vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud vSphere Replication 6.0 This document supports the version of each product listed and supports all subsequent versions until the document is replaced by a new edition. To check for more recent editions of this document, see http://www.vmware.com/support/pubs.
vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud You can find the most up-to-date technical documentation on the VMware Web site at: http://www.vmware.com/support/ The VMware Web site also provides the latest product updates. If you have comments about this documentation, submit your feedback to: docfeedback@vmware.com Copyright © 2015 VMware, Inc. All rights reserved. Copyright and trademark information. VMware, Inc. 3401 Hillview Ave. Palo Alto, CA 94304 www.vmware.com 2 VMware, Inc.
Contents 1 About Disaster Recovery to Cloud 5 Updated Information 7 2 Disaster Recovery to Cloud System Requirements and Compatibility 9 Roles and Permissions that Disaster Recovery to Cloud Requires 9 3 Installing and Configuring vSphere Replication to Cloud 11 Installing vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud 11 Upgrading vSphere Replication from Earlier Product Versions 12 Configure NTP Synchronisation in Your Environment 12 How vSphere Replication Connects to Cloud 12 Configuring the Co
vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud 4 VMware, Inc.
About Disaster Recovery to Cloud 1 ® You can subscribe to the VMware vCloud Air™ Disaster Recovery service to protect your vSphere workloads. vCloud Air Disaster Recovery lets administrators of small sites to protect their vSphere virtual workloads from a wide class of disasters by replicating those workloads into the cloud.
vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud 6 VMware, Inc.
Updated Information This vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud is updated with each release of the product or when necessary. This table provides the update history of the vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud. Revision Description EN-001621-01 n n EN-001621-00 VMware, Inc. Corrected information on supported vCenter Server versions in Chapter 2, “Disaster Recovery to Cloud System Requirements and Compatibility,” on page 9.
vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud 8 VMware, Inc.
Disaster Recovery to Cloud System Requirements and Compatibility 2 To enable replications to the cloud, your environment must meet certain requirements in terms of additional configuration and specific versions of the VMware products that you use. System Requirements Disaster Recovery to Cloud has the same requirements to the environment as vSphere Replication. In addition, Disaster Recovery to Cloud requires that ports 10000 to 10010 of ESXi hosts are open for outgoing traffic .
vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud vCloud User Credentials When you create a connection to the target virtual data center, you provide two pairs of credentials. Connection Credentials Used for authenticating within the cloud organization, these credentials initiate a user session with your cloud provider. The privileges for your user account are managed by your cloud provider. n com.vmware.hcs.{com.vmware.hcs}:ManageRight n com.vmware.hcs.{com.vmware.hcs}:ViewRight n Organization.
Installing and Configuring vSphere Replication to Cloud 3 Before you configure replications to the cloud, you must deploy the vSphere Replication appliance on the source site and set up your environment to enable connections to the cloud.
vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud Upgrading vSphere Replication from Earlier Product Versions You can upgrade vSphere Replication 5.5.x and 5.8 to vSphere Replication 6.0.
Chapter 3 Installing and Configuring vSphere Replication to Cloud connected in the vCenter Server. If an administrator removes the VIB from a host, for example by using the esxcli utility, the vSphere Replication appliance reinstalls the VIB the next time you restart the appliance or when a host is restarted or reconnected to the inventory.
vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud n Verify that you know the IP address of the vSphere Replication appliance in your environment. To check the IP address of the vSphere Replication appliance, select the vCenter Server in the inventory tree, navigate to the Manage tab, click vSphere Replication, and click About. n Verify that you have root user credentials for the vSphere Replication appliance.
Chapter 3 Installing and Configuring vSphere Replication to Cloud 2 On the Connection settings page, type the address of your cloud provider, the organization name, and credentials to authenticate with the cloud. By default, vSphere Replication uses these credentials to establish a user session to the cloud and for system monitoring purposes.
vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud Procedure 1 On the vSphere Replication tab under Manage, click the target network settings icon . If your user session to the cloud has expired, the Configure Target Networks wizard prompts you to type your credentials. 2 From the drop-down menus, select a recovery network and a test network and click Next. The drop-down menus display only the networks that are configured for vCloud Air.
