Cannot backup a W2k8 R2 VM running Oracle 11g DB

[frispete]

[#00200628}

Hi,

I would like to kindly ask here, if other veeam users ever tried to backup a VM with an Oracle 11g instance running inside?

DB installed on C:
DB table data running on D:
Both are vmdks of vSphere 5.1.

I just harvest a:
Failed to prepare guest for hot backup. Error: VSSControl: -2147212300 Backup job failed.
Cannot create a shadow copy of the volumes containing writer's data.
A VSS critical writer has failed. Writer name: [Oracle VSS Writer - SOLOPLAN].
Writer's state: [VSS_WS_FAILED_AT_PREPARE_BACKUP]. Error code: [0x800423f4].

What's strange here, this writer isn't listed in "vssadmin list writers" at all, nor in "vssadmin list providers".

I do ask myself, if Oracle is the bad guy here, or the company, that installed Oracle for their industry solution (Soloplan).

Any idea anybody?

Thanks in advance

[Vitaliy S.]

Hi Hans-Peter,

You definitely need to check that with Soloplan, as it looks like this VSS driver wasn't installed properly and right now is casing these issues. Btw, do you have any related messages in the Windows Event log?

Thanks!

[frispete]

Dear Vitaliy,

thanks for responding. I checked the event logs amply on this VM, but didn't find any related notice. Strange.
Since I kept the default of retrying 3 times, I can can see the the logins of B&R, but no follow ups. Hmm.

Will raise the pressure on Soloplan now..

Thanks,
Pete

[frispete]

Hi,

after Soloplan resolved the issue, it ran into another issue:

25.04.2013 14:56:12 :: Failed to prepare guest for hot backup. Error: RPC function call failed. Function name: [IsSnapshotInProgress]. Target machine: [172.16.24.17].
RPC error:Zugriff verweigert
Code: 5

Might be related to traffic on this machine, but I was under the impression, that a backup of a lightly busy system should be possible anyway.
Am I wrong?

[foggy]

Make sure you've specified account with local admin privileges on the target VM to perform application-aware image processing. Looks like you do not have enough permissions for that.

[frispete]

The latter issue was due to using a user@domain identification, instead of DOMAIN\user..

I was able to solve the topic issue with support of Soloplan.

Thank you for the fine support,
Pete

[m.novelli]

The latter issue was due to using a user@domain identification, instead of DOMAIN\user..

I was able to solve the topic issue with support of Soloplan.

Thank you for the fine support,
Pete

Hi, how did you solve the issue with VSS writer? I have a customer with Oracle and the same VSS error, but the Oracle DBA don't know how to handle Microsoft VSS (me too I don't know what to do... I'm a SQL Server guy )

Marco

[frispete]

Hi Marco,

Hi, how did you solve the issue with VSS writer?

Yes, partly by chance. I noticed, that the Oracle VSS service was started manually, and that resulted in above failures. After changing it to run automatically, it still failed here.
After stopping the service and keep it on starting automatic, it succeeded..

Try and call back

Cheers,
Pete

[m.novelli]

I've checked and the service is already set with automatic start with local service

Marco

[frispete]

Hm, too bad, but here's something else to check:

I have two other services related to VSS, one is called "Volume shadow copy" and the other "Microsoft shadow copy provider" (translated from german) both with start type: manually.

Try a few times, it took a few trials before it succeeded. Otherwise, provide the exact error as a starter

Cheers,
Pete

[m.novelli]

Yes the other VSS services are set correctly
My error is the same as your:

Failed to prepare guest for hot backup. Error: VSSControl: -2147212300 Backup job failed. Cannot create a shadow copy of the volumes containing writer's data. A VSS critical writer has failed. Writer name: [Oracle VSS Writer - PRDH2O]. Class ID: [{26d02976-b909-43ad-af7e-62a4f625e372}]. Instance ID: [{3b95b4fe-28e0-4340-b754-5cdd19602093}]. Writer's state: [VSS_WS_FAILED_AT_PREPARE_BACKUP]. Error code: [0x800423f4].
Error: VSSControl: -2147212300 Backup job failed. Cannot create a shadow copy of the volumes containing writer's data. A VSS critical writer has failed. Writer name: [Oracle VSS Writer - PRDH2O]. Class ID: [{26d02976-b909-43ad-af7e-62a4f625e372}]. Instance ID: [{3b95b4fe-28e0-4340-b754-5cdd19602093}]. Writer's state: [VSS_WS_FAILED_AT_PREPARE_BACKUP]. Error code: [0x800423f4].

[foggy]

Marco, as in case with OP, you also need to check with the VSS writer vendor (H2O, i guess) regarding this issue.

[frispete]

Well, the support didn't helped much. Playing with the services did..

We're using Oracle 11g (11.2.0).

Might be that your database is just too liquid to be backed up correctly..

[EvoTom]

We are having some issues with the Veeam and the Oracle VSS Writer. The job fails after preparing guest for hot backup. The error is "Unable to release guest. Error: Unfreeze error: Cannot create a shadow copy of the volumes containing writers data"

On the target server there is an error for VSS in the Event Log saying :

Volume Shadow Copy Service error: Unexpected error calling routine XML document is too long. hr = 0x80070018, The program issued a command but the command length is incorrect.
.

Operation:
Writer Modifying Modifying Backup Document

Context:
Execution Context: Requestor
Writer Instance ID: {D959B881-F426-4DA4-8266-495EABB8DBAB}

When you run vssadmin list writers for the 'Oracle VSS Writer - <ORACLE_SID>' the state is "[11] Failed" and the Last Error is "Retryable error".

In the alert log for Oracle you can see that the writer is putting the database into backup mode. Just trying to work out why the writer is failing.

[veremin]

It seems that you have an error that is similar to ones described in this topic. Try proposed solutions and see whether it helps.

Thanks.

[sebastian.mair]

We are having some issues with the Veeam and the Oracle VSS Writer. The job fails after preparing guest for hot backup. The error is "Unable to release guest. Error: Unfreeze error: Cannot create a shadow copy of the volumes containing writers data"

On the target server there is an error for VSS in the Event Log saying :

Volume Shadow Copy Service error: Unexpected error calling routine XML document is too long. hr = 0x80070018, The program issued a command but the command length is incorrect.

any news on this problem? i have the same problem on my w2k8 r2 running oracle 11g.

did you set the user to localsystem?

[veremin]

Have you already tried to check the state of the used VSS writer by running "vssadmin"? Also, is it by any chance vendor-specific writer? Thanks.