Easy to copy - quickly recover
Solutions in the field of backup and data recovery are needed as large companies, and representatives of small and medium businesses. However, the choice of ways to use such solutions depends on the size of the organization and the challenges it faces.
Hewlett Packard Enterprise's flagship backup solution is HPE Data Protector . This product has a solid, almost 30-year history. Developed by Apollo in 1987 under the name Omniback Network Backup System, after Apollo joined Hewlett-Packard in 1989, it developed for a long time and in 2002 received a new name - HP Data Protector. Despite the venerable age of the product, HP, and now Hewlett Packard Enterprise, is constantly working to improve it, reflecting all the technological changes taking place in the software world and in the IT industry as a whole.
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Briefly describe the main features of Data Protector, focusing on the most important and useful innovations implemented by developers in recent years.
The infrastructure unit of backup (cell) consists of several components - the control server and client parts. The control server part can be placed on any operating system: Microsoft Windows, Linux and HPUX - Unix in the HPE version. The control part has a database containing information about the entire backup process: what equipment it was used for, what was reserved and when, etc. HPE Data Protector control servers can be clustered to provide disaster recovery, and centralized support is also supported. their management, which is especially useful and relevant for organizations with a geographically distributed structure.
The client part is represented by integration agents Disk Agent and Application Agent, which transfer data to the Media Agent, which backs it up to standard disk arrays, network devices, physical and virtual tape libraries, as well as specialized deduplication storage systems. Data Protector supports both HPE StoreOnce proprietary storage systems and many third-party hardware solutions. Moreover, this is not about simple data placement, but about integration, which allows, for example, to perform distributed deduplication, centralized management of backup blocks and much more.
Cloud resources can also be used as backup resources, not only public clouds, but HPE Helion, a specialized solution based on the open platform OpenStack, which allows the customer to build their own private cloud.
Management HPE Data Protector is performed through a simple and convenient graphical interface, as well as using the command line, and depending on current tasks and user preferences, you can switch from one method to another.
Separately, it is worthwhile to dwell on some important functions implemented in Data Protector in recent years. So, in the 8th version of the product, released in 2013, a completely updated internal database appeared, which is based on the PostgreSQL DBMS. Thanks to the use of a powerful industrial relational DBMS, HPE Data Protector’s work has accelerated significantly, and besides, the limits of the solution by the number of supported devices, simultaneous sessions, etc. have increased many times. Thus, even large companies with extensive corporate IT infrastructure now it may well be enough to have one backup cell, and several cells are needed by those distributed organizations whose divisions or departments are either not connected at all scarlet or enjoying an unstable connection.
One of the key features of HPE Data Protector is integration with the HPE Store Once storage system where backups are stored. This integration allows deduplication of data at various parts of the IT infrastructure. First, on the site of their creation, that is, on the client side. Of course, this will lead to an increase in the load on client equipment, so there is an option when deduplication is performed first on a dedicated server, and only then the deduplicated data is transferred to storage. Finally, deduplication can be performed immediately on the HPE Store Once storage system. All three options can be used within the same backup infrastructure, switching from one to the other using the Data Protector, if necessary.
As for application backups, HPE Data Protector integrates with most software solutions and databases from Microsoft, VMware, SAP, Oracle, IBM Lotus, Sybase, etc. Integration is done using application agents. Since all the fine-tuning of the backup of these systems is done directly in Data Protector, the work of the system administrators and IT specialists responsible for backups is greatly simplified - no need to spend time setting up backup options in each application.
To protect virtual environments, HPE Data Protector integrates with the most popular hypervisors, VMware and Microsoft Hyper-V, although the basic copying capabilities of other virtualization solutions are present. At the same time, both copying and restoration can be carried out on the basis of both LAN and SAN networks. In addition, a few months ago, a separate product appeared in the Hewlett-Packard Enterprise product portfolio for backing up virtual environments - HPE VM Explorer. This affordable and simple solution may well be in demand by small and medium-sized businesses.
However, copying is only half the battle, because data needs to be quickly restored. By integrating HPE Data Protector with multiple devices and environments, including cloud, you can provide a combination of different levels of recovery. The analogy with the accommodation of passengers and their belongings on the plane is relevant here. There is a business class, and somewhere else the first, as the highest, then economy class and, finally, the luggage compartment. In our case, the more important the data, the faster they can recover, but the recovery process will have a corresponding price.
