Data Recovery attempts to back up each virtual machine in a defined backup job once a day during its backup window. If the backup timeframe for the backup window passes while the backup is in progress, the backup is stopped. The backup restarts when the backup window opens. As long as you have a sufficient backup window and a performing infrastructure (speed and capacity) then this is a great solution as the recovery time is extremely quick

This is the fourth post in a series about leveraging virtualization for the purpose of hosting an Agile PLM environment. This post walks you through the setup of VMware's Data Recovery appliance and plugin so your efforts aren't wasted. I am basing the series on a development instance of Agile PLM 9.3.0.2 that I need for testing. Thus far we have looked at:

• "Going Virtual with Agile PLM… Don’t Be Scared (Part 1)" which provided a series overview and included the first screen cast on how to create a virtual machine template of Windows Server 2008 SP1
• "Going Virtual with Agile PLM… Provisioning and Preparing the VM (Part 2)" which created our working virtual machine and got the operating system all ready for the installation of the Oracle stack
• "Going Virtual with Agile PLM… Installing the Agile Stack (Part 3)" covered installing the entire Agile PLM 9.3.0.2 stack along with AutoVue 20

Keep in mind I am installing this virtual machine for testing and development purposes. We do a lot of Agile Engineering Collaboration work as well as custom development against Agile. The settings I choose may not be appropriate for your environment.

Installing VMware Data Recovery

Here are the main things that need to happen with VMware DR and management from vCenter Server:

1. Install the DR applicance (OVF)
2. Install the vCenter Client plugin. This creates a section on the home screen called "Solutions and Applications" with an item in it for DR
3. Configure the DR application with a backup schedule, retention, destination, etc.

Install the Appliance

Note that the instructions here are for the DR version that ships with vSphere 4.0. If you are using the version that ships with 4.1 things have changed a bit. You'll have the option to choose thin or thick provisioned virtual machine and the option for networking has been removed. Instead, networking preference is set by going to the console for the virtual machine and setting it interally.

1. (Optional) Create a folder for operational type of virtual machine, we use "operations". To do this, right click on the parent folder and select "New Folder" then assign a name to it.
2. In vCenter, navigate to File -> Deploy OVF Template
3. Browse to the VMWareDataRecovery_OVFxx.ovf file downloaded from VMWare and select it
4. Continue through the wizard assigning a name to the virtual machine and the logical folder for it to reside in (such as "operations" created above)
5. Next select the host and cluster, then the datastore
6. Select the networking type, we opted for DHCP
7. Then continue until you are finished with the import
8. Start the virtual machine

Install the vCenter Plugin

The plugin is a CLIENT SIDE tool that connects to the DR ovf imported above. Every workstation that will run the vSphere client and have a need to configure DR will need to have this plugin installed, fortunately it is very simple.

1. Start the VMwareDataRecoveryPlugin.msi downloaded from VMware on the desired workstation that already has the vSphere client installed
2. Agree to the terms and conditions
3. Restart the vSphere client if its open

If you navigate to "Home" in the vSphere client home page, you will notice a new section called "Solutions and Applications" with the VMware Data Recover plugin.

Configure the Backup/DR

1. In the address bar of the vSphere Client, select Solutions and Applications > VMware Data Recovery
2. Highlight the VMware Data Recovery VM in the tree on the left and click the connect button in the plugin
3. If promopted for credentials, enter them
4. The first time you connect, you should be prompted to run the getting started wizard, if not you can start this manually by selecting the configuration tab, then the Getting Started Wizard link
5. Enter the credentials the system is to use to perform the backup
6. Select the storage location for the backup. You have the option to add a network share such as a NAS.
7. Then confirm the information (in the video, we sleect the checkbox to create a new backup job after completion)

Creating the backup job

1. Give the job a name
2. Select the datacenter, hosts, and/or VMs you want to have backed up
3. Select the datastore
4. Select any times to exclude (hours of business operation). Keep in mind that VMware will attempt to back up the selected machines EVERY DAY. If this is not desired, you can create more than one job and select specific days for the job to run! The first time VMware backs up, it will take a while. Our bare bones Agile install took a little over 5 hours. VMware DR features deduplication and incremental backups. The same bare bones backup only took 8 minutes the next day. This is an ENTIRE VM, not just a filesystem ... I think that is an impressive time.
5. Select your retention policy based on your corporate policy
6. Select finish to save the backup job

Here's the screencast, enjoy!

Well, what do you think?