Home > Data Protection > PowerProtect Data Manager > White Papers > Dell PowerProtect Data Manager: Data Protection for Dell PowerStore Storage Arrays > Application-consistent Backup and Recovery
Starting with Data Manager version 19.17, Data Manager supports application-consistent backup for MEDITECH and target generic applications. Multiple dependent volumes are grouped in Asset Groups and integrated with application-specific pre-backup and post-backup scripts to achieve application-consistent workflows.
Figure 15 shows the high-level workflow to perform an application-consistent backup with Data Manager:
Data Manager uses a file system agent on the application host to perform quiesce and un-quiesce operations on the application. Download the file system agent from the Data Manager UI > System Settings > Downloads section, as shown in Figure 16.
Note: It is mandatory to enable “Allow centralized scripting” as part of agent installation.
Add and upload scripts from the Data Manager UI. To add the script, navigate to the Protection > Scripts section in the Data Manager UI.
Click Add to open the Add script configuration page. Figure 18 shows the sample pre- and post-scripts added to Data Manager.
After enabling and adding pre-scripts and post-scripts, using Data Manager UI you can create an asset group to associate scripts with one or more block volume assets.
You can select an Application Type as Generic for any application that requires or provides quiescing/unquiescing functionality to enable application-consistent snapshot creation, or MEDITECH for a MEDITECH application. For more details about MEDITECH application-consistent protection, see the technical whitepaper - Protecting MEDITECH data with Dell PowerProtect Data Manager.
For application-consistent backup, all dependent assets (volumes and volume groups) are members of an asset group with scripts enabled. All assets to be protected as part of the application need to be added to the same Asset Group. When the asset group is created, the asset group can be added to the protection policy to perform the application-consistent backup.
To create an Asset Group, navigate to Infrastructure > Assets and select PowerStore Block. Select the Group View icon as shown in Figure 19. Click Add to create an Asset Group.
Enter the name for the asset group and select the application type as Generic or MEDITECH according to your requirements.
You can select and add all the assets to include in this Asset Group.
In the Pre/Post-Script section, select the application host and Operating System (OS) user credentials. Select the pre- and post-scripts created for performing application-consistent backups of the application, as shown in Figure 22.
Script Timeout – The maximum amount of time Data Manager waits for the pre-script to complete.
Quiescing Timeout – The maximum amount of time the application can remain quiesced. This time represents the maximum snapshot creation time for all assets (both volumes and volume groups) in the Asset Group. If the quiescing timeout exceeds the specified timeout value, the backup is automatically cancelled, and the post-script is executed to unquiesce the application. The default timeout value is 10 seconds, but this is configurable.
If the post-script fails, Data Manager generates a critical alert to inform the user to execute the unquiesce operation manually.
In the Script Parameters section, enter the values for the pre-and post-script parameters. The Parameter values must be the same for the Pre-script and Post-script sections.
Figure 23 shows the successful creation of an Asset Group.
Block volume protection policies with script-enabled asset groups help achieve application-consistent backup of the application on PowerStore block volumes.
Enter the name of the policy and select the type PowerStore Block.
Add the asset group to the policy, as shown in Figure 25.
To perform a manual backup, select the policy and click Protect Now, as shown in Figure 26.
Figure 27 shows the successful application-consistent backup for the application on PowerStore block volumes.
When the backup is successful, view the application-consistent backup copies from the Restore > Assets section in the Data Manager UI as shown in Figure 28.
When data in PowerStore volumes or volume groups is backed up as part of an application-consistent protection policy in Data Manager, you can restore the backups by using the centralized restore functionality in the Data Manager UI.
To restore all the volumes/volume groups from an asset group, switch to group view and select the checkbox next to an asset group. Click Restore to restore the most recent copy of the volume or volume group.
When data in volumes or volume groups is backed up as part of the PowerStore block protection policy in Data Manager, you can use the centralized restore functionality in the Data Manager UI to restore the backups.
You can restore the application-consistent backups to the original location or an alternate location.
For more details about application-consistent protection for PowerStore block volume data using Data Manager, see the PowerProtect Data Manager - Storage Array User Guide.