The fastest and most expensive level is an instant recovery from hardware snapshots (system snapshots) on disk arrays. Such hardware snapshot is created on the disk simultaneously with the backup and stored there. Features HPE Data Protector allow you to organize a rotation snapshots on the disk array and get several points to recover. This will be useful when you need to “pick up” a critical database from a backup copy in a matter of seconds: you do not have to restore anything in the usual way, it will just switch volumes on the disk array.
Virtual machines also do not need to be restored in the classical way, since they can be run directly from a backup, and then transferred in the background to the main disk.
For a number of systems, the so-called granular restoration is provided, allowing to restore certain elements, rather than the entire system. In particular, in VMware virtual machines, you can restore individual directories and files, and in Microsoft Exchange and SharePoint - separate objects: a letter, a file, etc.
Many customers will want to use the recovery function on “bare metal”, that is, on an absolutely clean server, without a pre-installed OS and other software. To do this, you need to prepare in advance a bootable ISO-image of the server, placing on it critical software that may be required for quick recovery in case of serious hardware malfunctions.
Starting with version 7, HPE Data Protector supports backup monitoring, implemented through integration with IT infrastructure monitoring tools such as HPE Operations Manager and Microsoft System Center Operations Manager. At the same time, a new module HPE Backup Navigator, responsible for analytics backup. For example, he will tell you when this or that backup device is full, the quota on the disk array is over, etc. This tool is capable of generating over 70 different types of reports, and IT professionals can present them to management as a justification for upgrading and expanding. backup hardware infrastructure. It is important to note that HPE Backup Navigator works with its own database, so its use will not entail additional burden on HPE Data Protector.
A useful addition is the new built-in task scheduler, which sorts backups according to priorities. Thus, more important sessions will be the first to gain access to the freed device. In addition, the scheduler displays a list of failed backup sessions and automatically launches them.
In conclusion, a few words about the licensing policy. HPE Data Protector has two licensing schemes - by component and by the amount of protected data. The component licensing scheme allows you to select a list of licenses individually for a specific infrastructure, taking into account the number of necessary integrations with application servers, used tape drives, disk devices and other options. The licensing scheme for the volume of protected data makes it possible to simplify the selection of HPE Data Protector licenses by calculating them for the total volume of protected data. This or that licensing scheme may be more profitable for different infrastructures; therefore, it is recommended to request settlement under both schemes - this is easy to do, since HPE has a Russian questionnaire questionnaire, based on the results of which HPE specialists or their partners can do the calculation.
Hewlett Packard Enterprise's flagship backup solution is HPE Data Protector . This product has a solid, almost 30-year history. Developed by Apollo in 1987 under the name Omniback Network Backup System, after Apollo joined Hewlett-Packard in 1989, it developed for a long time and in 2002 received a new name - HP Data Protector. Despite the venerable age of the product, HP, and now Hewlett Packard Enterprise, is constantly working to improve it, reflecting all the technological changes taking place in the software world and in the IT industry as a whole.
')
Briefly describe the main features of Data Protector, focusing on the most important and useful innovations implemented by developers in recent years.
The infrastructure unit of backup (cell) consists of several components - the control server and client parts. The control server part can be placed on any operating system: Microsoft Windows, Linux and HPUX - Unix in the HPE version. The control part has a database containing information about the entire backup process: what equipment it was used for, what was reserved and when, etc. HPE Data Protector control servers can be clustered to provide disaster recovery, and centralized support is also supported. their management, which is especially useful and relevant for organizations with a geographically distributed structure.
The client part is represented by integration agents Disk Agent and Application Agent, which transfer data to the Media Agent, which backs it up to standard disk arrays, network devices, physical and virtual tape libraries, as well as specialized deduplication storage systems. Data Protector supports both HPE StoreOnce proprietary storage systems and many third-party hardware solutions. Moreover, this is not about simple data placement, but about integration, which allows, for example, to perform distributed deduplication, centralized management of backup blocks and much more.
Cloud resources can also be used as backup resources, not only public clouds, but HPE Helion, a specialized solution based on the open platform OpenStack, which allows the customer to build their own private cloud.
Management HPE Data Protector is performed through a simple and convenient graphical interface, as well as using the command line, and depending on current tasks and user preferences, you can switch from one method to another.
Separately, it is worthwhile to dwell on some important functions implemented in Data Protector in recent years. So, in the 8th version of the product, released in 2013, a completely updated internal database appeared, which is based on the PostgreSQL DBMS. Thanks to the use of a powerful industrial relational DBMS, HPE Data Protector’s work has accelerated significantly, and besides, the limits of the solution by the number of supported devices, simultaneous sessions, etc. have increased many times. Thus, even large companies with extensive corporate IT infrastructure now it may well be enough to have one backup cell, and several cells are needed by those distributed organizations whose divisions or departments are either not connected at all scarlet or enjoying an unstable connection.
