I'm setting up NMM to back up an instance of MS-SQL in a clustered environment, and am receiving 'Internal Error' when the physical host goes to run nsrsnap_vss_save.exe
The client is running NW 8.0SP2 with NMM 2.4.1 build 92. The NetWorker server is 8.0SP2.
The config checker comes back with four failures, which are detailed below:
1) NETWORK_ADAPTER_STATUS - Network adapters which can be used for NMM backup operations, are not detected.
I'm not sure why this one appears. There are two teamed interfaces on the machine, one on one network, the other on another network. Both are pingable from the backup server, but the client name and server network interface are configured such that only one of those interfaces is used for backup.
2) VSS_SERVICE_STATUS - Unable to find status for service "vss".
I verified that Volume Shadow Copy Service is running on the machine.
3) NSREXECD_SERVICE_STATUS - Unable to find status for service 'nsrexecd'
I verified that the NetWorker client service is running, and that the nsrexecd process is running.
4) SQL_SERVER_WRITER_STATUS
I verified that 'SqlServerWriter' and 'System Writer' are running.
Interestingly, 'nsrsnap_vss_save -? -c {virtual client name}' returns virtually nothing. It starts off saying 'List of valid saveset entries for APPLICATIONS', then 'Initializing data to display', then creates the RM deposit path. Then after several moments, it comes back and says nsrsnap_vss_save exited with success.
When I run a backup, it gets as far as saying that 'APPLICATIONS:\SqlServerWriter' is a valid saveset, then the next line is that NMM failed to back up successfully, followed by 'internal error'. Thats it.
I can successfully run file level backups of the filesystem on the two physical machines, using nsrsnap_vss_save - so I'd think that means that anything like firewall, permissions (outside of SQL), and name resolution are fine. Unfortunately, I just can't find any information on what 'internal error' means, and why the physical host generates that error when running nsrsnap_vss_save.exe.
I've verified that there are sufficient NMM licenses. In fact, this was originally appearing during a phase when NetWorker was in eval mode.
Also, we found an issue with the Windows OS that the cluster was running on - the WMI stack was messed up. When we moved the SQL instance to the other host on the cluster, all those errors in the config checker went away. So now the config checker comes back clean.
Regarding name resolution - that is typically one of the first places I look as well, since it can be so insidious. This environment is complex in that there are multiple networks, and the backup server is sitting on all the networks, but with a unique FQDN for each network it sits on. Name resolution is done via DNS, and always specifying the FQDN of whatever it is being communicated with. I assumed that with the file system backup using the NMM having been successful, that name resolution is valid, so I didn't go back to thoroughly double check that. I have had situations with previous NMM versions where there were issues with it dealing with a FQDN that differs from the return value of the 'hostname' command - so I suppose it is not inconceivable that there is something that must be configured uniquely here for the module to work in this environment with SQL.
The thing that is odd is that even when nsrsnap_vss_save runs with -D5 or -D9, everything looks hunky dorey until it just says 'internal error', and then bombs out. Before that, I can see it doing all kinds of name resolution checks, determining which name to use for data transfer, validating the name of the save set being used, etc. Then, just 'internal error'. No indication as to why. It's so abrupt that I'd think it ran across a bad piece of code or something, as opposed to a misconfiguration that would more gracefully cause it to fail (and presumably with an indication as to what happened).
The name of the client is the name of the SQL cluster, so that is fine - although in my troubleshooting I did attempt the name of the windows cluster, but it bailed out long before the failure seen when specifying the SQL cluster name.
The SQL instance name is different from the cluster name.
ottov
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Posted September 4th, 2013 00:00
Are the NMM licenses OK?
You need one license for each Physical server.