Disaster Recovery with EonStor DS Series &VMware Site Recovery Manager Application Note Version: 1.0 Updated: July, 2015 Abstract: This application note provides information about Infortrend Storage Replication Adapters (SRA) for VMware Site Recovery Manager (SRM). It introduces key benefits and detail operations to assist readers better understand the key elements of planned migration and disaster recovery by adopting Infortrend array-based replication Copyright 2015 Infortrend Technology, Inc. All rights reserved. Infortrend, ESVA, EonStor, EonNAS, and EonPath are trademarks or registered trademarks of Infortrend. All other marks and names mentioned herein may be trademarks of their respective owners. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice. Content provided as is, without express or implied warranties of any kind.
Contents Contents... 2 Introduction... 3 What is VMware vcenter Site Recovery Manager?... 3 Why You Need SRM?... 4 Without SRM... 4 Scenario 1: Replicated Data Validation... 4 Scenario 2: After a Disaster... 5 With SRM and DS Remote Replication... 5 Scenario 1: Replicated Data Validation... 5 Scenario 2: After a Disaster... 6 Why You Need DS Remote Replication in SRM... 6 How EonStor DS Remote Replication Integrates with VMware SRM... 7 Workflows between SRM and EonStor DS... 13 Test Recovery Plan... 13 Cleanup after Testing a Recovery Plan... 14 One-Click Recovery... 14 Reprotecting Virtual Machines After a Recovery... 15 Features and Benefits of EonStor DS series Replication Adapter for VMware... 16 Easy Set-up and Management... 17 Enterprise reliability... 17 Requirements for SRM and SRA... 18 Best Practice and Recommendations on SRM... 19 Conclusion... 19 Copyright 2015 Infortrend Technology, Inc. All rights reserved. Page 2 / 19
Introduction With rapid development of enterprise businesses, the reliability and availability of the IT based systems have become more important than ever. Data lost and services going offline caused by natural disaster or human error is always a nightmare for IT administrators. Therefore, disaster recovery (DR) plan has become indispensable in order to ensure uninterrupted seamless flow of business operation. However, like any excellent recovery plan in the virtual environment, it may require manual steps that are lengthy, costly and complicated for IT staffs. In order to meet Recovery Time Objective (RTO) and Recovery Point Objective (RPO) requirement of various businesses, Infortrend EonStor DS series delivers proven storage replication adapters (SRA) that is thoroughly integrated with VMware Site Recovery Manager (SRM) and Infortrend Remote Replication. This translates to simplified and automated key elements of disaster recovery. It includes setting up disaster recovery plans, testing, executing planned or unplanned failover, reversing replication and failback. By integrating with VMware SRM to execute disaster recovery plan, EonStor DS is the ideal solution to meet these business needs, and more. What is VMware vcenter Site Recovery Manager? One of the most complicate procedures of a Disaster Recovery (DR) Failover in a VMware environment is the process of setting up inventory, register, reconfigure and power up VMs at the DR site, and VMware Site Recovery Manager is an ideal solution that simplifies and automates disaster recovery. SRM is an easy-to-use graphical user interface (GUI) application to manage virtual machines in datacenter and set recovery plan and policy in advance. For example, before planned or unexpected events occur, the user can define each VMs into High, Medium or Low priority groups and determine the recovery procedure running user-defined scripts and start sequence of individual VMs in advance. When planned migration or unexpected disaster occurs, the system administrator can easily initiate the recovery plan running via VMware vsphere Web Client with a single bottom. SRM enables integration with array-based replication, as well as the use of a native VMware vsphere-based replication. SRM, a plug-in for vcenter on both the primary (or protected) site and the recovery site, enables separate VMware environment to communicate and negotiate with each other. In array-based replication, VMware SRM perfectly coordinates with EonStor DS Remote Replication technology via Infortrend Storage Replication Adapter (SRA). Remote replication capability allows users to create full data copies of virtual machines across storage system, in synchronous or asynchronous mode. Copyright 2015 Infortrend Technology, Inc. All rights reserved. Infortrend, ESVA, EonStor, EonNAS, and EonPath are trademarks or registered trademarks of Infortrend. All other marks and names mentioned herein may be trademarks of their respective owners. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice. Content provided as is, without express or implied warranties of any kind.
