Veeam Support NetApp SnapMirror Active Sync

[MarcelM]

Hello *,

what are the detailed supported features and limitations regarding veeam's integration with NetApp SnapMirror Active Sync?
After reading the veeam docs it is a little bit unclear what is supported/possible and what not:

https://helpcenter.veeam.com/docs/backu ... ml?ver=120

Veeam Backup & Replication does not support the listed replication features of the secondary storage arrays. However, you can use volumes with these configured features as sources for backup.
- SnapMirror Active-Sync (formerly SnapMirror Business Continuity (SM-BC))

Will it be possible to replicate data/snapshots of a SM-AS source volume via snapmirror async to another netapp backup system with veeam (snapmirror/snapvault udate via secondary target)?
So SM-AS source has two relationships:

1.) Replication with SM-AS (not Veeam integrated / out of veeam scope)

2.) Replication with SnapMirror Async to third netapp system (Veeam VMware Backup Job with secondary target as snapmirror/snapvault update).

Thanks in advance!

Marcel

[rennerstefan]

Hi Marcel,

For us it's all about the relationship you configure. We won't detect and be able to work with sm-as but we will be able to work with regular relationships. So your 2) should work as long as NetApp supports it.

As I don't have access to a lab right now can't guarantee it.

Thanks

[MarcelM]

Hello Stefan,

thanks for your reply.
Is it possible for you to test the configuration in a lab?
It would be very nice to officially know how veeam behaves and what is possible without any errors.

[foggy]

We verified that Active-Sync relationships don't affect the current functionality of Veeam B&R in the past.

[Cyril]

Hello,

Snapmirror Active Sync seems supported. I am testing a backup with an SMAS and i got this error :
Failed to create snapshot for volume VOL_1_dest Error:
Snapshot copy create failed on volume "VOL_1_dest" in Vserver "svm01".
Snapshot copy create operation is not supported on destination of SnapMirror active sync relationship with policy-type "automated-failover-duplex".

Du you have any informations ?
Thank you.

[foggy]

As mentioned above and in a user guide, Active-Sync relationships themselves are not supported - Veeam B&R is not able to detect and use them to create snapshots on the destination side. What you can do though, is use volumes in such relationships as source volumes for backup.

[MatzeB]

Hi foggy, just to get correctly...a a collegue of mine asked me "hey look at veeam the KB, Snapmirror Active-Sync is possible".

Veeam Backup & Replication does not support the listed replication features of the secondary storage arrays. However, you can use volumes with these configured features as sources for backup.

- MetroCluster
- SVM-DR
- Synchronous SnapMirror
- SnapMirror Active-Sync (formerly SnapMirror Business Continuity (SM-BC))

https://helpcenter.veeam.com/docs/backu ... ml?ver=120

I understand that Veeam can't trigger this technologies to replicate, but the article says it's possible as source. In Case of Metrocluster and SVM-DR i know creating a storage snapshot on source (maybe temporary AUX...) is possible. Is this also working for the others? Don't have a Lab System at the moment. So only "source snapshot for backup from Storage snapshots?

Regards
Matze

[foggy]

Hi Matthias, yes, even though such relationships are not detected (so replication is not possible), they don't affect the functionality that doesn't need them (like creating a snapshot as a source for backup).

[MarcelM]

We openend Veeam Support - Case # 07624082 to get more information and asked for validation but we instead only were asked to post in the forums again.

From our tests we can confirm that an additional async SnapMirror relationship between the SnapMirror Active-Sync volume and a third volume will be discovered and updated by VEEAM B&R but unfortunately it‘s not officially supported.
What’s also missing is, that backup snapshots lack the possibility of SnapMirror Labels and thereby will not be replicated by Active-Sync, so that backup snapshots will only be present on one site of the storage solution. This could be easily solved if VEEAM would set SnapMirror Labels on the snapshots because Active-Sync would then replicate the snapshots automatically:

NetApp Documentation:

- Snapshot Replication: SnapMirror active sync replicates snapshots from the source to the destination, ensuring that the data remains synchronized between the primary and secondary sites.

- Snapshot Labels: To replicate snapshots successfully, ensure that the policy labels in both the source and destination clusters match. SnapMirror active sync will not replicate snapshots by default unless a rule with a SnapMirror label is added to the predefined AutomatedFailOver policy and the snapshots are created with that label.

I can find forum posts where Snapshot Labels have been requested by customers in 2021…veeam-backup-replication-f2/feature-req ... 71347.html

Can we please submit a feature request for this solution?

Regards Marcel & colleagues

[rennerstefan]

Hi Marcel,

thanks for the details and the follow up.
I can confirm the feature request exists and we added your input to it.
Unfortunately there is no ETA at this point when it may get solved.

Thanks
Stefan

[vee789]

From our tests we can confirm that an additional async SnapMirror relationship between the SnapMirror Active-Sync volume and a third volume will be discovered and updated by VEEAM B&R but unfortunately it‘s not officially supported.
What’s also missing is, that backup snapshots lack the possibility of SnapMirror Labels and thereby will not be replicated by Active-Sync, so that backup snapshots will only be present on one site of the storage solution.

Does anyone have new insights into those two points?
- "unfortunately it‘s not officially supported" -> Was/Is this unsupported from Veeam or from NetApp and why was/is it unsupported?
- lack of the replication of storage snapshots (triggered by VBR) between the two SM-as clusters (also named "snapshots symmetry")

[MatzeB]

Hi,
from all what i currently know we have two topics:

- We currently wait for the new Linux v13 NetApp Plugin based on RestAPI for ASA R2 Support
- While the Plugin will support this logic - for ASA R2 - it will NOT support ActiveSync Policy in the first release

What you can do today is traditional streaming backup using NBD or HotAdd or depending on the protocol map the LUN via ISCSI/FC to a proxy for direct SAN access like you can do with "any" blockstorage. Backup "from Storage Snapshots" is not possible.
You can't use snapshot replication or creation scenarios. I recently had a customer setup with ASA with active sync, some things "accidentally" works - but still not supported - and some things only work until you do a storage failover to the other side - so not useful for production.

All this informations are not officialy verified, more self research based

Matze

[vee789]

Hello Matze

Thank you for your insights.

> We currently wait for the new Linux v13 NetApp Plugin based on RestAPI
Yes, we are eagerly waiting for that as well to be able to leverage NetApp storage integration with the Veeam Software Appliance (for the integration AFF/FAS in general, not so much for ASA).

My setup does not involve an ASA, just "normal" ONTAP AFF/FAS systems. Therefore, any ASA limitation is not an issue for me.

From what I have heard from co-workers, Veeam can create storage snapshots on a primary AFF SM-as system and those snapshots are also getting replicated to the secondary backup system. But the snapshots on the SM-as system do only exist on the primary/master volume and not on the mirror volume. So there is no snapshot symmetry between the two SM-as systems.
Since ONTAP 9.15, an SM-as failover does also adjust the SnapVault between primary and secondary system. But it was not yet tested if snapshots will be created by Veeam on the previously "mirror volume" and if the SnapVault update via Veeam does still work.

What are your insights on such a setup or is your experience mainly with ASA systems?