Deconfiguring Agents

Topics | How To | Support | Related Topics

Overview

Deconfiguration Sequence

Deconfiguring Instances

Deconfiguring Agents

Deconfiguring Clients

General Considerations

Audit Trail

Reinstalling Deconfigured Components

Overview

If you are unable to uninstall a component from the computer by using the recommended procedures, you can use the Deconfigure feature to clean up these components from the CommServe database. Deconfiguring a component releases the license associated with it, but the files and registry entries relevant to the component are not removed from its host computer. As such, data is still available for data recovery operations. This feature should not be used to briefly suspend use of a client, see Suspend Use of a Client Computer Temporarily for more information.

Deconfiguration Sequence

Deconfigure operations vary based on the targeted components.

To use the deconfigure option on a Client computer with multiple applications, all the Agents installed on the Client must first be deconfigured. Application-related Agents (Backup and Recovery Agents, Quick Recovery Agents, DataArchiver Agents, ContinuousDataReplicator, Enablers, etc.) must be deconfigured before the File System iDataAgent or SRM Agents can be deconfigured. The File System iDataAgent must then be deconfigured before the Client can be deconfigured.

For this reason, we recommend that you use the following sequence when deconfiguring a Client with multiple applications:

1. Application-related Agents (Backup and Recovery Agents, Quick Recovery Agents, DataArchiver Agents, ContinuousDataReplicator, Enablers, etc.)

2. File System iDataAgent/SRM Agents

3. Client

Deconfiguring Instances

When an Instance is deconfigured, the following will occur:

• Deconfiguration of instances is supported only for File Archiver for Windows Agent.
• Instances can be deconfigured for all Instance types: Local File System, FPolicy, Celerra, and Network File Share.
• The Instance will appear dimmed or greyed-out in the CommCell Browser. Functionality related to issuing an archive job will not be available. However, browse and restore operations are available.
• The related files and registry entries associated with the Instances will not be removed from the computer. For example, the subclients associated with the Instance will be hidden and can be re-displayed if the instance is reconfigured with the Reconfigure option.
• To permanently delete all data and job history, delete the Instance in the CommCell Console.
• The license is released if the Instance that is being deconfigured is the last instance to use that license. See License Requirement for information on licenses used by File Archiver for Windows. The license is re-enabled when a new Instance is created or if the Instance is reconfigured with the Reconfigure option.
• All Data Protection/Data Recovery job schedules (independent and those part of a schedule policy), which are related to the specific Agent, Client, or Instance will continued to be displayed in the Schedule Details dialog box after the Agent, Client, or Instance has been deconfigured. Restore jobs can be performed and scheduled restore operations are continued after the Agent, Client, or Instance has been deconfigured. However, the user will not be able to run or edit an archive schedule, or perform a Run Immediately operation on the schedule unless the Agent or Client is reinstalled or unless the Instance is reconfigured.

Instances are deconfigured at the Instance level. For step-by-step instructions, see Deconfigure an Instance.

Deconfiguring Agents

When an Agent is deconfigured, the following will occur:

• The Agent License will be recaptured, allowing it to be reused.
• Related files and registry entries associated with the Agent will not be removed from the computer.
• To permanently delete all data and job history, delete the Agent in the CommCell Console.
• For Backup and Recovery Agents, all backups associated with the Agents in the Client will be available for restore.
• For Quick Recovery Agents, QR volumes from previous data protection operations can be used for data recovery purposes.
• For Migration Archiver Agents, all archived data associated with the Agents in the Client will be available for recovery.
• For Compliance Archiver Agents, you will be able to retrieve all archived data associated with the Agents in the Client.

• All Data Protection/Data Recovery job schedules (independent and those part of a schedule policy) that are related to the specific Agent, Client, or Instance will continued to be displayed in the Schedule Details dialog box after the Agent, Client, or Instance has been deconfigured. Restore jobs can be performed and scheduled restore operations are continued after the Agent, Client, or Instance has been deconfigured. However, the user will not be able to run, edit, or perform a Run Immediately operation on the schedule unless the Agent or Client is reinstalled or unless the Instance is reconfigured.

