Snapshot Management Workflows

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Overview

How to Create a Snapshot Management Workflow

Best Practices

Overview

A Snapshot Management Workflow defines all of the details of how, when, and in what sequence the Snapshot Volume Units are acted upon, and shares similarities with the concept of a Schedule Policy, and defines all of the operations to be performed, such as QR Copy, backups, and unmounting or deleting of snapshots (hardware snapshots only.) When a new Snapshot Management Workflow is created, it is named and associated with an already created Snapshot Volume Unit.

How to Create a Snapshot Management Workflow

The following section provides a high-level view of the steps for creating a SnapShot Management Workflow.

Create a Workflow using the Workflow Configuration Wizard:

1. Create custom Application Types, if the Workflow will use applications not supported directly by the QR Agent.
2. Create scripts for the Generic Enabler, if the Workflow will use hardware snapshots not already integrated with the QR Agent.
3. Create the Storage Policies that the iDataAgents in the Workflow will use.
4. Use the Workflow Configuration Wizard to do the following:
   • Create a Snapshot Volume Unit (SVU).
   • Create a QR Policy.
   • Create a Workflow.
   • Create a Schedule for the Workflow. This is required if you want to Create a QR Volume with Incremental Updates.

Create a Workflow manually:

1. Create custom Application Types, if the Workflow will use applications not supported directly by the QR Agent.
2. Create scripts for the Generic Enabler, if the Workflow will use hardware snapshots not already integrated with the QR Agent.
3. Create the QR Policies that the Workflow will use.
4. Create the Storage Policies that the iDataAgents in the Workflow will use.
5. Create Snapshot Volume Units (SVU) to be used by the Workflow.
6. Create a Snapshot Management Workflow.
7. Create a Snapshot Management Workflow Schedule. This is required if you want to Create a QR Volume with Incremental Updates.

Create Multiple Workflows using the same Snapshot Volume Unit

You can point multiple Workflows to the same SVU, allowing you to create different Workflows scheduled at different times depending on the frequency and type of job you would like to run. Thus you can, for example:

1. Create an SVU with QR, ProxyHost, and Image Level ProxyHost associated to it.
2. Create Workflow1, and select QR and ProxyHost operations.
3. Create Workflow2, and select QR and Image Level ProxyHost operations.
4. Create Workflow3, and select QR operations.
5. Schedule each Workflow independently, and associate each to the SVU created in Step 1.

For multiple Workflows pointing to the same SVU, you must create the Workflows manually; this cannot be done using the Wizard. All of the jobs in a Workflow for a given SVU must complete before any jobs in another Workflow pointing to the same SVU can start. Thus, if a job in one of the Workflows goes into pending state, and it is time for the next Workflow to be run, it will not do so until all the jobs in the previous Workflow complete successfully.

Best Practices

Consider the following when creating a SnapShot Management Workflow:

• VSS Hardware snapshot must be marked Transportable, or they cannot be imported.
• When using VSS as the snap engine to create Hardware snapshots and you have selected a ProxyHost backup to run after the QR snapshot job, the snapshot is automatically imported. Select the Delete operation in the Workflow so that the snapshot will be deleted at the end of the workflow.
• When using EMC SnapView as the snap engine to create Hardware snapshots and you have selected a ProxyHost or Image Level ProxyHost backup to run after the QR snapshot job, the snapshot is automatically activated. Select the Delete operation in the Workflow so that the snapshot will be deleted at the end of the workflow.
• All Data Recovery operations are performed from the Agent or the iDataAgent level. Refer to one of the following:
  • Recover QR Volumes
  • Restore Data - Image Level ProxyHost
  • Restore Data - Proxyhost

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