Data on PowerScale clusters can be replicated using Dell PowerScale SyncIQ. SyncIQ delivers fast replication of millions of files and terabytes of data over the WAN and LAN. SyncIQ also enables replication jobs to be parallelized and evenly distributed across all sending and receiving nodes in the PowerScale clusters. You can use SyncIQ to replicate SmartLock-protected or normal data for business continuity, disaster recovery, disk-to-disk backup, and restore functions.
SyncIQ replicates the data asynchronously from the primary PowerScale cluster to one or more clusters, and it creates multiple copies of data. You can use the copy if there is a failure on the primary PowerScale cluster. The process of activating a secondary copy for read/write purposes is called a failover. A failover is performed when the primary PowerScale cluster becomes unavailable or is taken down for maintenance. When the original primary cluster is back online, SyncIQ can establish a reverse sync. If required, the original primary can be made the read/write copy. This process is called a failback.
Table 5 describes the compatibility of SyncIQ between different types of SmartLock directories on the source and target of SyncIQ.
Table 5. SmartLock and SyncIQ source-to-target compatibility
Non-WORM | Non-WORM | Yes | Yes |
Enterprise SmartLock | Yes | Yes, unless files are committed to a WORM state on the target cluster. However, retention is not enforced. |
Compliance SmartLock | No | No |
Enterprise SmartLock | Non-WORM | Yes, replication type is allowed, but retention is not enforced. | Yes, but files do not have WORM status. |
Enterprise SmartLock | Yes | Yes, any newly committed WORM files are included. |
Compliance SmartLock | No | No |
Compliance SmartLock | Non-WORM | No | No |
Enterprise SmartLock | No | No |
Compliance SmartLock | Yes | Yes, any newly committed WORM files are included. |
For SmartLock and SyncIQ integration, considerations and best practices include:
- Configure with Network Time Protocol (NTP) peer mode on the source and target cluster so that all node clocks are synchronized for the SyncIQ and SmartLock environment.
- Use the same OneFS version and patches on both the source and target cluster. Starting with OneFS 8.2.0, SmartLock uses a new structure.
- If you are replicating a SmartLock directory to another SmartLock directory, you must create the target SmartLock directory before running the replication policy.
- SmartLock Compliance mode clusters do not support the SyncIQ preshared key (PSK).
- SmartLock Enterprise mode clusters do support the SyncIQ PSK.
- Create a separate SyncIQ policy for each SmartLock directory.
- Ensure that the source and target directories of the replication policy are root paths of SmartLock compliance directories of the source and target cluster.
- If you replicate SmartLock directories to another PowerScale cluster with SyncIQ, the WORM state of files is replicated. However, SmartLock directory configuration settings are not transferred to the target directory.
- Files that are committed on the source but have not been sent are not committed on the target and might be in an inconsistent state.
- A SyncIQ job cannot synchronize to a target SmartLock domain that has the autocommit, min retention, default retention, or max retention settings set on the target cluster in the initial synchronization. Before the initial synchronization, you must clear those WORM settings for the target SmartLock domain on the target cluster. We recommend clearing those WORM settings for the target SmartLock domain on the target cluster, even though you can set those WORM settings for the target SmartLock domain on the target cluster for incremental synchronization. Consider the case that the retention date of a WORM file has expired, and the WORM file is deleted on the target cluster after SyncIQ failover. However, the retention date of a WORM file is not expired on the source cluster. During SyncIQ failback, SyncIQ overwrites committed files as necessary in WORM domains to ensure that the source and target datasets are synchronized.
- Set the same WORM settings for the target SmartLock domain on the target cluster as the source SmartLock domain after failover. Also, clear the WORM settings for the source SmartLock domain on the source cluster.
- Reset the WORM settings for the source SmartLock domain on the source cluster after failback. Also, clear the WORM settings for the target SmartLock domain on the target cluster.
- Ensure all metadata related to the retention date and commit status persists on the target.