouping for this time. This allows you to always have on-hand operational data on whether the recovery points for critical machines are relevant, and take timely action.
"Who sat in my chair and moved him from his seat?"
If the organization does not have a lone system administrator, but a friendly team of IT specialists, then:
- It is important to control who, when and how changed the settings of tasks - to be aware of what changes have been made, and to be able to roll back. To do this, you can use the built-in report "Job Configuration Change Tracking" . To monitor the configuration, the report “Orphaned VMs” will also be useful, which lists the machines that for some reason or other fell out of the backup tasks, but which have restore points and which need protection.
- If specially assigned operators are engaged in restoring VMs, then it is recommended to monitor their area of ​​activity using the “Delegated Restore Permissions Overview” report.
- Well, for those who work tape libraries, the appropriate group of reports is useful: “Tape Backups” (which VMs were archived on a magnetic tape), “Tape Media Retention Period” (storage times for tape archives) and “Tape Vaults” (information on magnetic tapes that are currently in storage, ie, outside active use).
Working with VMware vSphere tags
Tags (or “business categories”) are gradually “coming into vogue” among VMware administrators, since they provide new infrastructure management capabilities. In version 8.0, tags are supported in both Veeam Backup & Replication and Veeam ONE.
Although vSphere does not allow you to assign tags automatically / dynamically, but Veeam ONE Business View is able to do this successfully. With it, you can assign tags using static rules or dynamic groups based on VM attributes (for example, name, location, or allocated resources). Customize the rule for inclusion in the group in the Business View - and voila! the corresponding tags are picked up automatically in the vSphere. And now you can use them, for example, to assign backup tasks to a VM group with the necessary tag (say, QA ).
Note that this way the assigned tags will work in any product that uses vSphere tags.
And, which is nice, this functionality is available in the free edition of Veeam ONE Free Edition.
Multi-user monitoring and reporting
In the new version, going to meet service providers and large organizations, Veeam ONE offers simple and secure monitoring for both internal cloud structures (private cloud) and public (public cloud). Users can monitor the status of their cloud resources using the access rights configured in the vCenter Server and the vCloud Director.
It should be noted that the infrastructures of different clients of the same provider are always logically isolated from each other, so that one client of the provider cannot see the data of another client of the same provider, even if they physically share the same virtual infrastructure.
What else?
- In the new version, the server part was optimized, which made it possible to support work with several Veeam Backup & Replication servers, with large virtual infrastructures (100 or more hosts) and with large amounts of data.
- Many new alerts have appeared to monitor Veeam Backup & Replication 8.0 and Hyper-V (including monitoring storage systems and incorrect logons to Hyper-V hosts).
- Notification features and other properties of alerts, the number of which has now exceeded two hundred, have been improved. With their help, the fire is becoming easier to warn (which, as we know, is much easier than to extinguish) - for what, in fact, monitoring is intended.
- It also supports performance metrics and configuration data for vSAN, SNMP v2, v3 protocols for sending SNMP traps to other systems.
- Well, a nice updated interface is pleasing to the eye and has become more convenient for working with large infrastructures.
Free version
In addition to the commercial version, Veeam ONE is available in the free version. It, of course, does not contain a full set of features, but is also quite effective and useful as a solution for monitoring infrastructure. In particular, it makes sense to use it to evaluate your environment when planning deployment Veeam Backup & Replication.
What is in the free version? Many useful, for example:
- VM change reports and their configuration - it is recommended to use them for scheduling repositories
- performance reports (for the last 24 hours - free version restriction) and monitoring data
- monitoring functionality (including email notifications)
- New functionality for creating your own custom reports (one report - limiting the free version)
For a complete list of free and commercial versions, see here . If you decide to purchase a commercial version after becoming acquainted with the free version, you just need to enter the license key.
Read more:
- Article on Habré "How to take control of Virtual Machine Sprawl: 7 useful reports in the Veeam Availability Suite"
- Veeam ONE v8 page
- Overview of the functionality of VeeamONE v8
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/245287/
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