PowerProtect Data Manager 19.14 Network-Attached Storage User Guide

Add a centralized protection policy for NAS assets

Create a protection policy that backs up NAS assets on a schedule. NAS supports both synthetic-full backups and full backup types, and they can have different retention values. However, you must add a synthetic-full backup before you can add a full backup.

1. Log in to the PowerProtect Data Manager user interface as a user with the Administrator role.
2. From the left navigation pane, select Protection > Protection Policies.
   The Protection Policies window appears.
3. Click Add.
   The Add Policy window appears.
4. In the Type page, specify the new protection policy fields.
   1. In the Name field, specify a descriptive name for the protection policy.
      If you do not specify an existing storage unit and let PowerProtect Data Manager automatically create a storage unit, the name that you specify here becomes part of the storage unit name.
   2. In the Description field, specify a short description of the protection policy.
   3. In the Type field, select NAS.
   4. Click Next.
      The Purpose page appears.
5. In the Purpose page:
   1. Select Centralized Protection.
   2. Click Select Credentials.
      The Set Credentials dialog box opens.
   3. Select a credential from the drop-down list or add a NAS credential.

      PowerProtect Data Manager uses these credentials at the policy level for all shares unless otherwise specified at the asset level.

      The credentials provide snapshot creation and export permissions on the appliance, and read/write access to the NAS shares. Supply administrator-level credentials. For supported appliances, these credentials are specific to the discovered assets rather than the management console.

   4. Click Save.
   5. Click Next.
      The Assets page appears and displays any matching unprotected assets that have not been assigned to a protection policy.
6. Select the unprotected assets that you want to add to the backup for this protection policy.

   Within this page, you can filter by share name, protocol, and asset source to locate the required assets.

   To avoid duplicate backups, a yellow identifies NAS assets that are offered through multiple protocols. Select the entry with the preferred protocol.

   NOTE:For generic shares and PowerScale shares, the .snapshot folder is not backed up as it contains the manual snapshots, which increases shares size during the backup. For example, .snapshot in PowerScale and PowerStore, .ckpt_xxx in Unity, and ~snapshot for generic shares.
7. Click Next.
   The Objectives page appears.
8. On the Objectives page, select a policy-level Service Level Agreement (SLA) from the Set Policy Level SLA list, or select Add to open the Add Service Level Agreement wizard and create a policy-level SLA.
   The PowerProtect Data Manager Administrator Guide provides instructions.
9. Click Add under Primary Backup.
   The Add Primary Backup dialog box appears.
10. To schedule a synthetic-full backup of the protection policy, on the Schedules pane of the Add Primary Backup dialog box, specify the following fields:
    1. Backup every—Specify how often to create a synthetic-full backup. A synthetic-full backup uses only the changed data since the last backup to create a new full backup.
    2. Retain for—Specify the retention period for the backup.

       The retention period cannot be less than any associated replication frequency. If you set a shorter retention time this value automatically updates to match the replication frequency.

    3. Start and End—The activity window. Specify a time of day to start the synthetic-full backup, and a time of day after which backups cannot be started.
       NOTE:Any backups started before End occurs continue until completion.
11. To schedule a full backup of the protection policy, complete the following actions:
    1. Click Add backup.
       The backup type in the Create a field defaults to Full.
    2. In the backup every field, specify how often to create the backup.
    3. In the Repeat on field, specify the day on which the backup is to repeat.
    4. In the Retain for field, specify the retention period for the backup.
    5. In the Start and End fields, specify the time of day to start the backup and a time of day after which backups cannot be started.
12. Click Add Backup and repeat the procedure for creating full backups if you want to create additional backup copies at different intervals with different retention periods.
    Within this protection policy, when a full schedule conflicts with another full backup schedule, a message appears, indicating that there is a conflict. Schedule occurrences can conflict with each other when the activity windows are identical or occur entirely within the same time range. To avoid full schedule conflicts in a policy, edit the activity windows.

    If you proceed with conflicting schedules, the backup of the lower priority schedule will be skipped. Schedule priority is ranked according to the following criteria:

    • Full schedules have a higher priority than Synthetic Full schedules.
    • For schedules of the same backup type, the schedules that run less frequently have a higher priority than schedules that run more frequently.
    • For schedules with the same backup type and frequency, the schedule with the longest activity window has the higher priority. If the activity windows are also identical, only one of these schedules will run.

    NOTE:When a schedule conflict between full backups occurs, PowerProtect Data Manager runs the full backup with the longest retention period.
13. Specify the fields on the Target pane of the Add Primary Backup dialog:
    1. Storage Name—For the primary backup, select a destination from the list of existing DD systems. Alternatively, select Add to add a system and then complete the details in the Storage Target window.
       The Space field indicates the total amount of space, and the percentage of available space, on the storage system.
    2. Storage Unit—Select an existing storage unit from the list, or select New to let PowerProtect Data Manager automatically create a storage unit for this policy.
    3. Network Interface—Select a network interface from the list, if applicable.
    4. Retention Lock—Move the Retention Lock slider to the right to enable retention locking for these backups.

       The retention lock mode setting comes from the configuration of the selected storage unit. When you enable retention locking, the Retention Lock Mode field displays the corresponding storage unit setting.

       Setting a retention lock applies to the current backup copy only, and does not impact the retention lock setting for existing backup copies.