Chapter 3 Installing and Configuring vSphere Replication to Cloud Table 3‑2. Cloud Connection States Icon VMware, Inc. Status Description Remediation Connected The connection between the source site and the target site is working properly. Not needed. Not authenticated The remote site is online, but your user session to the cloud has expired. In this state, you need to provide credentials to manage replication tasks. Already configured replications are running in the background.
vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud Table 3‑2. Cloud Connection States (Continued) Icon Status Description Remediation Missing network settings You have not selected the networks to use for recovery and test recovery operations on the target site. In this state, when you start the configure replication wizard, you are prompted to configure the networks on the target site first. Configure the network settings.
Chapter 3 Installing and Configuring vSphere Replication to Cloud The connection state changes to Connected. VMware, Inc.
vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud 20 VMware, Inc.
Replicating Virtual Machines to Cloud 4 You can configure replications from vSphere environments to cloud for a single virtual machine or for multiple virtual machines. To replicate virtual machines to cloud, you must deploy the vSphere Replication 5.8 appliance at the source site, and your cloud provider must enable replications to the cloud in your cloud organization. The source and target sites must be connected so that you can configure replications.
vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud Every time that a virtual machine reaches its RPO target, vSphere Replication records approximately 3800 bytes of data in the vCenter Server events database. If you set a low RPO period, this can quickly create a large volume of data in the database. To reduce the volume of data that is kept in the vCenter Server events database, limit the number of days that vCenter Server retains event data.
Chapter 4 Replicating Virtual Machines to Cloud 5 6 On the Target location page, select where to store replication data. Option Procedure Use storage policy From the drop-down menu, select the storage policy for replication placement and click Next. Use replication seeds a Click Next to navigate to the list of available seed vApps on the target site. b Select a seed vApp from the list and click Next.
vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud What to do next On the vSphere Replication tab under Monitor, you can check the state of each replication. See “Monitoring the Status of Replication Tasks,” on page 39. You can click a replication task in the list and use the tabs at the bottom of the vSphere Web Client to view details about the replication, the recovery status, and the latest performed test, if test results are not cleared yet.
Chapter 4 Replicating Virtual Machines to Cloud 4 Right-click the virtual machines and select All vSphere Replication Actions > Configure Replication. The Configure Replication wizard opens and vSphere Replication validates the virtual machines that can be configured for replication. 5 Verify the validation results and click Next. 6 Select Replicate to a cloud provider and click Next. 7 Select the target site to which you want to replicate the virtual machine.
vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud The number of replication instances that vSphere Replication keeps depends on the configured retention policy, and requires that the RPO period is short enough for these instances to be created.
Chapter 4 Replicating Virtual Machines to Cloud n Clone a virtual machine: A virtual machine in the org virtual data center can be cloned to create a seed vApp. vSphere Replication calculates checksum and exchanges the different blocks from the replication source to the seed vApp. n Copy over the network: A source virtual machine can be copied to the cloud organization by using means other than vSphere Replication to copy the initial source data to the target site.
vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud 28 VMware, Inc.
Reconfiguring Replications to the Cloud 5 You can reconfigure cloud replications to change the quiescing method for the guest operating system, the RPO, the network compression, and the retention of point in time instances. Reconfigure a Replication to Cloud You reconfigure a replication to change the RPO settings, the number of replication instances to keep, or the quiescing method that is applied when synchronizing the replication source virtual machine to your cloud organization.
vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud 30 VMware, Inc.
Recovering Virtual Machines to Cloud 6 You can check if virtual machines are properly replicated in the cloud, and migrate replicated virtual machines to your cloud organization. This chapter includes the following topics: n “Test Recovery to Cloud,” on page 31 n “Planned Migration to Cloud,” on page 33 Test Recovery to Cloud Test recoveries allow you to verify that source data is replicated correctly on the target site.
vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud Test recoveries are allowed for the following replication statuses: OK, OK (RPO Violation), Error, Error (RPO Violation), Full Sync, Full Sync (RPO Violation), Not Active, Not Active (RPO Violation), Paused, Sync, and Sync (RPO Violation). NOTE By default, the Test Status column is not visible in the list of outgoing replications . To view the column, right-click the table header, select Show/Hide Columns, select the Test Status check box, and click OK.
