Tag: VDRO

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Veeam Disaster Recovery Orchestrator – Creating the plan

We have arrived at the latest article on Veeam Disaster Recovery Orchestrator version 5.

In this last part, we will concentrate on the efforts made previously and available on this site, to implement the Disaster Recovery Orchestration plan.

After logging in, the dashboard illustrates the status of the completed plans (image 1).

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Note that, unlike the previous VDrO version, it is possible to filter planes based on “scopes” (image 2).

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A second and very useful novelty of version 5 is the presence of the inventory items (image 3), where the VM Groups are reported.

This option immediately verifies that in the chosen “scope” there is the group of VMs that will implement the DR plan.

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Image 4 shows the details of the Orchestration plans already created.

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Let’s see now how to create a plan:

From the manage, menu selects the New item (image 5).

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And continuing with the wizard, we enter a name (image 6), the scope (image 7), and the type of floor (image 8).

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After adding the VM group to be orchestrated (image 9, 10 and 11)

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It is possible to customize the Recovery options, (for example whether to process the VMs in parallel or sequential mode) (image 12).

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Now I add the steps necessary for the realization of the plan (in the example the shutdown of the production VM was added as the first activity of the plan) (see images 13, 14, 15, and 16).

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The wizard ends with:

  • The option to backup the VMs that were started during the DR plan (image 17)
  • The RTPO values that must be respected for the plan to be executed (image 18)
  • The choice of the language of the template to be used (image 19)
  • The time at which the reports will be automatically generated (image 20)
  • Whether to immediately create the readiness report (which verifies all components of the plan) (image 21)

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Now you can test and start your orchestration plans later

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Veeam Disaster Recovery Orchestrator v.5: Components verification

This article explains how to configure the Veeam Disaster Recovery Orchestrator (VDrO) administration menu.

Before proceeding to the administration phase, it is essential to have already labeled the resources that will have to be part of the Disaster Recovery plans.

The classification was illustrated in the previous article, available by clicking on the following link: VDrO – VOne – Tagging .

Note 1 : To access the administration menu, select the item called “Administration” (see image 1)

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The configuration of the administration menu is divided into three main areas:

In the first, the following are set:

  • The name of the VDrO Server and the contact name (image 2).
  • connections to Veeam Backup & Replication Servers (VBR) (image 3)
  • connections to vCenters (image 4)
  • the optional connection to the storage (image 5) (refer to this article to find out the details)

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The second area identifies the resources to be added to the DR plans through tagging:

  • The recovery location (image 6)
  • In the recovery location the datastores where the VM filesystems will reside (image 7)
  • Network mapping (image 8)
  • IP address remapping (image 9)

Note 2: The operations described above are possible if and only if all necessary resources have been tagged.

Note 3: Automatic remapping of IP addresses when starting a DR plan is only available for Windows VMs.

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In the third area are identified:

  • User profiling. In simple terms, the VDrO allows you to create users capable of administering only specific workloads which are called “scopes” (image 10).
  • The assignment of the DataLabs to the “scopes”. Remember that the DataLabs allow you to verify that the DR plan is usable (image 11).

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The last configuration allows you to link the group of VMs replicated or saved via backup (called VM Groups) to the users’ scopes.

For example, image 12 shows that the VM Group “B&R Job – Replication VAO Win 10” is assigned (included) to both the Admin and Linux scopes.

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In the next and last article, we will find out how to create and verify a DR plan.

See you soon

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Veeam Disaster Recovery Orchestrator v.5 – First Check

On November 23, 2021, the new version of the Veeam Disaster Recovery Orchestrator was released.

The list of new features introduced in version 5 is available by clicking here.

Today we will deal with the phase immediately following installation; specifically, the configuration and commissioning phase.

After logging in (it is mandatory that the user has already joined the Domain – Image 1 and 2)

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The wizard allows you to add and define:

  1. The Name of the Orchestrator Server (Image 3)
  2. The admin account or group of accounts (image 4, 5 and 6)
  3. The Backup Servers that will communicate with the Orchestrator Server through a specific agent (image 6, 7 and 8)
  4. The vCenters that will be commanded to start the Disaster Recovery plans (Image 10)

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In the next article, I’m going to illustrate the steps to create a Disaster Recovery Plan with this new version of the Veeam Disaster Recovery Orchestratrion

See you Soon!

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VDrO v.4 – Run a DR plan

This is the last article about how to integrate the Continuous Data Protection (CDP)  technology (available from VBR v.11) and VDrO v.4 (former VAO).

In this part, we are going to see what happens when an orchestration plan is launched.

Yes, I wrote the word “see” because I created a short video showing the tasks that are automatically completed when a Disaster Recovery is occurring.

If you need more details about how to set up the environment, please read the previous articles.

Let me know if videos and youtube platform are a good way to expose technological valuable topics.

Thx for reading and watching and take care

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VDrO v.4 – Setup a Plan from CDP Replica

In this article, I’m going to show you how to set up an orchestration plan using as a source a CDP replica Job.

This article will not cover how to create and run a CDP replica job from VBR console. If you need a guide please refer to the official guide.

There are four main parts:

  1. Create a Business Category
  2. Setup the Environment
  3. Create an Orchestration Plan
  4. Launch the Orchestration Plan

The first and the second topics will be described in this article. The third and the fourth ones in the next articles.

