Generic Enablers

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Overview

• Quick Recovery Agent and Generic Enablers
• Recovery Director and Generic Enabler

Supported Platforms

Configuration

• AIX Considerations

License Requirements

Overview

The Generic Enabler feature, which is included with the Quick Recovery Agent and can thus be used with Recovery Director, allows you to create custom snapshot enabler scripts that tap into the capabilities of third-party hardware snapshot engines and the Unix File System Snapshot feature. Three basic scripts -- snap, unsnap, and recovery -- are needed to implement this capability on a supported platform. Standard templates are provided. The scripts do the following:

• initialize the hardware snapshot (clone)
• manage the Business Continuance Volume (BCV) pair for data protection operations
• handle mounting and unmounting of volumes.

The scripts provide performance and flexibility. A snapshot can be deleted by calling the hardware unsnap script and removing the CommServe database entry. The recovery script provides a way to accomplish recovery on the hardware level, providing greater speed and avoiding LAN congestion.

Generic Enablers do not support multiple snaps of the same source volume for any snap engine (e.g., SnapView) that requires its own unique identifier to be referenced in both its create snap and its delete snap scripts.

Quick Recovery Agent and Generic Enablers

When the Copyback feature is used with a Generic Enabler and the Quick Recovery Agent, it is not necessary to flip the mount point or drive letter. Copyback unmounts both source and destination volumes (if they are mounted) and then re-mounts them when the copyback process is completed.

Recovery Director and Generic Enabler

If the QR Policy selected for a Snapshot Volume Units (SVU) is associated with a Generic snapshot, the hardware snap (clone) is used to manage the snapshot as both a QR volume and a BCV that can be backed up to the tape using the Image Level ProxyHost, or ProxyHost iDataAgent. Recovery Director coordinates the hardware snap (i.e., the QR copy) and the backup job, so that the same version of data will be both replicated and backed up. For examples of using Generic Enabler with Recovery Director in specific environments, see Create a Generic Enabler.

Supported Platforms

Generic Enablers can be created for devices that run on any platform supported by the Quick Recovery Agent, including:

• Windows
• AIX
• HP-UX
• Linux
• Solaris

For details on specific platform versions supported, see Quick Recovery Agent System Requirements.

AIX Considerations

When using a Generic Enabler with the Quick Recovery Agent on AIX, note that AIX's Journal File System requires that you specify a separate log volume when mounting a disk. It is recommended that you create an external log volume in the Volume Configuration dialog box as follows:

1. Click the Mount Points tab.
2. Click the Add button.
3. Select Specify Mount Point Option in the Add Mount Point dialog box.
4. In the Specify Mount Point Option space, type the mount option command and specify the log's volume name (e.g.: mount -o log=logvolumename).
5. Click OK.

If you do not do this beforehand, and the file system mount information is removed from /etc/filesystems, then you must specify the log device as explained in the previous procedures in order for the file system to be mounted.

Configuration

To configure a Generic Enabler script for use with the Quick Recovery Agent:

1. Create three Generic Enabler scripts based on template scripts for your hardware provider. For a remote scenario, you need scripts for snap, unsnap, and copyback. For a local scenario, use a recovery script rather than a copyback script. (See Hitachi ShadowImage and HP EVA for sample scripts.)
2. Create a QR Policy. Select Generic snapshot as the Snapshot Engine Type.
3. Create a subclient.
4. Associate the subclient created in the previous step with the QR Policy created in step 2.
5. Configure the subclient for using Generic Enabler scripts in the Generic Snap Scripts tab of the Subclient Properties window. Specify the pathnames for the snap, unsnap, and recovery (or copyback) scripts, and select the host for the scripts.

License Requirements

No separate license is needed for the Generic Enabler feature when you purchase a Quick Recovery Agent license. The Generic Enabler feature and template scripts for five hardware providers are included with the Quick Recovery Agent.

Review general license requirements described in License Administration.

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