Virtual TapeServer 6.03.42 Operations and Administration Guide

Introduction | 3
Overview of features
The following VTS features enable you to simplify and streamline tape operations, reduce
costs for storage, automate backup and restore operations, and increase flexibility in
managing backed-up data:
• Flexible and extendable, enabling you to create any number of virtual tape pools that
“contain” any number of virtual tapes
• Compatibility with Backup, Restore, and TMF
• Compatibility with Mediacom and DSM/TC
• Support for backup management applications (BMAs), including IBM Tivoli Storage
Manager, Symantec Veritas NetBackup, Syncsort Backup Express, and EMC Legato
Networker
The heart of VTS is a middleware tape emulation engine that enables VTS to emulate tape
storage to host servers and provides backup storage for the data on industry standard, low-
cost disk arrays. Data stored in VTS can later be copied to real tape media for archival storage
or disaster recovery if long-term backup copies are required. The advantages of this approach
include the following:
• Access to data in VTS is almost immediate, and there is no tape to mount or rewind and
no searching through tape volumes for data files.
• If additional tape storage is needed, you can create virtual tapes using the VTS web
interface without involving the host server. Tapes exported by VTS are identical to those
made by the application directly and can be read on any NonStop server, including sites
without VTS.
• VTS allows multiple hosts to perform up to 16 simultaneous backups per VTS server.
Overview of the VTS web interface
VTS is managed through a standard web browser interface. Links on the navigation pane on
the left side of the page enable you to navigate through VTS functions. The View
Configurations, Manage Connections, Supervisor Functions, and Factory Setup links provide
setup and management options. The System Status page provides operation status
information, most of which is also available on the Virtual Media - Operation page.