A. To create a business category for CDP replica, just open the Veeam ONE interface from the VAO server (picture 1).

In this example, the business category is called Ubuntu-CDP , the resource group is called CDP-Linux (Picture 2).

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B. After opening the VAO web interface it’s necessary to follow the next four steps.

1. Add a Role and Scope (picture 3).

In my example, the scope is named Linux-CDP.

The plan Author/Operator is VBR.

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2. Add or modify the Recovery Location (picture 4).

In my example, the recovery location is Verderio and has the Cluster-Verderio as Compute resource (Picture 5).

Pictures 6 and 7 show how to remap the Networking and how to set up the changing IP address rules.

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Note1: The Re-IP feature is available just for Windows VMs (please have a look at the official documentation to get all detail (user guide). For Linux VMs it’s necessary creating a custom script.

3. Reporting

Pictures 8, 9, and 10 show how to assign the Linux-CDP scope to your custom reports.

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4. Assign the plan Components

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Picture 12 shows how to add the VM group called Ubuntu-CDP to the scope Linux-CDP.

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Picture 13 shows how to add a recovery location, i.e. Verderio.

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Picture 14 shows how to add the plan steps to the orchestration plan (In my example I included all the plan steps).

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The next article shows how to create an Orchestration Plan and run it.

Suggestion: If you can’t wait and want to do it immediately, just read the previous articles 🙂

See you soon and take care.

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VDrO-Baseline 1

August’s 2022 topic is VDrO (former VAO)

This topic needs an awfully long time to be rightly covered. For this reason, I wrote 5 articles.

The first two will explain the base concepts in front of technology. The others will cover how to set up VDrO for managing the Veeam Replica job, the Veeam Backup job, and the Netapp Storage Replica.

Here below all the direct links to the topic:

Baseline-2 – VBR-Replicas – Veeam Backup – Netapp integration

In these articles, I will not manage how to install VDO software; please refer to the deployment guide (VDrO Guides).

  1. VDrO – Baseline-1:

One of the common requirements of big companies is to automatically manage Disaster Recovery.

Let’s see the decisional process of the IT Manager

These are the VDrO answers.

Let’s move to the VDrO console:

The first steps after logging in (picture 1) is to click on the administrator tab (Yellow on picture 2) and check the license file installed (picture  3)

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https://lnx.gable.it/wp-content/uploads/2020/07/VAO-login.jpgPicture 3

Now I’m going to describe the structure of the software components.

VDrO Server:  it shows where the VDrO Server has been installed (Picture 4)

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The VDrO architecture is well-represented in picture 5 where three production sites replicate their data to a DR site.

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Is it important to fill up the VDrO Server form? Yes, because VDrO creates automatically the DR- Plan documentation.

In my lab, I have just a production site and a  DR site.

VDrO AGENTS: to control the activities of the Backup Server located in production sites, VDrO installs his own agent. The installation task is performed directly from the VDrO console (Picture 6).

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vCENTER SERVERS: in my scenario, there are two vCenters; the first one in production and the second in DR site (Picture 7).

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STORAGE SYSTEM: the most important VDrO news is the integration with storage replication technology. This version supports just Netapp. Picture 8 shows how to add the Storages to VDrO.

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The last VDrO article will deal with how to set up and use this great technology.

RECOVERY LOCATION: it’s the place where the DR will be performed (Picture 9). It can be different locations in respect to where VDrO is installed.

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In the next rows and pictures, I’ll show which info VDrO needs to work at its best.

In particular, I’m talking about the resources present in the recovery location. In this example the computer resources (Picture 10) and storage resources (picture 11).

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The next 10 rows are very important to fix in mind.

How the VDrO can understand which resources are available? In other words, how can I assign resources to my Failover Plan?

The answer is VDrO uses massively tagging to all resources present at the VMware level.

Tagging means that resources can be added to VDRO

But …. is it possible to tag the resources?

Yes, It’s possible because inside VDrO there is the Veeam ONE Business-View component that can be freely used to tag resources.

To have more details about tagging please refer to the VDrO-guide.

One of the most common requests from the customers is to create automatic documentation about failover for both testing and procedures.

VDrO has already templates (in different languages that you can personalize at will) that are automatically filled up from software when you test or perform the Disaster Recovery.

In the next two pictures, it is shown how to set up an e-mail subscription (Picture 12) and configure the report Detail level (Picture 13).

Just remember to subscribe to the report to the right scope.

(Picture 12)

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The next option is the reason why I fell in love with VDrO (Picture 14).

(Picture 14)

As you can see there is a big choice with DR plan steps. What does it mean?

Let’s see it with an easy example:

My DR plan requires switching on the Domain Controller (VM1) and afterward the SQL Application (VM2).

I want also to be sure that

a. the original VMs are switched off before starting the DR plan

b.  when DR-plan is up and running, the SQL application has to answer port 1433.

What the VDrO can do for you?

With the pre-plan step, you can check the original VMs are switched off.

With a post-plan, you can check that the application answers correctly.

Another great point about plan steps is that you can choose if the actions have to be executed or skipped. In this way, it adds more flexibility to the solution.

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It’s time to have a break. My next Article (VDrO – Baseline 2) will show scopes and plan components.