Why You Need SRM? Without SRM Figure: SRM and EonStor DS Configuration Scenario 1: Replicated Data Validation It needs complicated procedure to validate replicated data Execute Remote Replication from Protected site to Recovery site Create Snapshot for Target Volume Map the snapshot to host Copyright 2015 Infortrend Technology, Inc. All rights reserved. Page 4 / 19
Boot the host to check data validity check data validity Scenario 2: After a Disaster It needs complicated procedures to resume services via multiple interfaces Based on previous procedure of remote replication and map target volumes to ESXi Host via Infortrend GUI Manually boot each virtual machine to resume service in vcenter With SRM and DS Remote Replication Scenario 1: Replicated Data Validation Make operations simple Only need to set remote replication pairs via SANWatch in advance Copyright 2015 Infortrend Technology, Inc. All rights reserved. Page 5 / 19
Click on the Test button and SRM automatically checks data validity Scenario 2: After a Disaster Make operations simple Based on previous procedure of remote replication, only via SRM GUI Click on the Recovery button and SRM automatically to launches the recovery process Why You Need DS Remote Replication in SRM Less performance impact by adopting storage computing power Within the same data center or non-cross WAN environment, EonStor DS could execute Synchronous replication for business-critical service to meet toughest Recovery Point Objective Support a wide range versions of vsphere Copyright 2015 Infortrend Technology, Inc. All rights reserved. Page 6 / 19
Table: Comparisons in SRM Between vsphere-based Replication and Array-based Replication How EonStor DS Remote Replication Integrates with VMware SRM SRM and Storage Replication Adapter (SRA) should be installed both at the protected and recovery site. Once SRA has been installed, the user should easily discover Infortrend SRA in Array Managers of SRM and execute additional configurations for the local array at the protected site and peer arrays at the recovery site. Step 1 Before SRM and SRA installation, you have to set up Replication Pair via SANWatch Copyright 2015 Infortrend Technology, Inc. All rights reserved. Page 7 / 19
Figure: Set up Replication Pair via SANWatch Step 2 Storage Replication Adapters 5.5/ 5.8 Installation 1. Download Infortrend SRA from VMware or Infortrend Customer Support System VMware website: https://my.vmware.com/web/vmware/details?productid=357&downloadgroup=srm_sra Infortrend Customer Support System: http://support.infortrend.com/ 2. Install SRA on the server which installed with vcenter Server and SRM Figure: SRA installation screen shot Copyright 2015 Infortrend Technology, Inc. All rights reserved. Page 8 / 19
Please refer to VMware website and Infortrend User Manuel for more information VMware official document: https://pubs.vmware.com/srm-55/topic/com.vmware.icbase/pdf/srm-install-config-5-5.pdf Step 3 To setup DR, click on Site Recovery via vsphere Client and configure Site Recovery Manager including build connection, map resource, assigned datastores and adding an Array Manager. Figure: Procedure of Site Recovery Manager configuration Copyright 2015 Infortrend Technology, Inc. All rights reserved. Page 9 / 19
Step 4 After establishing a basic connection between primary and remote sites, the user should discover Infortrend SRA in Array Managers. Users may configure Local and Peer array IP addresses. Figure: Discover Infortrend SRA, configure Local and Peer array IP addresses Copyright 2015 Infortrend Technology, Inc. All rights reserved. Infortrend, ESVA, EonStor, EonNAS, and EonPath are trademarks or registered trademarks of Infortrend. All other marks and names mentioned herein may be trademarks of their respective owners. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice. Content provided as is, without express or implied warranties of any kind.
Step 5 Once both sites and Array Managers are configured, the user can create a protection Group and select targeted partition(s) to protect. Figure: Protection Groups Configuration Copyright 2015 Infortrend Technology, Inc. All rights reserved. Infortrend, ESVA, EonStor, EonNAS, and EonPath are trademarks or registered trademarks of Infortrend. All other marks and names mentioned herein may be trademarks of their respective owners. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice. Content provided as is, without express or implied warranties of any kind.
