Vizioncore VRanger (Previously ESXRanger) Quiescing & VSS Recommended Settings:
I have been always hit by customers who have a problem taking an image backup of virtual machines that run a database application. Another repeated question is “when & when not to use Quiescing & VSS with VCB & vRanger”. For that I have decided to write this set of posts hoping to answer these questions. The answer will have the instruction of how to do this as step by step for Vizioncore vRanger, which is a great & easy backup software for VMware, but the explanation apply for any other image level backup software used with VMware, though you will have to adapt the instructions to the backup tool of your choice.
vRanger provides support for Quiescing the virtual machine before it start to backup that VM. The purpose of Quiescing is to ensure that no file system writes are pending when the snapshot is taken, allowing for file system level consistency. Although Quiescing has always been proved to be a great method to backup normal virtual machines, it seems to cause issues for virtual machines which is running a database. Example of virtual machines with database & where it’s recommended to disable Quiescing is MS SQL Server, MS Exchange, Active Directory, and so on.
For VMs which run a database, it’s highly recommended to stop Quiescing. Though not Quiescing a virtual machine before backing it up you will end up with a crash-consistent image (Restoring a crash-consistent image is essentially the equivalent of rebooting a server after a hard shutdown.). Although most applications & operating systems today can sustain a sudden shutdown, most enterprises will not accept to take that risk for critical servers. As database servers are mostly critical servers, then a crash-consistent images might not be the desired solution. For that case, vRanger offer VSS (Volume Shadow Copy Services) which can get you a transactionally consistent backup image. For you to benefit from this feature, the application you are backing up has to support Microsoft VSS. Example of applications which support VSS are MS SQL Server, MS Exchange, & Active Directory.
The message of this document:
1- Virtual Machines which does not run any database, you are recommended to enable Quiescing. As running Quiescing before the backup will give you a file system level consistent image, which is a lot better than a crash-consistent image.
2- Virtual Machines running a database tend to face issues when Quiescing happen, so it’s recommended to disable Quiescing on database servers. If the database application being used support Microsoft VSS (Active Directory, MS SQL Server, MS Exchange, & So on) , then its recommended to enable VSS which will provide you with a transactionally consistent backup image.
From above you will figure out that the way you handle your vRanger backup setting is depend on the server being backed up is a database server, or a non database server. For that, the instruction is introduced as how to handle it for non database server, then how to handle it for database server and titled as below:
1- Vizioncore vRanger (Previously ESXRanger) Quiescing & VSS Setting for non-database Virtual Machines
2- Vizioncore vRanger (Previously ESXRanger) Quiescing & VSS Setting for database Virtual Machines
April 21st, 2009 at 10:19 am
[...] Vizioncore VRanger (Previously ESXRanger) Quiescing & VSS Recommended Settings [...]
April 21st, 2009 at 6:05 pm
Much better Double-Take to have a hot consistency backup with DBs. No need to stop Quiescing.
April 22nd, 2009 at 6:33 am
I appreciate your contribution Leo, but it seems you had missed the point of the article. If you are taking backup with vRanger over lan then Quiescing is diabled by default and you really have to do nothing with vRanger to establish a crash-conistent database backup in that matter. Double take is actually offering the same of vRanger over LAN backup & more than likely they have Quiescing disabled by default which give you a crash-consistent image backup. I am not sure if Double Take is offering VSS integration as vRanger are offering for database machines which give you a transactionally consistent backup image which is a lot better than a crash-consistent image.
In addition, although its a good idea to disable Quiescing for database server to avoid problems, it would be better to consider enabling it for VMs which does not run databases to get a better consistency. I am sure double take had implemented away to enable & disable that as needed & might even automanted that.
Though this get more relevant when you interact with VCB. As vRanger offer the ability to backup VM images using VCB which provide you with a LAN-free backup, then you will have to interact with the VMware filesystem sync driver. Though as Double Take does not offer VCB integration & LAN-Free backup this part of the article is irrelevant. Although of the extra work required to integrate vRanger with VCB, it get to be a nice feature with an enterprise environment with a large amount of data.
Furthermore, the problem with Quiescing is not vRanger problem, but a “filesystem sync driver” problem which is a part of the VMware tools. Please note understanding when to use Quiescing & VSS as explained in the article is very important when backing up Virtual Machines using any backup solution. As the problem does not always occur & the backup software will not alert you to any problem when you backup, the problem only will be detected when trying to restore. In the database restore case, you might end up restoring a consistent file, but inconsistent database. I hope that help a bit clearing it up.