Permanent Failover Grayed Out?

[jeffbourassa]

We are looking at using Replicas to migrate large VMs from one vcenter to another, like a datacenter migration but in the same network/server room.

We have setup replicas to the target location. We are planning to do a failover, then a permanent failover to complete the migration.

Is this a 2 step process? Currently the Permanent Failover is grayed out and not available, as per the docs on this.

Jeff

[Gostev]

Yes, it is a 2 step process. The idea is that you first perform the failover, and ensure that VMs are functioning correctly in the new data center. If yes, you execute Permanent Failover. If not, you still have an option to execute Undo Failover.

[rob_nikson]

Hello,

I have same problem: after performing failover the Permanent Failover is grayed out. Why? I can use the Permanent failover, only when I put it to the failover plan...Is that normal?

[foggy]

Hi Robert, are you sure that the failover stage is complete and the VM is ready for permanent failover? Feel free to contact our technical support to review your configuration for faster troubleshooting.

[rob_nikson]

Hello foggy,
I am not sure. I am working with Cloud Provider, and am replicating the VMs to the vCloud Director using IP Remapping. I have success for permanent failover if use "failoverplan", this is very strange.

[veremin]

What happens if you right-click on replica VM, will permanent failover be available there? And are you positive you have not performed permanent failover yet? Thanks!

[rob_nikson]

the replica is "runing" at the service provider vCloud. After 1st step - "failover" starts the replica on the vCD site: there is no option to right-click on the replica. So now I need permanent failover. I worke it out with "failover plan". After setting up a failover plan I am able to use the function "permanent failover". Not sure, this is the right way... But after doing this the replica will removed from veeam database and the job contains 0 objects.

[dcampregher]

Hello!

I'm with same question. Why the Permanent failover only is possible for VMs whithin a failover plan ? What is the reason for this limitation ? In the real world i will need create a failover plan for each VM at the crash moment

[veremin]

Because we think about two different failover scenarios:

- Partial site failover. One production VM becomes corrupted, but the rest of production site remains operative. In this case you need to switch temporarily to replica VM and communicate it via VPN tunnel established between two sites. As this is temporary operation, there is no permanent failover available. Also, there is a question - what should be done to VPN tunnel, if partial site failover is finalized for particular VM

- Full site failover. The whole production site goes offline for any reason. You run the cloud failover plan and perform full site failover, which doesn't look like a temporary operation and so the is permanent failover available

Side question - are you using vCD Cloud Connect Replication or not?

Thanks!

[ftravinsky]

Just stumbled on the same issue in B&R 9.5u4.

This behavior contradicts with Documentation for both 9.5 and 10.0:
https://helpcenter.veeam.com/archive/ba ... lover.html
The Help Center states opposite:
"The finalizing options for a planned failover are similar to those of an unplanned failover: undoing failover, permanent failover or failback."

I'd use Veeam for a purpose of VM migration to IaaS-cloud, but finalize button is not available
I'm doing Cloud Connect Replication to vCD.

[ftravinsky]

Just tried a Failover Plan feature.
Although Permanent Failover button becomes available, it’s no use for my migration purpose.
Cause all these Failover Plans don’t do Planned Failover: they just spin up replicas, doing nothing (no power down and extra sync) to source VM, which is a guaranteed way to the split-brain.

Currently I compare Veeam Cloud Connect Replication features vs VMware vCloud Availability: last one allows Planned Failover + Commit.

Please, enable the Permanent Failover button, as Help Center initially suggested.
“Try planned failover” checkbox for a Failover Plan would be a nice option too.

[veremin]

I think you might approach the concept of Cloud Failover Plans a bit differently from what it's been designed for.

Cloud Failover Plan is specifically for tenants that needs to switch quickly to replicas when disaster hits production environment.

In this case there are no production workloads available, no need to check them, shutdown and do the last sync - each of these steps slows the much needed failover process down.

So, if you describe you issue in a bit more details, probably, we can suggest alternative to Cloud Failover Plan (that apparently does not suite your current needs).

Thanks!

[ftravinsky]

Veeam Cloud Connect offers a solution to fully control and easily migrate on premises data to highest standard cloud environments

I see no easy one-way-to-the-cloud migration here. As the Permanent Failover button is greyed out, I can't finish the migration process.

[veremin]

You can run Planned Failover manually:

- Run replication job
- Power of source VMs
- Run replication job
- Run failover plan
- Run permanent failover

We understand that it might not be that easy and convenient, but still it might be worth trying.

Thank you for the feedback, we will see how experience can be improved in one of the next product releases.

[Limey_005]

I just ran into this with v12.

I did a planned failover per the documentation, expecting to see the permanent failover option available after.
However, this was not the case. I created a failover plan and added the VM's to it. This still did not make the permanent failover option available.

At this point, I tried to 'start' the failover plan hoping it would already see the running VM's. It gave a warning about them already running.

After this, the Permanent Failover option was available and allowed pressing the button. It then successfully completed the Permanent Failover process!!

Hopefully, this helps someone out who is stuck with a greyed-out permanent failover option!

[ftravinsky]

Thank you for the feedback, we will see how experience can be improved in one of the next product releases.

Please dig this issue out of 3 year old backlog. Topic is a common scenario with workflow currently broken.

[veremin]

Just to be sure - are we still talking about one-time migration of tenant VM to SP cloud infrastructure?

If so, it can be done with the use of a Failover Plan coupled with permanent failover, as to the implementation of something more robust, we've received too few requests to afford to spend the R&D resources on it (especially while more demanding features are waiting in the line).

Thanks!

[ftravinsky]

We do talk about one-time migration, as your marketing team promised that working:

Veeam Cloud Connect offers a solution to fully control and easily migrate on premises data to highest standard cloud environments

Workaround scenario posted here is fine, it just requires a Documentation article.

Or better straiten out the GUI (ungrey the button) = R&D resources. Please, just make sure it is still in the backlog.

[veremin]

Sure, we keep track of requests generated by our customers, it just happens that some features receive more demand and thus get first to be implemented. Thanks!