    5. SLA—Select an existing service level agreement that you want to apply to this schedule from the list, or select Add to create an SLA within the Add Service Level Agreement wizard.
       The PowerProtect Data Manager Administrator Guide provides instructions.
14. Click Save to save your changes and return to the Objectives page.

    The Objectives page updates to display the name and location of the target storage system under Primary Backup.

    After completing the objective, you can change any details by clicking Edit next to the objective.

15. Optionally, replicate the backups:
    NOTE:

    To enable replication, ensure that you add remote protection storage as the replication location. The PowerProtect Data Manager Administration and User Guide provides detailed instructions about adding remote protection storage.

    When creating multiple replicas for the same protection policy, it is recommended to select a different storage system for each copy. If you select a storage unit that is the target of another objective for the same policy, the UI issues a warning. The PowerProtect Data Manager Administration and User Guide provides information about replicating to shared protection storage to support PowerProtect Cyber Recovery. Verify the storage targets and the use case before you continue.

    When you create a replication objective, you can specify either scheduled replication or replication after backup completion, which is applicable to both centralized protection policies.

    NOTE:

    For replication after backup completion, it is recommended that you update the application agents to the latest version.

    Depending on the type of backup, the following versions are required to ensure that replication occurs immediately after the backups complete:

    • For self-service primary backups, update all application agents to PowerProtect Data Manager version 19.12 or later.
    • For centralized primary backups, update all application agents to PowerProtect Data Manager version 19.11 or later.

    If you want to replicate only specific backups, perform a manual replication of these backups in advance.

    For replicas of centralized backups, when you set retention periods for different backup types, any undefined types use the full backup retention period. For example, if you do not define a log backup in the primary objective, the log backup for the replication objective is also undefined. After you run a manual log backup, replicas of that log backup use the same retention period as the full backup.

    1. Click Replicate next to Primary Backup. An entry for Replicate is created to the right of the primary backup objective.
    2. Under Replicate, click Add.
       The Add Replication dialog appears, with information in the left pane for each schedule that has been added for the primary backup objective of this protection policy.

       NOTE:Backups for all of the listed schedules will be replicated. You cannot select individual schedules for replication.
    3. Select a storage target:
       • Storage Name—Select a destination from the list of protection storage. Or, select Add to add a protection storage system and complete the details in the Storage Target window.
       • Storage Unit—Select an existing storage unit on the protection storage system. Or, select New to automatically create a storage unit.
       • Network Interface—Select a network interface from the list, if applicable.

       • Retention Lock—Move the Retention Lock slider to the right to enable retention locking for these replicas.

         The retention lock mode setting comes from the configuration of the selected storage unit. When you enable retention locking, the Retention Lock Mode field displays the corresponding storage unit setting.

       • SLA—Select an existing replication service level agreement that you want to apply to this schedule from the list. Or, select Add to create a replication SLA within the Add Service Level Agreement wizard.

       The PowerProtect Data Manager Administration and User Guide provides more information about replication targets, such as SLAs.

    4. Select when to replicate the backups:

       NAS replication triggers provides more information.

       • To replicate after the backup finishes, move the Replicate immediately upon backup completion slider to on.

       • For scheduled replication, move the Replicate immediately upon backup completion slider to off, and then complete the schedule details in the Add Replication dialog.

         For replication of the primary backup, the schedule frequency can be every day, week, month, or x hours.

         For daily, weekly, and monthly schedules, the numeric value cannot be modified. For hourly, however, you can edit the numeric value. For example, if you set Create a Full backup every 4 hours, you can set a value of anywhere from 1 to 12 hours.

       By default, all replicas of the primary backup objective inherit the retention period from the Retain For value of the synthetic full and full backup schedules.

    5. To specify a different retention period for individual synthetic full and full replicas, clear Set the same retention time for all replicated copies, click Edit in the row of each schedule that you want to change, update the value in the Retain For field, and then click Save.
       CAUTION:Setting a shorter retention period for replicas of incremental, differential, or log backups than for the corresponding full backup may result in being unable to recover from those replicas.
    6. Click Save to save your changes and return to the Objectives page.
16. Click Next.
    The Options page appears.
17. Use the following options if required for the policy:

    Option	Description
    Enable indexing for file search and restore	Enables FLR. Enable the Search Engine before you activate this option.
    Continue backup on data access denied	Select this option to continue the backup process even if the data access is denied.
    Continue backup on ACL access denied	Select this option to continue the backup process even if the ACL access is denied.
    Continue policy backup when asset name character limit is exceeded	Select this option to continue the backup process even if the file or folder name length exceeds the limit of 255 bytes.
    Skip Files/Folders when name character limit is exceeded	Select this option to skip the backup process if the file or folder name length exceeds the limit of 255 bytes. NOTE:This option cannot be selected without selecting the Continue asset backup when file name character limit is exceeded option as the backup cannot be processed without it.
    Troubleshooting	Enables a higher debug logging level for extended troubleshooting.

18. Click Next.
    The Summary page appears.
19. Review the protection policy configuration details. You can click Edit next to any details to make changes. When you are done, click Finish.

    An informational message appears to confirm that PowerProtect Data Manager has saved the protection policy.

    When the new protection policy is created and assets are added to the protection policy, PowerProtect Data Manager performs backups according to the backup schedule.

20. Click OK to exit the window, or click Go to Jobs to open the Jobs window to monitor the configuration of the new protection policy.
    NOTE:For generic shares and PowerScale shares, the .snapshot folder is not backed up as it contains the manual snapshots, which increases shares size during the backup.