Chapter 6 Recovering Virtual Machines to Cloud 3 If the test status is other than Test recovery has not been run or has been cleaned up from the target site, click the Run test cleanup icon 4 . Click Yes. Planned Migration to Cloud Planned migration is an action that is available for replications to cloud. Planned migrations allow you to move your workloads from vCenter Server to your cloud organization. When you run a planned migration operation, the replication source virtual machine is powered off.
vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud What to do next To continue replicating the source virtual machine to the target site, stop the replication task that is in Recovered state and configure a new replication. 34 VMware, Inc.
Configuring Replications from Cloud 7 You can replicate a virtual machine from your vCloud Air environment to a vCenter Server if the virtual machine was recovered in the cloud. You select whether to configure a new replication from cloud or a reverse replication from cloud depending on the condition of your local environment.
vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud Configure a Replication From Cloud You can use vSphere Replication to configure a replication from cloud to your local site. If your local site was recovered from a major breakdown and you need to restore it, or you cannot configure a reverse replication, you can configure a new replication from cloud to synchronize data from cloud to your local site. NOTE You can configure a replication from cloud for only one virtual machine in a vApp.
Chapter 7 Configuring Replications from Cloud 9 (Optional) On the Replication options page, select the quiescing method for the guest operating system of the source virtual machine. NOTE Quiescing options are available only for virtual machines that support quiescing. vSphere Replication does not support VSS quiescing on Virtual Volumes. 10 (Optional) Select Network Compression.
vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud Configure a Reverse Replication from Cloud You can use vSphere Replication to reverse a recovered outgoing replication and start copying data from the cloud to your local site.
8 Monitoring and Managing Replication Tasks Outgoing replications are listed on the vSphere Replication tab under Monitor. You can monitor the state of replications to the cloud, control their running state, or stop them if you no longer need them.
vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud Table 8‑1. Replication Statuses (Continued) Status Description Possible Cause Error The replication is not running at the moment. n n Status (RPO violation) For replication status OK, Sync, or Full Sync, the replication is running, but the RPO that is set for the replication is not met and is violated. For replication status Not Active or Error, the replication is not running, and the RPO that is set for the replication is violated.
Chapter 8 Monitoring and Managing Replication Tasks If the target site is offline, you can force stop the replication task from the source site. When you force stop a replication, you remove the replication task only from the source site. The data on the target site remains intact. When the target site becomes available, you must delete the replication artifacts from the target site manually or contact your cloud provider.
vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud Prerequisites Verify that you have enough privileges to manage replications in the vSphere Web Client. See “Roles and Permissions that Disaster Recovery to Cloud Requires,” on page 9. Procedure 1 Use the vSphere Web Client to connect to your local site. 2 Navigate to the vSphere Replication tab under Monitor, and click Incoming Replications. 3 Right-click a replication and select Stop.
Troubleshooting vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud 9 Known troubleshooting information can help you diagnose and correct problems that occur while using vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud. vSphere Replication UI is Missing After a vCenter Server Upgrade After you upgrade the vCenter Server that contains the vSphere Replication 5.8 virtual appliance, the vSphere Replication user interface is no longer visible in the vSphere Web Client.
vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud 44 VMware, Inc.
Index A forced stop 40, 41 about disaster recovery 5 automatic copying 16 I B batch replications 24 C changing the RPO 29 changing the quiescing method 29 cloud, configuring replications 35 cloud pairing 14 cloud permissions 9 cloud replications configuring 36 from cloud 35 multiple VMs 24 reverse 35 reversing 38 single VM 21 troubleshooting 43 cloud connections 14 compatibility 9 configuration mirroring 16 configuring connections 14 connection issue 16 connection status connection issue 16 missing ne
vSphere Replication for Disaster Recovery to Cloud Q U quiescing 29 updated information 7 upgrading vSphere Replication 12 user roles 9 user session, authenticating 18 R reconfiguring replications 29 reconnecting to cloud 18 recovery network 15 recovery point objective 21 recovery to the cloud 31 replication seeds 21, 26 replication status 39 replications from cloud 35 management 39 monitoring 39 pausing 40 resuming 40 stopping 40, 41 to cloud 21 replications from cloud deleting 41 stopping 41 vApps 36