One of the key features of HPE Data Protector is integration with the HPE Store Once storage system where backups are stored. This integration allows deduplication of data at various parts of the IT infrastructure. First, on the site of their creation, that is, on the client side. Of course, this will lead to an increase in the load on client equipment, so there is an option when deduplication is performed first on a dedicated server, and only then the deduplicated data is transferred to storage. Finally, deduplication can be performed immediately on the HPE Store Once storage system. All three options can be used within the same backup infrastructure, switching from one to the other using the Data Protector, if necessary.
As for application backups, HPE Data Protector integrates with most software solutions and databases from Microsoft, VMware, SAP, Oracle, IBM Lotus, Sybase, etc. Integration is done using application agents. Since all the fine-tuning of the backup of these systems is done directly in Data Protector, the work of the system administrators and IT specialists responsible for backups is greatly simplified - no need to spend time setting up backup options in each application.
To protect virtual environments, HPE Data Protector integrates with the most popular hypervisors, VMware and Microsoft Hyper-V, although the basic copying capabilities of other virtualization solutions are present. At the same time, both copying and restoration can be carried out on the basis of both LAN and SAN networks. In addition, a few months ago, a separate product appeared in the Hewlett-Packard Enterprise product portfolio for backing up virtual environments - HPE VM Explorer. This affordable and simple solution may well be in demand by small and medium-sized businesses.
However, copying is only half the battle, because data needs to be quickly restored. By integrating HPE Data Protector with multiple devices and environments, including cloud, you can provide a combination of different levels of recovery. The analogy with the accommodation of passengers and their belongings on the plane is relevant here. There is a business class, and somewhere else the first, as the highest, then economy class and, finally, the luggage compartment. In our case, the more important the data, the faster they can recover, but the recovery process will have a corresponding price.
The fastest and most expensive level is an instant recovery from hardware snapshots (system snapshots) on disk arrays. Such hardware snapshot is created on the disk simultaneously with the backup and stored there. Features HPE Data Protector allow you to organize a rotation snapshots on the disk array and get several points to recover. This will be useful when you need to “pick up” a critical database from a backup copy in a matter of seconds: you do not have to restore anything in the usual way, it will just switch volumes on the disk array.
Virtual machines also do not need to be restored in the classical way, since they can be run directly from a backup, and then transferred in the background to the main disk.
For a number of systems, the so-called granular restoration is provided, allowing to restore certain elements, rather than the entire system. In particular, in VMware virtual machines, you can restore individual directories and files, and in Microsoft Exchange and SharePoint - separate objects: a letter, a file, etc.
Many customers will want to use the recovery function on “bare metal”, that is, on an absolutely clean server, without a pre-installed OS and other software. To do this, you need to prepare in advance a bootable ISO-image of the server, placing on it critical software that may be required for quick recovery in case of serious hardware malfunctions.
Starting with version 7, HPE Data Protector supports backup monitoring, implemented through integration with IT infrastructure monitoring tools such as HPE Operations Manager and Microsoft System Center Operations Manager. At the same time, a new module HPE Backup Navigator, responsible for analytics backup. For example, he will tell you when this or that backup device is full, the quota on the disk array is over, etc. This tool is capable of generating over 70 different types of reports, and IT professionals can present them to management as a justification for upgrading and expanding. backup hardware infrastructure. It is important to note that HPE Backup Navigator works with its own database, so its use will not entail additional burden on HPE Data Protector.
A useful addition is the new built-in task scheduler, which sorts backups according to priorities. Thus, more important sessions will be the first to gain access to the freed device. In addition, the scheduler displays a list of failed backup sessions and automatically launches them.
In conclusion, a few words about the licensing policy. HPE Data Protector has two licensing schemes - by component and by the amount of protected data. The component licensing scheme allows you to select a list of licenses individually for a specific infrastructure, taking into account the number of necessary integrations with application servers, used tape drives, disk devices and other options. The licensing scheme for the volume of protected data makes it possible to simplify the selection of HPE Data Protector licenses by calculating them for the total volume of protected data. This or that licensing scheme may be more profitable for different infrastructures; therefore, it is recommended to request settlement under both schemes - this is easy to do, since HPE has a Russian questionnaire questionnaire, based on the results of which HPE specialists or their partners can do the calculation.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/311928/
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