Cloud Backup - Commvault v11

/ photo by Robert Scoble CC

Constantly changing requirements for cloud infrastructure lead to the need to work out new business models and create architectural solutions to increase the level of data security and improve infrastructure manageability.
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Today we want to talk about Commvault v11 - a solution for managing data and organizing data backup and recovery to the cloud of an IaaS provider. We will discuss the components of the platform and consider possible scenarios for using Commvault.

Commvault v11 is a software and hardware-independent platform that performs the following tasks: backing up data and virtual environments, monitoring virtual infrastructure, archiving data, databases, etc.

The main components of Commvault v11 are CommServe, ContentStore, Data Agent and Media Agent. CommServe is the management server, and ContentStore is a single set of storage resources, which include storage systems, cloud storage, file servers, and tape drives. The name of the Data Agent is an agent for applications and file systems capable of compressing, deduplicating, and encrypting data at the source, and as for the Media Agent component, it is the agent that receives the data stream from the Data Agent.

According to the supplier, in Commvault v11 the approach to data protection and management remained the same, however, new possibilities appeared and the functionality expanded.

The concept of Role Based Security has been introduced. Role-based security goes beyond the limitations of traditional users and security groups.

Now the following entities appeared in the service:

• User or user group;
• Roles - define a set of permissions without binding to a specific user or group of users;
• An object is a component that binds a user (group) to the corresponding role.

Such a division allows the user (or group of users) to have different permissions depending on what his role is in the activity of a particular object.



Suppose a user needs permissions to perform backup and restore on a file server and permission to restore mail server data. In this case, the user is associated with the file server object, and the “restore” / “backup” role is defined for it. Then the same user is bound to the mail server object and gets the “restore” role.

Further, it should be noted that the concept of “indexing a new generation v2” has been introduced in Commvault v11. The new functionality reduces the size of the indexed files stored in the cache and repositories.



Indexing v2 works like this: indexed data is placed into the index database. One index database manages the records of all objects within the backup set. Therefore, all subclients, and therefore all data sets for backup and settings within the same backup set, are recorded in the same index database.

The third feature of the new version is “content-based deduplication”. Commvault supports deduplication based on the contents of databases and logs. Application databases often use built-in compression, which compresses blocks before Commvault generates the signatures of these blocks. Compression at the application level results in non-consecutive blocks being deduplicated several times when starting a backup.



Using Commvault compression during the backup instead of being compressed by the application, the application agent determines that the database backup process is running, and then "signs" the uncompressed data. After signing the data block is compressed. This leads to an improvement in the deduplication rate.

It is also known that the log files are constantly updated with new information and replace the old data with new ones. Since this is an ongoing process, deduplication does not benefit in terms of disk space savings. However, during the start of the process of backing up logs, the application agent is able to determine that there is a backup of log files in front of it, in which case it will not put a signature, which significantly saves memory and processor resources.

In addition, the changes affected the policies of storage, disk and tape libraries, also appeared a new interface in the form of an administrative console with support for virtualization. Additionally, it became possible to manage Microsoft Hyper-V hypervisor-based virtual machines and password-protect files and shared folders. You can read about these and other features of Commvault v11 in the official manuals ( here and here ).

Commvault solutions help you cope with growing business requirements, saving organizations from excessive costs and complicated processes. It is not for nothing that, according to the Gartner results, the Commvault solution is in the quadrant of the leaders in the study of Enterprise backup and integrated appliance for the fifth time in a row. Next, let's look at the three main scenarios for using Commvault.

Backup or archive to the cloud

There are several possible options. The first is offsite storage, when you don’t need to restore data to the cloud, but if necessary, this option is provided. The second is a direct connection to the storage facility, and the third is the situation when the target storage facility is provided by a public IaaS provider or service provider as part of the BaaS service.

Disaster Recovery in the Cloud

When using the Off-site Storage Requirement & Cloud DR Site scenario, the cloud infrastructure is used only when DR events occur, which saves time and money (as part of the IaaS, DRaaS service).

In the case of a VM Provisioning script, the client uses its own tools to deploy virtual machines in the cloud until they are restored.

Cloud protection

Commvault v11 provides recovery of active workloads and data within an external provider cloud. Among possible usage scenarios, data protection in the context of workloads should be highlighted. In this case, active workflows (Production, Dev / Test) are protected within the existing IaaS-cloud.

Another scenario is copying to another cloud or “onpremis”, when full data mobility is provided and replication is performed to a geographically remote site of an IaaS provider, a site of various IaaS providers or back to the customer site.

In conclusion, I would like to add that the Commvault v11 platform provides a unified approach to data management, which is one of the main business assets of companies. Using flexible integrated data management, Commvault v11 is responsible for organizing backup and disaster recovery to the service provider's cloud, ensures the protection of cloud sites and controls the workflows that take place in the cloud.