Backup SLES for vmware issues

[Vmagic]

Hi,

Hoping someone could help me out with some issues Im experiencing on a SLES.
There is a tailored SLES for vmware (http://www.vmware.com/products/sles-for ... rview.html) that I am using.

The fsfreeze command in my pre-freeze/post-thaw scripts is not working, and has been confirmed by vmware. I need to proceed with the install and configuration of software on this VM and would like to know if I should be worried about file / file system corruption if I only use the "VMware quiensce" option in Veeam and no pre-freeze/post-thaw scripts?

Thank you
/Gabriel

[Vitaliy S.]

Hi Gabriel,

As far as I remember VMware Tools quiescence does already provide some sort of consistency during VM snapshot operation, so I believe you should be fine. Btw, what applications are you running on this SLES VM?

Thanks!

[Vmagic]

Hi Vitaly,

Basically Im running a bunch of open source applications, Apache Solr (indexing app), mysql, etc.

There will be _alot_ of files on this VM, several million (large VM), so thats why I am a bit worried.

Regarding Mysql, I will have to dump the database prior to the snapshot/backup to get it consistent. I did a testrestore without using any pre-freeze/post-thaw scripts and mysql logs said

Regarding the filesystem (EXT-3), I also spoke with vmware and they basically said that the vmware sync driver is stable enough in the latest vmware tools version to provide a consistent filesystem during backups, even though it says experimental in capital letters.

If using the vmsync driver, should the vmware quiescence option in Veeam still be enabled. ?

Does anyone have vmsync experience on a EXT-3 filesystem?

Thanks

[veremin]

To use VMware Quiescence, firstly you should deploy VMware tools on each VM. The file system quiescence is performed by a SYNC driver (installed with VMware Tools). So, the answer for your question is “yes”, you should have vmware quiescence enabled.

Nevertheless, previously it has been reported, that sync driver is set off by default. Consequently, in order to have consistent backup of your Linux-based VM, you have to:

1) Enable VMware quiescence option in your job settings.
2) Manually enable vmsync driver during the first VMware Tools installation. Otherwise, if you’ve already installed VMWare Tools, re-run the VMware Tools
Configuration (vmware-config-tools.pl) and enter yes when it asks for the VMware FileSystem Sync Driver.

Even though this article is about version 6.1, you might find it as being useful for you, especially Part 3.

Hope this helps.
Thanks.

[veremin]

Another 2 cents regarding vmsync-driver, based on the discussion I’ve had with one Linux specialist.

Only recently has this driver been released to general public. Till that moment, even without such driver, backups of Linux-based VM were crash-consistent only. With this driver’s introduction, the situation changed slightly, so, today it’s highly-recommended to backup such VMs with vmsync driver.

Additionally, the most consistent backup of Linux-based VM is guaranteed when you’re backing up powered off VM.

Thanks.

[daphnis]

I'm curious to know others' findings with this vmsync driver. It is no longer listed as experimental in the scripted install, yet I can't really find any recent and official word from VMware on this. Does the use of this on Linux database servers tend to work fairly stable? Are there any applications or scenarios where it may not be best to enable?