Step 6 Finally, the user can set up a recovery plan based on requirement. The SRA allows for lots of interaction workflows between SRM server and EonStor DS series storage, including Test, Cleanup, Recovery, and Reprotect. Figure: Start to build recovery plans In addition, the user can define the priority for each virtual machine. Site Recovery Manager sets all virtual machines in a new recovery plan to recovery priority level 3 by default. The user can adjust the recovery priority of a virtual machine. If a planned migration or a disaster occurs, Site Recovery Manager will start virtual machines on the recovery site based on the priority. Site Recovery Manager starts priority 1 virtual machines first, then priority 2 virtual machines second, and so on. Figure: Define priority for each virtual machine Copyright 2015 Infortrend Technology, Inc. All rights reserved. Infortrend, ESVA, EonStor, EonNAS, and EonPath are trademarks or registered trademarks of Infortrend. All other marks and names mentioned herein may be trademarks of their respective owners. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice. Content provided as is, without express or implied warranties of any kind.
Workflows between SRM and EonStor DS Test Recovery Plan When you test a recovery plan, Site Recovery Manager will execute the recovery plan to go through all the steps in the plan, including test network, execute remote mirror of replicated data at the recovery site, and make sure the synchronizing data is available and writeable at recovery site.the most improtant thing is that Site Recovery Manager does not disrupt the current operations at the protected site. That is, it will skip the steps in the plan to shutdown all virtual machines in protected site and force devices at the recovery site to assume ownership. Figure: Testing the recovery plan Notes: Before the test is starting you will get a warning to be sure you know what you are doing Also you have the possibility here to select a checkbox to synchronize the datastores Copyright 2015 Infortrend Technology, Inc. All rights reserved. Page 13 / 19
Figure: Test Confirmation Cleanup after Testing a Recovery Plan After testing a recovery plan, running a cleanup operation will make SRA remove the test environment and return the recovery plan back to Ready state Figure: Cleanup after testing One-Click Recovery There are two failover possibilities that may occur and would require SRM and SRA to act. One is planned downtime, such as upgrades of operating systems/ applications and hardware maintenance. In this instance, we would ask SRA to shut down the VMs, unmounts the datastores at protected site, executes datastores replication from source to target storage, and restart the services on the recovery site. Another is unplanned downtime when an unexpected event occurs. In Copyright 2015 Infortrend Technology, Inc. All rights reserved. Page 14 / 19
this scenario, minimizing the impact is the key. Once virtual machines are offline at the protected site, copies of these virtual machines at the recovery site based on the last storage replication from protected sites could be powered up to resume the services. By using one-click botton, both scenarios will be automatically covered by the implement the pre-defined procedure to migrate or recover the protected data. Figure: One-Click to execute planned migration or disaster recovery For example, site A is the protected site and site B is the recovery site. If site A goes offline because of disaster, by using one click of Disaster Recovery, Site Recovery Manager will resume the services at site B based on the last storage replication. Figure: Scenario of disaster recovery Reprotecting Virtual Machines After a Recovery When site A comes back online, you can execute a reprotect operation to protect the virtual machines on site B. That is, Site B becomes the protected site, and site A becomes the recovery site. Site Recovery Manager and SRA reverses the direction of replication from site B to site A. Copyright 2015 Infortrend Technology, Inc. All rights reserved. Page 15 / 19
Figure: Reprotect after planned migration or disaster recovery Figure: How it works in reprotect Features and Benefits of EonStor DS series Replication Adapter for VMware As mentioned before, SRM manages the failover from protected site to recovery site and EonStor DS Storage Replication Adapter plays an important role to enable communication between SRM and EonStor DS series scheduled Remote replications. The main benefits of EonStor DS series SRA can be summarized as: Copyright 2015 Infortrend Technology, Inc. All rights reserved. Page 16 / 19