Deconfiguring Clients

When a Client is deconfigured, the following will occur:

• All functionality associated with the Client will be unavailable.
• The related files and registry entries associated with the Client will not be removed from the computer.
• To permanently delete all data and job history, delete the Client in the CommCell Console.
• For NAS NDMP iDataAgents, which do not have a software install or uninstall procedure, deconfiguring the Client is the functional equivalent of uninstalling other Agents. Consider the following when deconfiguring one of these Clients:
  • After deconfiguring the client, the protected data is still available on the media for the length of time expressed in the Retention Time defined in the associated Storage Policy Copy. If desired, you can browse the backup data or perform data recovery operations from the client to another active client of the same type within the same CommCell. You cannot, however, restore the data to the original NAS File Server, because the Client is no longer present.
  • Once you have deconfigured the Client, the corresponding icon in the CommCell Browser will appear dimmed. While this icon exists, the Client can still perform data recovery operations. If you delete this icon, all of the Client’s data is irretrievably lost.

• All Data Protection/Data Recovery job schedules (independent and those part of a schedule policy) that are related to the specific Agent, Client, or Instance will continued to be displayed in the Schedule Details dialog box after the Agent, Client, or Instance has been deconfigured. Restore jobs can be performed and scheduled restore operations are continued after the Agent, Client, or Instance has been deconfigured. However, the user will not be able to run, edit, or perform a Run Immediately operation on the schedule unless the Agent or Client is reinstalled or unless the Instance is reconfigured.

• You have the option of hiding all the deconfigured clients. This is useful to manage and maintain a clear view of the structure of all active client computers in the CommCell Browser instead of viewing a mix of clients. See Hide Deconfigured Clients for a step-by-step procedure.

General Considerations

Consider the following before you deconfigure a component:

• Administrative Management capabilities cannot be used to perform the deconfigure operation from the level of the component that you are deconfiguring (e.g., if you are deconfiguring a Client, these capabilities cannot be used to perform the deconfigure operations from the Client level).

• If a Client crashes, and if you cannot remove the Client from the CommServe database, you can use the deconfigure feature to remove the Client. However, this does not uninstall the Client.

• When a user changes the storage policy association of a subclient, a subclient is deleted, or a client or an agent is deleted, only the retention days must be exceeded for data to be aged. In these cases, retention cycles are set to zero (0). However, when a client or an agent is deconfigured, the associated data will be aged according to the associated storage policy copy’s defined retention time and cycle rules. In this case, retention cycles are honored. If necessary, you can enable the Ignore Cycles Retention on De-Configured Clients option from the control panel’s Media Management Configuration (Service Configuration) dialog box so that the defined retention cycle rules are ignored for the data associated with deconfigured clients.

• All Data Protection/Data Recovery job schedules (independent and those part of a schedule policy) that are related to the specific Agent, Client, or Instance will continued to be displayed in the Schedule Details dialog box after the Agent, Client, or Instance has been deconfigured. Restore jobs can be performed and scheduled restore operations are continued after the Agent, Client, or Instance has been deconfigured. However, the user will not be able to run, edit, or perform a Run Immediately operation on the schedule unless the Agent or Client is reinstalled or unless the Instance is reconfigured.

• It is recommended that you deconfigure the magnetic libraries before uninstalling the MediaAgent. In a windows clustered environment, deconfigure the magnetic libraries on the virtual machine before uninstalling the MediaAgent.

• If an update cache has been configured on a client that is deconfigured or deleted from the CommCell, all clients associated with this update cache client will automatically receive their updates from the CommServe Update Cache. For more information, see What Happens When a Client Designated as an Update Cache is DeConfigured.

• Deconfigured clients can be Content Indexed and Searched, if backup operations were performed before the deconfiguration.

• If the CommServe software is upgraded to a new software release, any deconfigured clients from up to two prior releases will be automatically upgraded to the same software release. Thus, if a deconfigured client must be reinstalled, it will need to be reinstalled using the installation package for the same software release as the CommServe.

  In cases where the deconfigured client is three or more releases older than the current release, the DBUpgrade utility can be used to upgrade the deconfigured client to the current software release. (See Tools and Utilities for more information on this utility.) However, the software will only be upgraded if there are fewer than 50 deconfigured clients in the CommCell. If more than 50 clients in the CommCell are deconfigured, the deconfigured clients will not be upgraded.

• It is recommended, that you delete the replication set before deconfiguring the Workstation Backup Agent.

Audit Trail

Operations performed with this feature are recorded in the Audit Trail. See Audit Trail for more information.

Reinstalling Deconfigured Components

If you wish to reinstall a component that has been deconfigured, you must first uninstall the component software from the computer. See Uninstall Components for more information.

Once the deconfigured component has been uninstalled, you may then reinstall the component software as you would any other component. See Reinstalling Uninstalled Agents for more information.