Easy Set-up and Management In array-based replication, SRA must be installed on the Site Recovery Manager Server hosts both at protected and recovery sites. EonStor DS series SRA is easy to install and deploy in just minutes via set-up wizard. Therefore, the user can efficiently set-up basic SRM infrastructure in virtual environment. After SRA installation, configuration of required SRM parameters and database settings, SRM can be fully integrated with EonStor DS remote features and datastores. Infortrend provides synchronous and asynchronous remote replication to ensure the user s critical service data remains usable by backing up to another storage system at the recovery site. Based on the user-defined recovery plan and pre-define boot sequences, it is time-saving, simple to manage and implement automated Disaster Recovery. Enterprise reliability Figure: screenshot of SRA installation SRM uses EonStor DS SRA to provide the ability to fully test user-defined DR test plan by executing a failover in an isolated environment. When the user tests a recovery plan, Site Recovery Manager runs the recovery plan on a test network and a temporary snapshot of replicated data at the recovery site. It is a straightforward method to verify the procedure of recovery plan and make sure the backup data is tested. In addition, both failover and failback are support in EonStor DS series products and SRA. Failover occurs when the recovery site takes over operation in place of the protected site after planned migration or unexpected disaster, and failback is the opposite of failover, returning IT operations to the previous production site. EonStor DS series products and SRA support both failover and failback and make the IT operation more reliable and flexible. Copyright 2015 Infortrend Technology, Inc. All rights reserved. Page 17 / 19
Requirements for SRM and SRA Requirements for EonStor DS series: Remote Replication License both in protected site and recovery site Recommended systems with firmware 5.13D01 or later VMware vcenter SRM requirements VMware vcenter Site Recovery Manager 5.5 or 5.8 license SRA (on the server installed with vcenter Server and SRM) VMware tools for Guest OS virtual machine vcenter and SRM support Windows Platform only Windows Server 2003 is not a supported platform for SRM Server but the SRM installer allows you to install SRM on Windows Server 2003 VMware vcenter SRM and Compatibility Matrixes including vsphere Editions, ESX/ESXi Server requirement, Support Database software, Host Operating System compatibility, etc. Please refer to Compatibility Matrixes for vcenter Site Recovery Manager 5.5 https://www.vmware.com/support/srm/srm-compat-matrix-5-5.html Compatibility Matrixes for vcenter Site Recovery Manager 5.8 https://www.vmware.com/support/srm/srm-compat-matrix-5-8.html Copyright 2015 Infortrend Technology, Inc. All rights reserved. Infortrend, ESVA, EonStor, EonNAS, and EonPath are trademarks or registered trademarks of Infortrend. All other marks and names mentioned herein may be trademarks of their respective owners. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice. Content provided as is, without express or implied warranties of any kind.
Best Practice and Recommendations on SRM 1. Prepare an organized recovery plan in advance i. Define the backup schedule to meet RTO and RPO requirements ii. Test the recovery plan to make sure its usable iii. Define the importance of each virtual machine and assign each VMs into High, Medium or Low priority groups and determine the start sequence of individual VMs in advance. 2. SRA only supports replication between identical hardware models 3. Within the same data center or non-cross WAN environment, EonStor DS could execute Synchronous replication for business-critical service 4. The user may choose asynchronous mode to allow the mirroring to occur during off-peak hours in order to have effective bandwidth utilization and also helps to reduce costs 5. To ensure successful remote replication in array-based scenario, users are advised to reserve extra space in the storage system at recovery sites 6. For more information about Infortrend Remote Replication, please refer to SANWatch Configurations for Remote Replication on EonStor DS www.infortrend.com/imageloader/loaddoc/189 EonStor DS remote replication feature guide www.infortrend.com/imageloader/loaddoc/598 Conclusion The integration of VMware with Infortrend EonStor DS series storage delivers lots of benefits that significantly reduce the complexity and workload in a virtual environment. SRM and SRA enable integration with Infortrend s array-based replication engines running on VMware vcenter with better disaster recovery capabilities. When virtual machines at one site shut down, copies of these virtual machines at the other site start up and assume the same operation and services. Therefore, the integration of VMware with Infortrend EonStor DS series storage is the ideal solution to ensure business continuity. Copyright 2015 Infortrend Technology, Inc. All rights reserved. Infortrend, ESVA, EonStor, EonNAS, and EonPath are trademarks or registered trademarks of Infortrend. All other marks and names mentioned herein may be trademarks of their respective owners. The information contained herein is subject to change without notice. Content provided as is, without express or implied warranties of any kind.